Topic: Report Suggests Wii Development Lagging Behind

[NWR_DrewMG]

iPhone development is on the rise as Nintendo fights for developer attention.
 http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/newsArt.cfm?artid=21123

 In the past year, only 30 percent of console developers have been actively working on Wii games, down from 42 percent in 2008, according to a recent survey conducted by Game Developer Research.    

The survey consisted of 55 questions, and was submitted to 814 developers via Game Developer Magazine, Gamasutra, and the Game Developer's Conference.  The results were compiled into a 100-page report that featured many statistics about game developers, including the following:    

• Of all game developers, more than 70 percent were working on a PC, Mac, or Browser based game.  41 percent reported working on a console game.
 
• 69 percent of console developers were working on an Xbox 360 game, compared to 61 percent on Playstation 3 and 40 percent on Wii.
 
• 25 percent of developers were working on games for mobile platforms.
 
• Of the mobile developers, almost 75 percent were working on games for iPhone OS.  Less than half of this percentage was working on either a Nintendo DS or Sony PSP game.
 
• Developers working for smaller teams of 50 employees or fewer grew by 7 percent in the past year.  Likewise, the number of developers working for large teams of 500 or more fell by 2 percent.
 

   

According to the survey, "ease of development" and "market penetration" were the leading factors in choosing which platform to develop for, along with the skill sets of their team, the ability to easily port to multiple platforms, and the cost of development materials.    

The full report is available for purchase from Game Developer Research for $2495.  More data from the survey will be revealed in the next issue of Game Developers Magazine.

[Ian Sane]

I hope Nintendo is aware of this and recognizes it as a problem.  When you're the market leading console and third party support is DROPPING there is something wrong and it's foolish to think you can continue to find success in the next generation if no games are being made.

The Wii has obviously been very successful for Nintendo.  But they said that part of the reason why the used such inferior hardware was to keep development costs down and that that would be a benefit to developers.  While they have kept their own costs down this attempt to lure third parties (if it ever even was an attempt, I think Nintendo was only thinking of cutting costs for themselves) has utterly and completely failed.  If you're losing third party support as the market leader then your plans for attracting third party support failed.  So next gen, if Nintendo doesn't want this to be a problem, they have to do something different.  And this IS their problem.  No one will buy a Wii 2 if Nintendo is the only company making games for it.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Why not? according to most, Nintendo games are all people buy on a Nintendo platform anyway, so why would no games from 3rd parties (that people aren't buying anyway) prevent them from buying a Wii2?

[King of Twitch]

A part of me would like to see them make Wii 2 development as complicated and expensive as possible, just to see what would happen

[Stogi]

I'm telling you. They already have a beta system in place to put pressure on big third parties. It's called WiiWare. As that matures, so will Nintendo's 3rd party support.

[Ian Sane]

Why not? according to most, Nintendo games are all people buy on a Nintendo platform anyway, so why would no games from 3rd parties (that people aren't buying anyway) prevent them from buying a Wii2?

Nintendo could never support a console by themselves because the absense of games would result in such small shelf space.  If you went into Best Buy and saw one tiny shelf of literally ten games what would you think?  Would you not assume this product is not well supported and thus not a safe buy?  At least now with all the junk the Wii has quantity so it's in-store presence makes it look like a well supported product.  Nintendo found success with the Wii with mainstream appeal.  A lack of support makes a console look niche.  If Nintendo wants to be the everybody console they need all third parties on board.  "Everybody" includes gamers knowledgable enough to know that their third party support sucks.

[Halbred]

Wow, $2,495 for a report? That seems hard to swallow.

I'm sure there's supposed to be a dot in there, maybe between the 4 and the 9?

[vudu]

814 developers?  I think there are maybe 100 of those that matter--tops.  The rest create shovelware, cell phone games, small PC games, etc.  If we lose some of the developers who made this junk no one's going to mind.  Unless we know exactly what developers are shifting focus away from Wii there's nothing we can accurately extract from this report.

[Jonnyboy117]

vudu, your criticism of the sample size fails to recognize the significant relative difference between how many of them develop for the various consoles.

In any case, this bodes poorly for the future of Nintendo's third-party support, which appears to be falling over time.

[vudu]

vudu, your criticism of the sample size fails to recognize the significant relative difference between how many of them develop for the various consoles.

If 814 developers were surveyed and 69% of them are developing games for Xbox 360 that means 562 developers are working on Xbox 360 titles.  To date, there are 736 retail Xbox 360 titles.  The numbers are even closer for PS3--497 developers and 558 retail releases.  Those numbers don't sit well with me, as I know there are quite a few developers who have several 360/PS3 titles available. 

