So, recently there have been developers saying they are scaling back support for Wii and concentrating more on the HD twins.  This had me wondering why because Wii has some games that are putting up some huge numbers.  However, I was looking at the top 50 selling games for each system and this is what I came up with.

Wii First Party =20 Third Party=30

360  First Party=9     Third Party=41

PS3 First Party=11 Third Party=39

DS First Party =32 Third Party=18

PSP First Party=10 Third Party=40

It is interesting to see how many more first party titles nintendo has in the top 50.  The top 10 on both Wii and DS are all Nintendo published.  While Microsoft and Sony show a healthy variety of third and first party mixed in throughout their top software sells.  

So, this is my question.  Do you think Nintendo success makes for a difficult platform for 3rd parties to succeed? 

I find it curious that Nintendo dominance on the DS is far stronger than it is on the Wii, but we don't hear complaints from third party publishers about that. They're happy to support the platform, and seem to be meeting a lot of success.

So, why is there so much more grousing about Nintendo's software on the Wii when Nintendo's actually weaker on that platform? Why do they feel that they can compete on the DS but not the Wii?

The DS has double the userbase and has proven since development that Third Party Software sells very well, it is also much cheaper to develop for and so if a title does flop the effect isn't that great. The Wii doesn't have solid evidence that more core developed games will sell well outiside of a few chosen examples. Hopefully if games like Red Steel 2 are succesful then publishers can use that as evidence that the Wii is ready for similar experiences.

I'm guessing that with the PS Move, thirdy Parties will probably take larger risks on multiplats, so third party development could be stronger soon.

The Wii is selling faster than the DS, so it's not the userbase. As we can see from the OP, third parties have actually struck more gold on the Wii than they have on the DS, so the DS can't be a proven third party seller if the Wii isn't.

There must be other factors at play, because those reasons just don't add up.

What do you want them to do, make worse games?

One thing I might add that definitely explain the Wii's first party sales

on top of them being good games. Wii Mascots are loveable and sells anything that moves, Look no further than the Mario and Sonic series.

Also, the lack of good third party games just further move more people to buy Wii first party game only. Why take a risk on third party games on Wii?? When you have a much safer bet on getting a quality games Published by Nintendo.

YES! but its not the succes of Nintendo.. its the not so much of an succes for 3rd parties..

From what I can see third parties have made up their minds after the experience of the last few years in that they gain the most from making multi platform games for the 360/PS3. Sales are obviously affected by multiple factors but primarily I would say it is demographics of the consoles as well as the hardware specs.

Because the PS3 and 360 are comparable in performance, all a developer has to do is make a suitable engine which will be more or less equal across the two platforms. Unfortunately due to it having lower specs the aforementioned engine is unusable for the wii and a seperate engine must be created thus adding to development costs.

The third party company then has to figure out if the added costs can be made up for with the sales on that platform.

If regular gamers have more than one console in most cases it appears they go for the game which is more impressive graphically and that favors the 360/ps3 versions when it comes to sales.

Regarding demographics it has been regularly acknowledged that Nintendo has captured the majority of the casual market and while that is great for hardware sales it can make it tougher to sell 3rd party hardcore games. Casual games and Nintendo first party games have done very well though which suggests that most of the user-base are casuals and gamers who primarily purchase wii exclusives and ignore most multi platform games.

So basically to your question I would say yes but it seems that the Wii is affected more due to the choices that gamers have in the 360 and PS3 consoles.

I guess there is no easy answer but those are my 2 cents. Looking forward to other insights.

Too successful for who? 

For the third parties, yes, the competition is too much for them .

For Nintendo, first party ratio could only be too successful if it would exceed 100%.  

Firsts party sales bring more profit for the company, they move more hardware, they have the potential for higher sales than any third party on any console. 

Wait, that's the most stupid method of comparing sucess.

3rd parties have sold more on the Wii using an aligned launch comparison than on the PS3 or 360. And that is even considering that most development effort and money has gone into the PS3 and 360. Nintendo's sucess does not stop others from succeeding, especially being as first party sucess causes hardware sales, which leads to increased 3rd party sales