And you don't have to throw everything plus the kitchen sink at a game either. Games should only cost as much as needed to make, and that varies from project to project. Often developers have ideas, that only require modest budgets, and Nintendo's one of the few major publishers who will take a chance on those kinds of games.

But you do understand that no one’s going to give much credit to Nintendo for the said chance when they can recoup the cost of it by selling one copy. lol

problem here in this thread is that the TC wants praise for Nintendo for taking risks but they’re hardly risking anything by making these little cheap mini-games and selling them for exorbitant prices to their blindly loyal fanbase.

Ignoring the Hyperbole, it's far to argue that Nintendo mostly focuses on smaller, carefully planned risks, often with potentially huge rewards. That's true. But a Calculated risk is still a risk, and often times games with lower budgets than AAA games tend to take more creative risks because there is less to loose. Nintendo's one of the few major publishers in the industry who still takes chances on these kinds of games. Like, if you pitched an idea for an RPG that's played using a Pilates Ring and Exercises to Sony today, You'd probably be laughed out of the building. But with Nintendo, they'll give it a shot so long as within a reasonable budget.

That's what separates Nintendo from its contemporaries. They don't focus on spending as much money on a single game as possible. They start with ideas, and then let the strength of those ideas dictate the budget, not vice versa. You seem to have this idea, that a new IP isn't risky if you're not spending $50 million dollars on its development. Also, LOL again at "Cheap Mini games" right because Astral Chain is a cheap mini game...

They would give credit to Nintendo because outside of a obscure third party developer, no high-profile developer would dare develop such games like Ring Fit Adventure or Labo (maybe EA back in the day with EA Sports Active back  in the day or Ubisoft's Just Dance, which likely doesn't use as much of a budget as Ring Fit or Labo). These are unconventional video games that, nowadays, are not likely to garner as much attention as they would if they released during the Wii era. Still, Nintendo tinkers like a toy company, which is part of their DNA of over 125 years as a business.

And even then, Nintendo publishes a ton of games, which Sony and Microsoft don't do as much, yearly. Not every game has to be AAA. Every game is an investment, regardless. You assume things as if you know the budgets that Nintendo uses for every game they develop and/or publish.

Seems there are more enthousiastic Nintendo guys than "normal" microsoft/playstation guys if you consider console sales so yeah it's nice of them to cater to their own playerbase i would say.

I also thought using the term "normal" is mostly used for the bigger amount of people liking something but ofcourse it depends on the bubble that one can reside in.

The problem with AAA games is that they have a bunch of lawyer-like producers who market research the mechanics and make their judgments on whether to greenlight or not the ideas based on their research. In other words, their games are not about artistic achievement anymore, it's corporate manufactured products that are essentially just updated versions of existing ideas. The creative and inventive work is done by other people.

Nintendo is one of the teams that's willing to push the boundaries in a satisfying way. And I agree, Breath of the Wild - if it qualifies as AAA is barely AAA - 300 developers on it, 1 expansion and 1 sequel; most modern AAA games would call for many DLC upgrades and various other money extraction methods and have as many as 7 or 8 sequels which are iterations of the core game + new or updated content, sometimes a few new feature or two to help with the marketing thrust. Assassin's Creed is a good example of this, they're all basically just the same game branched off the trunk with a new set of content and new features appropriate to the content - a good strategy for marketing to a mass audience, but a company like that will never make a Mario Galaxy or Breath of the Wild until someone else does it first.

Indies and certain medium-end developers, that's where the real creativity happens. Most often for less of a dent in your wallet.