Topic: Is 3rd-party support on handhelds important?

[tendoboy1984]

Everyone talks about 3rd-party support on home consoles, but I rarely see anyone complaining about it on handhelds. The 3DS doesn't get much support from the big publishers like EA, Rockstar, Activision, Ubisoft, etc., yet the system does very well on its own. Is this proof that 3rd-party support doesn't matter on handhelds?

[Shaymin]

Because the 3DS is so dominant in Japan, a combination of indies and Japanese 3rd parties is able to provide the diversity of lineup that Nintendo can't/doesn't want to.

[Adrock]

Third party support on 3DS is pretty strong even without much of a Western presence. The nature of gaming in Japan heavily favors portable gaming devices like 3DS which is why Japanese third parties flock to it. There's less competition and it's also easier and cheaper to develop for than home consoles. There's enough support for 3DS that the absence of certain publishers doesn't noticeably hurt it.

[Ian Sane]

Can you even name five good Western handheld games in videogame history?  Western handheld games are typically **** because Western publishers consider handhelds to be mere dumping grounds for shovelware.  So no one cares if the Western third party support is poor on a handheld.  If anything, the 3DS is better off without that junk cluttering up the store shelves.  But Japanese devs have always treated handhelds more seriously and this has just increased as the Japanese market has moved more to handhelds.  The 3DS DOES have good third party support because it has strong support from the devs that are actually worth a damn on a handheld.  Frankly I see no drop-off in support throughout Nintendo's entire handheld line.  If anything, it's better as the original Game Boy didn't have that many third party gems.

When I think back to when Nintendo did have good third party support on consoles the appeal was that a game not made by Sega was announced and you just assumed it would be on the Nintendo console and 90% of the time you were right (now I make the opposite assumption).  The 3DS is like that.  If a third party game is announced for a handheld I just assume it will be on the 3DS and most of the time I'm right.  It doesn't get everything but the misses are infrequent enough that it isn't a problem.

Of course multiplatform support isn't a thing with handhelds.  It isn't like there are three handhelds and games keep getting made for all of them BUT the 3DS.  Handheld support is more like the older days of consoles where exclusives were common.

[Adrock]

Western handheld games are typically **** because Western publishers consider handhelds to be mere dumping grounds for shovelware.

That's not really it at all. It has everything to do with how different the culture is. We see this all the time. There's a reason things like Streetpass work so much better in Japan than pretty much everywhere else.

Frankly I see no drop-off in support throughout Nintendo's entire handheld line.

It's not from a lack of trying. PSP got some pretty serious support from Japanese publishers. It was like they wanted to loosen Nintendo's grip on the market. The perfect storm of old favorites like Pokemon plus all the Touch Generation stuff like Brain Age put an end to that fairly quickly. The rampant piracy on PSP didn't help things either. Nintendo has done a better job of adapting in the handheld space, as they should. They were able to take away Monster Hunter, arguably Sony's biggest asset in the handheld market.

[NWR_insanolord]

The only reason Monster Hunter was on the PSP and not the DS is the DS couldn't run it. It would've gotten a port if it had been possible. The support Nintendo handhelds get is the main reason to believe it's possible for Nintendo to regain significant support on consoles, because it would seem to prove that the lack of console support isn't just because publishers don't like Nintendo.

[Adrock]

Capcom could have made Monster Hunter DS if they wanted to. It probably would have suffered from the same problems as Phantasy Star 0, but they could have done it and it probably would have sold well. The PSP ports required same downgrading. It just seemed like third parties really wanted PSP to succeed. Nintendo just has the market cornered. They get it and they've been smart enough to evolve with a rapidly changing gaming culture. I think that's the main reason they're been able to stay on top.

Despite the success of Monster Hunter on PSP, Capcom went out of their way to say the series wouldn't appear on Vita (which isn't entirely true because Monster Hunter Frontier G was eventually announced and 3DS is the only thing not getting it). Capcom could port Monster Hunter 4 to Vita, but it's almost not even worth it. In Japan, you either have 3DS or you want one.

It's going to take a lot of work to get third party support back to a respectable level on the home console end. Nintendo really has to start now while development on their next home console is in their early stages. It's never too early to ask for thoughts and suggestions. Nintendo admitted to listening to feedback they received from third parties. Keep doing things like that. The only problem is that third parties are probably going to start with parity with Sony and Microsoft which has its problems. Nintendo handled the Swapnote situation really poorly so something like a Share button or Twitch support doesn't seem up their alley. The key is finding a fair middle ground, but Nintendo absolutely has to give up some ground if they ever want decent third party support on their home consoles again.

