Just because N doesn't sell as many consoles as the competition doesn't make them unsuccessful. We've seen in recent quarterly reports that the Wii U is starting to make a profit. Their operating costs as a company are just far lower than MS and Sony. They don't need to sell as much to create that cash flow.

Nintendo's main competitive advantage is that they have games that can't be experienced anywhere else. If they go 3rd party, they have lost that.The fact that so many people want them to choose this route shows how powerful their IP are. Wii U may end up being a bust sales wise, but many people will come crawling back to Nintendo eventually because they will miss their great original content.

because.. theyre doing just fine on their own. they would have a lot harder time trying to rake in money working under other people. that is just ridiculous.

Yup! That's the one that probably keeps confusing people. 

Who knows? Maybe StuOhQ has a different one.

I agree with you OP. Nintendo being in the hardware business just hurts consumers and stifles the development of the industry in general. This is because Nintendo doesn't share the vision of HD/VR gaming of Sony and MS.

They have the potential to make A LOT more money i they are first party.  They make significantly more money on each piece of software sold.  Plus they do bring variety to the console space, even if I do think they need to make their consoles more powerful that is a seperate issue.  Also they do make the most reliable consoles, which I love.

Well MS does not have that many games to offer as a third party developper... Sony on the other hand, well they do release some games on PC, just not all of their IPs (MS does it too).

And their console sales are not bad... Nintendo on the other hand, their hardware is clearly the limitting factor, when I had more time (and no wife to argue with) I used to buy Nintendo consoles for their Zelda + Mario titles... now, well, I had to make a choice and I could not bring myseld to buy the Wii U.

Sega was an Hot Lady when still in the console market, developing their own consoles. When they became 3rd party devs, slowly they lost their magic touch. Nintendo will continue to make a profit with their home console, they will wow everybody with their Next Mario on their next system, and they must continue making console. I can't see one single reason why they should go 3rd party.

Sony & MS are in competition, and primarily in the business of collecting 3rd party royalties and subscriptions on their platforms, therefore they make exclusive games to grow their platforms.  They don't necessarily make 1st party games for profit.  You can see they have a model of giving away 1st party games to grow userbase and subscribers to PS+/XBL.

Nintendo is primarily in the business of selling it's own games for profit.

These are reasons Nintendo should not go 3rd party:
- Nintendo sells hardware at nice prifits.
- Nintendo is able to build it's own large userbase.

Unfortunately those reasons are unattainable.  Hardware margins are tight, and with 3rd party royalties making a small share of Nintendo's profit, Nintendo relies on it's own games for everything: sell the hardware AND make profits.

Nintendo will make less money if they stop making hardware.

From the desk of a "hurt" consumer.