I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that the percentages given in the report summary include small indie developers who exclusively work on Live Arcade and PSN games.  And to be frank, these developers simply don't matter all that much in the grand scheme of things.  As crazy as you might be about 'Splosion Man, 90% of the gaming population doesn't even know the title exists.

[NWR_Lindy]

They don't matter?  They could be working on WiiWare or Wii games, but they have CHOSEN not to.  Of course they matter!

Furthermore, if the sample size was, say, 50 developers, the first criticism we'd hear is, "Oh, the sample size is so small, there are plenty of smaller developers out there who are supporting Wii."

[vudu]

Furthermore, if the sample size was, say, 50 developers, the first criticism we'd hear is, "Oh, the sample size is so small, there are plenty of smaller developers out there who are supporting Wii."

Okay, let's say we have 100 "big-name" developers and another 200 indies.  That's 300.  Where the heck did these other 500 come from?  It just seems like an astoundingly large number. 

EDIT:  Hey, look what I found!  List of Xbox 360 developers.

Click on a random letter and then every developer within that category to see all there games.  The vast majority of these games--and by extension, their developers--simply don't matter to you or me.

[Deguello]

According to the survey, "ease of development" and "market penetration" were the leading factors in choosing which platform to develop for

So then why don't they make more Wii games?

I'm with vudu.  This survey's gonna be pretty bogus if they are counting the massive hordes of people who make cheap crap nobody cares about on the iPhone.  And Majortiy working on PC and Mac games?  The PC market is dead!  Are they counting those stupid little ad-supported flash games, too?

Am I sad that Nintendo just can't seem to attract third parties despite being the market leader?  Yeah, but not for Nintendo.  They're pulling down billions and their financial survival is basically secure, which is more than could be said about a few developers (and publishers.). No, what I'm sad that the third parties' reaction to the Wii userbase not buying their crappy shovelware is to insult them and pack it up.  It's absolutely mindboggling that third parties just want to leave billions on the table for Nintendo to get all for themselves.  If I were a shareholder, I'd think those guys went batshit insane.

[NWR_DrewMG]

If 814 developers were surveyed and 69% of them are developing games for Xbox 360 that means 562 developers are working on Xbox 360 titles.  To date, there are 736 retail Xbox 360 titles.  The numbers are even closer for PS3--497 developers and 558 retail releases.  Those numbers don't sit well with me, as I know there are quite a few developers who have several 360/PS3 titles available. 

69% of CONSOLE developers, which is only 41 percent of all developers polled.
That's 69% of 334 developers, which is 230 developers out of 814 were working on Xbox 360 games, not 562.  Likewise, 133 on Wii.

[Kairon]

In any case, this bodes poorly for the future of Nintendo's third-party support, which appears to be falling over time.

Well, one would like to think that the current amount of Nintendo console development is STILL heads and shoulders above GC support.

Either way, it looks like Third-Party support will not go away as a point of concern and interest for Nintendo and its fans. In my opinion, Nintendo's made significant strides in addressing this concern, but well... *sigh* The saga continues.

[Shorty McNostril]

This pretty much confirms to me that a Wii HD/2 will never work.  3rd parties have shown what they think of it.  It would be stupid to do the same thing again next gen and hope it works.  Next gen they will have a bigger disadvantage because the "casual" gamer does not buy every generation of console.  That's the whole point of it. 

Like I said in the Wii Rumor thread, I think Nintendo need to go all out for their next system.  Spend some money (they have enough of it) and give produce something that will make Sony and Microsoft quake in fear.  Go back to proper controller and keep everyone happy.  Don't fix what isn't broken.  If third parties are prefer to spend <spoiler>risk</spoiler> millions making something for an HD console rather than its cheaper counterpart then lets give them something they want to develop for. 

Nintendo already have the spotlight to be noticed now.  I think this arrogance thing that led to the downfall of the N64 era onwards is starting to creep in again.  They need to do something about it while they are in the best position to do it, (read ASAP).  If they leave it too long they will have lost the media and public attention and releasing another gimick system won't get it back again.  The devs and the core crowd have shown what they want, why not give it to them. 

[Ian Sane]

814 developers?  I think there are maybe 100 of those that matter--tops.  The rest create shovelware, cell phone games, small PC games, etc.

The thing is the developers that matter already don't give the Wii much support.  When I think of devs that matter, that make console games and aren't exclusive to one console, I think of Capcom, Konami, Square Enix, Namco, Rockstar North, Bioware, Ubisoft Montreal.  These guys have NEVER treated the Wii like anything important.  The shovelware devs?  They're the ones who were always there.  And now the amount of devs supporting the Wii is getting smaller?
 
And does it really matter who they are?  The second and third place consoles have more devs on board than the market leading console.  The market leading console is ALWAYS supposed to have the most because they attract all the best and all the worst.  Third party developers do not consider the market leading console to be the best choice to make money on.  That's insane.