[Hey Einstein!]

Can you even name five good Western handheld games in videogame history? 

Such Hyperbole!
The Vita has some great Western developed games:


Wipeout 2084
Super Stardust Delta
OMG Z on PSP/Vita and Velocity on PSP/Vita are both great games
Both of Drinkbox studios games are essential in my view
Uncharted is pretty decent
I haven't played Tear Away yet but it's supposed to be good too.
That's 8 not including ports or cross buy games.


Back on Nintendo platforms: I'm not a fan of Wayforward or Renegade kid's games but a lot of people love them. They have each done over 5 high rated games.


Have I just been trolled?

[NWR_insanolord]

Have I just been trolled?

It's Ian, so yes.

For the record, my favorite DS game, Henry Hatsworth, was made by the guys who made Madden. And I'm on the record as being a huge fan of Renegade Kid's Mutant Mudds. There are certainly good handheld games from western developers; there are fewer of them, but mostly because there aren't as many western-developed handheld games to begin with.

[tendoboy1984]

Everyone complains about the lack of 3rd-party support on Nintendo's home consoles, but their handhelds sell just fine without major 3rd-party games. Why is 3rd-party support more important for home consoles than handhelds? Why the double standard?

[Oblivion]

Here's what I don't understand about Tendoboy...

Why can't he ask these questions in the appropriate thread? I view this as spamming and should be moved to the right thread.

[Khushrenada]

I'm pleasantly surprised. When I saw the title for this thread, I thought the original post was going to be a much, much longer. Hi-yoooooooo!

[Adrock]

Is this really happening?

There is no double standard. Third party support is important on any platform. The problem is that you're comparing different markets. There is historically less third party support on handhelds, but Nintendo gets the majority of key releases. If you're a handheld gamer, it's hard to complain about the output.

[tendoboy1984]

But why does Nintendo need 3rd-party support on their home consoles to stay relevant, but their handhelds do just fine without it?

[Adrock]

You can't be this daft.

As previously stated, Nintendo's handhelds aren't without third party support; they get most of the important ones. To achieve such high level of success in the handheld market, Nintendo needs third party support and they have third party support. Handhelds don't need all the same types of games as consoles. In fact, as Sony has shown, that's pretty much the opposite of what handheld owners want. Handhelds need their own types of games, namely those that take advantage of being portable and quick experiences. Nintendo AND third parties are making those kinds of games on 3DS.

[ShyGuy]

Consoles have different expectations.

[Pixelated Pixies]

I think the answer lies in the fact that dedicated handhelds are much more popular in Japan than in the west. The 3DS has actually been served pretty well by Japanese developers, while western developers seem to have shifted their focus towards the smartphone market.

Japanese developers traditionally have been very capable when it comes to creating meaty handheld games with lots of content, but have struggled somewhat with the demands of asset creation in the last console generation. As a result western third party developers, many of whom greatly expanded their teams and outsourced much of the work of asset creation, seem to have come to prominence on the consoles (at least in American and Europe), while Japanese developers have remained crucial to the dedicated handheld market (which is pretty much the 3DS at this point).

When people bemoan the lack of third party support on Wii U, they're referring to the fact that neither region is really supporting the system. Anyone who complains about the 3DS lacking third party support is probably referring specifically to western developers.

[smallsharkbigbite]

TIE ratio is typically quite a bit lower on handheld than console.  So in Japan, where handhelds are more popular, they may button down and play Monster Hunter for 100's of hours versus focusing on other available software.  In the US, it's likely that handhelds are viewed more as travel companions and the expectation is that a couple of quality titles a year are sufficient, vs. a console where the expectation is that you need a steady stream of games. 

[leahsdad]

Can you even name five good Western handheld games in videogame history? 

Such Hyperbole!
The Vita has some great Western developed games:


Wipeout 2084
Super Stardust Delta
OMG Z on PSP/Vita and Velocity on PSP/Vita are both great games
Both of Drinkbox studios games are essential in my view
Uncharted is pretty decent
I haven't played Tear Away yet but it's supposed to be good too.
That's 8 not including ports or cross buy games.

Have I just been trolled?

Maybe.  Uh, but dude, no offense, but by the 5th item on your list, you've already gone from "great" to "pretty decent."

But I think Pixelated Pixies perfectly illustrates why there's very little western development on the 3DS.  There are some exceptions, but they are exceptions that pretty much prove the rule.  Wayforward.   Renegade Kid.  These are experienced developers who [#1] Don't make and don't aim to make Flappy Bird money and [#2] are doing things in game development that no other western game developers can do or want to do.