Why do developers act like Nintendo fans are obligated to buy their shitty games?

[gumby_trucker]

RolStoppable said:

I can't say I have sympathy with these people, at least not in these specific cases. Steam is of course more flexible, because it's Valve's only platform.

There are hardly any numbers for download services on consoles available and the ones that are are usually based on leaderboards. That being said, I don't think it's far fetched that the bestselling VC games have crossed the 500k mark and when you have developers like Icon Games complaining about a treshold of 5k units, then it's pretty obvious that WiiWare gets crushed in terms of sales numbers. Can't blame consumers for that, because the Virtual Console has far better games for the same amount of money. Nintendo could have demos, patches and no size limits all in one place, but for third parties to be happy, Nintendo would also need to remove the VC service altogether.

I don't know where you are getting it from that VC and xWare aren't separate categories anymore. They sure still are on the 3DS.

Sorry for the comparible short reply.

Once again, your personal taste can not be used as an argument.
Furthermore, the assumption you keep using that games are either good or garbage is troll-worthy, and you know this. As is the assumption that all bad games are objectively bad and devoid of merit. Experience is at least as important as talent when it comes to making a successful developer, as are funds, time, proper exposure and so on.
Please don't build your argument around Icon Games exclusively, even if they are the originators of the OP they still make some valid general points.

Your VC argument is also not something I can take seriously unless you back it up with facts. At the very least show me a recent quote from a developer complaining about how they are competing with Super Mario Bros, and using that as the main reason why their games aren't selling. I'm not talking about the first year of WiiWare when pickings were slim, but rather recently. If you find such a quote, please explain to me why it is any different than games on Steam competing with Half Life 2, or DOOM or Abe's Oddysey/Exodus or competing services like GOG which make it their business to offer classics at a very competitive price.

There is no indication AFAIK that the online market isn't big enough to sustain both types of games successfully. Furthermore, if the issue really is as one sided as you present it, why aren't we seeing more classic releases from 3rd parties on VC? Why have Chrono-Trigger and FF6 arrived so late in the service's life? Where is Rogue Squadron for N64? (god knows it's not a rights-management issue with that one!).

If anything I'd say VC suffers from pretty much the exact same issues as WW, having no way to gage a game before making a purchase, and offering very little information on it. If Nintendo classics are indeed dominating the service (which they probably are), I think that would be a better explanation as to why. The majority of VC releases might as well be new to most of the Wii's userbase, since they certainly didn't play them way back then, and most likely know very little about them either. That being the case, rushing to buy only Nintendo branded games would be typical consumer behavior that has been shown to happen in the retail sector when there is little to no exposure given.
And even then you don't hear any complaints from publishers about Nintendo releasing Super Mario All Stars or Metroid Prime Trilogy!

Regarding the separation of VC and original games, I thought I read somewhere that this was going to be addressed in the 3DS eshop or one of its updates, and that the two categories would be merged. Perhaps I am mistaken, it makes little difference to the main point of this discussion since you are basing your argument on something that the majority of Wii consumers aren't as aware of as you are. If anything I was under the impression that such a merging would be beneficial to VC games since newer gamers are more likely to notice them this way and less likely to think of them as "out-dated, hard-core experiences". But once again, that's just my personal opinion and not a serious discussion point.

To be honest, I think you should drop this argument unless you can support it somehow. It seems to be mainly getting in the way of addressing the more relevant issues at hand and feels to me like a distraction at most.