[vudu]

69% of CONSOLE developers, which is only 41 percent of all developers polled.
That's 69% of 334 developers, which is 230 developers out of 814 were working on Xbox 360 games, not 562.  Likewise, 133 on Wii.

I missed that part.  Thank you for pointing it out.  These new numbers jive a lot more with what I expected to see.

[Deguello]

The second and third place consoles have more devs on board than the market leading console.  The market leading console is ALWAYS supposed to have the most because they attract all the best and all the worst.  Third party developers do not consider the market leading console to be the best choice to make money on.  They're insane.

Fixed.  I read another report similar in topic that had developers closing their doors and going bankrupt more quickly than ever before.  I wonder if that study and this study are somehow related.

[KDR_11k]

According to the survey, "ease of development" and "market penetration" were the leading factors in choosing which platform to develop for

I think we can conclude that these devs are either liars or imbeciles.

[Kairon]

Third party developers do not consider the market leading console to be the best choice to make money on.  That's insane.

Well, it could be argued that the Market Leading console in this case requires skills and competencies that third-party developers don't seem to be bringing to the table.

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

They're free to close up shop.

[Ian Sane]

Fixed.  I read another report similar in topic that had developers closing their doors and going bankrupt more quickly than ever before.  I wonder if that study and this study are somehow related.

I agree with you in that it makes no sense.  But the sheer numbers suggests to me that there's more to this than meets the eye.  Every company cannot be stupid.  The sheer odds of that are impossible.  It just seems like there must be some factor that we can't truly see from the outside.
 
Is it possible that the videogame market in general is just not that viable anymore?  Maybe it's just too hard to make money on all three consoles.  The PS360 requires the extra manhours to pour over the visuals and the little details.  The Wii requires one to program motion control which might just be WAY out of most dev's league.  Remember that Nintendo isn't some small dev.  They're a huge company.  They had the resources to design the remote in the first place so they have qualified individuals to make it work with their games.  Other devs don't have that.  The HD visuals may be expensive but at least it's something a dev may already know how to do.  The Wii is still very complex, just in a different way.
 
I wonder if Nintendo's support and documentation for the remote is any good.  That would easily explain why Nintendo, who has full knowledge of the device, can make Wii magic and everyone else shits the bed.  My company needs to make a new game and I can either **** around with the remote and bug Nintendo for info that they may or may not provide to me or I can make something for the other consoles where at the very least I'm confident my team knows what they're doing.  It's easier to work with something familiar.
 
Is it possible that HD games and remote games are both huge financial risks?

[NWR_Lindy]

So the important factors in choosing a platform are:

1) ease of development
2) market penetration
3) team members’ existing skill sets
4) portability of code to a given platform
5) acquisition costs of development kits and materials

I'd say that Nintendo has 1, 2, and 5, but probably turns a lot of third-party developers off due to 3 and especially 4.  Most of the Vudu-approved "developers that matter" have skillsets suited to developing PC-style games, which makes them (and their companies) perfectly comfortable with developing for PC/360/PS3.  They're good at that, so why do something different like a Wii game, that might completely tank in the marketplace?  It makes sense - business sense - to play to your strengths.

Developing games for Wii also shackles a developer to only being able to use that code for future Wii games.  In other words, it's not like 360 code that can be ported to PC and PS3 in a reasonable amount of time to make some extra cash. Take The Grinder for instance...HVS had to license a game engine for the HD platform work, since (apparently) none of the work they did on the Wii engine could be used elsewhere.  It must be tough for third-parties to hitch their wagon exclusively to the Wii, when there's no guarantee that their non-Mario/Zelda/Kart/Metroid/Sports/Fit game will even sell.

Besides, it's not like Nintendo cares about these third-parties anyways, really.  Unlike Microsoft and Sony, who need third-party royalties to mitigate the losses they take on their hardware, Nintendo doesn't need to cater to third-parties because it makes money on its own software AND hardware.  Third-party sales are gravy to them, so it's very easy for them to sit back and shake their heads, telling third-party developers that they just don't "get it".

I guess third-parties are taking that to heart, and aren't trying to "get it" any more.

[Guitar Smasher]

Like I said in the Wii Rumor thread, I think Nintendo need to go all out for their next system.  Spend some money (they have enough of it) and give produce something that will make Sony and Microsoft quake in fear.  Go back to proper controller and keep everyone happy.  Don't fix what isn't broken.  If third parties are prefer to spend <spoiler>risk</spoiler> millions making something for an HD console rather than its cheaper counterpart then lets give them something they want to develop for. 

So basically, you want Nintendo to make the next PS3?

Am I trolling if I call you crazy?