niallyb on 26 August 2014
I'd like to add some qualifiers to "mature games DO sell well on nintendo console platforms"
- Said "mature" (my which I presume we mean sex and violence - as if this in anyway denotes maturity in the real world) game needs to be exclusive on the nintendo platform at the time (Resi 4 for example). Otherwise the blood/sex fratboy set will just fire it up on their Sony/Xbox platform which they undoubtedly already have. Both Sony and MS have made it clear to gore junkies that they are willing to let anything on their platforms uncensored.
- Nintendo needs to lend marketing support, (media, merchandising, hype etc) because its not known as a natural platform for this sort of content.
- The big N has a long history of refusing to bribe/grease/whatever journalists and magazines the way certain 3rd party publishers do (not looking at Acclaim in the past, or EA in the present or anything :)). The magazine + retail trade is incentivized to look to its pockets before it looks at game quality. Why do you think Call of Duty 150/ Anonymous formula FPS gets made and hyped to death every year? If Nintendo REALLY wants to change the playing field on this front - they gotta play like EA and Activision... corrupt and dirty. (ultimately this drives the cost of games WAY up and is bad for consumers in the long term)
Short answer - game quality has almost nothing to do with the issue. Its all about changing the business realities for the publishers.
niallyb
