I don't mean reaching out to 3rd parties either; when developing hardware, Iwata mentioned how it was not as productive for Nintendo to attempt the whole endeavor alone and wished to enlist a few more companies in the involvement of building hardware.

I do not think Nintendo *needs* 3rd parties either if they can support their console with enough software, but they cannot. Their first party releases are largely inconsistent and there have been too many periods where there is a software drought lasting longer than 6 months. Expansion is the only way to combat that.

Yeah, I think it's just a leedle bit early for Nintendo to up and go third party. Even porting old VC titles to other companies' platforms undermines Nintendo's own platforms.

Acquisitions might be a good idea, but Nintendo seems to be having a little trouble managing the studios they already own. If they buy something, they have to be able to easily integrate it into the rest of their business and they have to be able to leverage it to either fix a weakness or reinforce a strength, otherwise they're just wasting limited resources. More acquisitions go wrong than go right, so you have to be careful, and not simply toss your billions around.

It's easy for angry shareholders to scream "do something!", but sometimes the best thing to do is hold on to that money and wait for a good opportunity to arise.

Just want to answer to this. Nintendo has worked on the following games with 3rd parties, only for Wii.

Excite Truck - Monster Games
Mario Party 8 - Hudson Soft
Mario Strikers Charged - Next Level Games
Donkey Kong Barrel Blast - Paon
Battalion Wars 2 - Kuju Entertainment
Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games - Sega
Endless Ocean - Arika
Wario Land: The Shake Dimension - Good-Feel
Mario Super Sluggers - Namco Bandai
Fatal Frame IV: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse - Tecmo
Punch-Out!! - Next Level Games
Another Code: R – A Journey into Lost Memories - Cing
Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Winter Games - Sega
Excitebots: Trick Racing - Monster Games
Endless Ocean 2: Adventures of the Deep - Arika
Sin & Punishment: Star Successor - Treasure
Metroid: Other M - Team Ninja
FlingSmash - Artoon
Zangeki no Reginleiv - Sandlot
And-Kensaku - Shift
Mario Sports Mix - Square Enix
Wii Play: Motion - several have worked on this title: Arzest Corporation, Good-Feel, Prope, Vanpool, Mitchell Corporation, Chunsoft.
The Last Story - Mistwalker
Pandora's Tower - Ganbarion
Mystery Case Files: The Malgrave Incident - Big Fish Games and Sanzaru Games

Several WiiWare games I don't have the patience to list. And they have helped 3rd parties publish certain games, most notable Monster Hunter Tri and Samurai Warriors 3.

My concern is what Nintendo's first party developers have been doing.

Google for it.  Check my last post on this, for a hit on what to google.  Trust me on it, once you see it, you wish you hadn't.  And I am not referring to Atari and Coleco getting Nintendo stuff (the Atari 8 bit computer versions of Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr. are good).

I think that Nintendo should have their online game own store, such as the PlayStation Suite. Games like Mario for example could be quickly downloaded and sold at higher prices than most games found in app stores.

I think that tablets are going to begin seriously competing with portable game machines such as Vita and DS. Tablets arguably offer better value and are more 'cool' these days.

Sure, Nintendo could continue catering for the core and loyal Nintendo audience, but just how big is that audience? A substantial chunk of Wii sales were not from usual Nintendo customers, and I don't believe that their handhelds have ever faced such a real threat as tablet PC's will no doubt offer. The audience big enough to keep Nintendo ticking over and profiting, but I don't believe it's big enough to keep the company as valuable as it is today.

So, I don't see why Nintendo wouldn't sell its games using an online app store. If customers on other hardware like the Nintendo games that much, then surely they'll be even more likely to purchase some of Nintendo's own machines?

One thing you could try too is to use the smartphone market as a marketing/advertising tool and release cheaper version of your games with much less functionalities on those smartphones and see if it helps at all boost the sales on your portables. In that case you could sell a cheap Nintendog demo for 1-2$ and see what effect it has.

Nintendo has enough resources to try those kind of experiments but in all cases putting your head in the sand and totally ignoring the smart phone market and saying it doesn't impact your sales  is not the rationnal way to handle it.......

Suddenly in the space of 5 years Nintendo went from being visionaries ( with the original Wii release) to reactionaries( there is no smart phone impact !)...

Although buying a studio or studios may be a good way for Nintendo to diversify the offer to core gamers, like buying a studio who can produce the next Halo, Call of Duty or Uncharted, etc., i think Nintendo shouldn`t buy another studio that thinks and makes the kind of games Nintendo makes? Why? Well, 3 parties always complain that only Nintendo games sell on Nintendo consoles and that is somewhat true. It`s their games that do sell the console.
So, for core gamers, it`s best for Nintendo to buy someone who can help other 3rd parties penetrate their market.

If Nintendo decides to buy some casual developer it can use it either to produce the Brain Training kinda games for retail or use them to help make their own Nintendo app-store.
This would probably help Nintendo "sell" the Wii U controller-tablet idea to the casual crowd that plays on tablets ot just on their computers.

Nintendo`s money could be used in more than one way.

Making him put some effort instead of just telling him!!!  I'll spill the beans..  It was the CD-i and the Nintendo games (Zelda, Mario) that were published on it were pure shit.  The Angry Video Game Nerd did a few episodes on these games.  It was pretty fun to see him play and talk shit about them.

"Following the Wii U’s unveiling, analysts at UBS AG and Bank of America Corp.’s Merrill Lynch wrote in notes to clients that they weren’t impressed by the next-generation console."

You know what I am not impressed by the way these companies handled their own finances. These shit companies would probably not even be in existence or be very limited if it were not for government bailouts. They can't even handle their own shit and investors look to them for "sound" financial advise...

ninty is not gonna sell out to apple without a fight...