| Jay520 said: But the point is 3rd parties clearly weren't going to make the first move. So why didn't Nintendo make that Grand Theft Auto type games? Or that Call of Duty? Would this not have proved to 3rd parties that 'core' games sell on Nintendo consoles. |
Given that third parties complained about not being able to compete with Nintendo's first-party franchises, it seems to me that it wouldn't have made much difference. Basically, third parties weren't willing to come to the table anyway, and they just sought excuses for it.
Capcom put Resident Evil 4 on the Wii, got better sales than the Gamecube version despite there having been both PS2 and Gamecube versions before it. And what did Capcom do with it? They made a lightgun game. And when it sold well, but not as well as Resident Evil 4, they made another lightgun game. Meanwhile, the PS3 and 360 got a true Resident Evil title (that is, an RE that was a third-person shooter).
Call of Duty 3 sold nearly as well on Wii as it did on Xbox 360, and did significantly better than PS3. Call of Duty 4 skipped Wii (until Treyarch managed to convince Activision to let them port it, two years late). Barring the intervention by Treyarch, the Wii wasn't going to get another CoD at all, and by the time the Wii got a major one, the big-seller that established the brand as a powerhouse had already been out on PS3 and 360 for a year, and thus most people interested in it already had it on one of those systems. Add to this the fact that Activision barely wanted it even acknowledged that the Wii was getting a version of any of the games, and refused to advertise it, and the fact that CoD still managed to break 1 million for 3 more titles (including 1.85 million for World at War - which was lacking about half of the content, including the Zombie mode) proves that the Wii was a viable platform for the games, but that developer (Infinity Ward) and publisher arrogance prevented it.
Goldeneye 007 on Wii easily outsold the PS3 and 360 versions combined... and yet, Activision decided to have the next 007 title, 007 Legends, be for PS3 and 360 only. Although it is theoretically possible that there'll be a Wii U version, the obvious question is, why not release a Wii version, too? The market is certainly there.
NBA Jam was announced for Wii, hyped up, and then, just as it released, they decided to announce that it was going to PS3 and 360 as well, to be released in less than two months. Which is annoying, but otherwise fine. The Wii version outsold the other versions... and they decided to then release the "On Fire edition" for PS3 and 360 only.
Silent Hill: Shattered Memories on Wii easily outsold Homecoming on PS3 and 360, and the PS2 version of Shattered Memories also did very well. So what does Konami do? They make the next one, Downpour, for PS3 and 360, no Wii version.
Ubisoft made Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII for Wii, PS3, and 360 (and PC) - note that the Wii version released later than the others. The Wii version still sold best, far outpacing the 360 version and neatly beating the PS3 version. So when it came time to make a sequel, they released it on PS3, 360, and PC. No Wii version. Note that the sequel on 360 and PS3 struggled to sell, managing about 200,000 copies total between PS3, 360, and PC.
And I haven't even brought up, yet, the way that other developers and publishers decided to release spinoff games in IPs in utterly nonsensical ways. Konami making a Castlevania game for the Wii? It's a fighter, not an action game. Namco Bandai making a SoulCalibur game for the Wii? It's an action game, not a fighter. The Final Fantasy (Crystal Chronicles) that Square Enix put on the Wii? It's an action adventure, not an RPG. Their RPG Final Fantasy (again, Crystal Chronicles) on Wii was a direct port of the DS version, with DS-quality graphics.
So if third-parties wouldn't even pay attention to their own core games released on the system, why would they be more likely to put their games on the Wii when they have to compete with first-party titles, given that first-party strength was their main complaint? No, third-parties had a series of excuses that they used, none of which were really valid.
