Wow, a twofer! I'm proud of you, son.

man nintendo needs to get top gear remade . i would love to see that one happen 1 and 3000 , also rock n roll racing definatelly needs a sequal

Really? I thought the DS had the best 3rd party support for a Nintendo system since the SNES.

Yes, they did get lots of support, but not with solid IP main entries. Also, the PSP did get a huge amount of support for the marketshare it had compared to the DS.

I love Seaman... He can be so crumpy and annoying.. reminds me of my gf... but this one you can turn off after a while..

Maybe I'm just being a Negative Nancy, but that's actually the part that makes me unexcited.

They're expending time and resources to entice third-party developers onto their handheld to revive old franchises. Reading between the lines, this means that they're again having to go the extra mile to get developers on board their system, they're settling for franchises which have already died, franchises whose own publisher is uninterested in reviving without added incentive, and they're starting with a niche and bizzare pet simulator that was most notable for how weird it was.

@noname2200.

What matters the most, despite the how, is the objective:

I think the most important part of what I bolded was "as part of a strategy to bring new strong titles to the system".

That's something that can excite you regardless of the how. It's Nintendo making an aggressive move to attract 3rd parties and reintroduce what they call strong titles to their console. In other words, main entries of big IPs.

The how, and (probably) why:

As for how they're approaching it, put it this way. 3rd parties are still playing hard-to-get despite Nintendo's proven new midas touch. One consequence of that would be that some of the 3rd party publishers may not want to bring some of their successful new IPs to the system, or at least not the main series. In order to court them, Nintendo offers to go through the back door, by offering to fund what the companies don't consider their cash-cows anymore, but were at some point in the future (which indicates their potential for success).

Seaman not good? Try these:

If seaman doesn't please you, consider MegaMan. You know as well as I do that Capcom canned Megaman Legends 3 for the 3DS. There's one. Shenmue. Mmm, I'm sure lots of people would want to play that. What about Crazy Taxi or Jet Grind Radio? Well, even if Nintendo can't touch this one, what about Killer Instinct? All these old franchises that have the ability to shine are out there, Nintendo is brilliant to refurbish the scraps.

About Seaman and why it matters:

Regarding Seaman, you don't see its value, but try to see its important in the Japanese market. I got this from Wikipedia:

For seaman, I don't think it's the game itself that wasn't able to sell, it's more that Sega no longer had the ability to market it as a smash hit anymore.

Other less obvious benefits of this strategy - Return of the King:

Another thing we might want to consider. We don't know exactly which IPs Nintendo is reaching for, but one indirect effect of this strategy is to revive the old Nintendo, where they dominated the market. Since this happened at a time where those old IPs were born, it is another form of bringing back the old kingdom, so to speak. I'm not saying this is the way to go, but I'm offering factors and consequences of this approach that might interest us as fans.

As for the newer IPs such as Seaman, it could also signify Nintendo's defeat of the gamecube stigma and its victory over the dominance of the Playstation toppling once and for all, showing the actual power of the games released during that generation on either the Cube or the Dreamcast (which underperformed due to the dominance of the Playstation brand).

The risk and its mitigation:

By targeting the core and the Non-Nintendo fans, Nintendo risks failing to reach the casual.

My view on this is, as long as Nintendo is still able to pump out casual content (which is not expensive) and continues to attract the DS audience while expanding on this new front, Nintendo has nothing to fear. Actually, this is the bridge Nintendo is looking to make, so as to lock casual gamers in and converting them to core gamers.

What games would you like to see Nintendo 'encourage' 3rd parties to make?

As we already know SEGA are willing to take part, so from them I want a Skies of Arcadia 2, a Ristar sequel, Jet Set Radio 2 and Chu Chu Rocket sequel. Not to mention Shenmue 3.

You know what would be great? A new Megaman Legends..

A well thought out reply! I don't agree with all of it, though.

To begin with, having lived through the N64 and Gamecube eras in particular, I promise you that the means do in fact matter. Nintendo has been trying for over a decade to re-attract third-party support, so the goal is nothing new. I don't believe that this new method will bear fruit. By funding games that have fallen to the wayside, Nintendo is essentially putting itself in a quandry. They're attempting to bank on IPs which the owners no longer believe are commercially viable. How likely then is the IP publisher to devote their top-tier developers to these projects? Without that talent, this gamble is unlikely to be successful, as numerous C-and-D-team Wii games have amply demonstrated. Nintendo is investing its money and energy into getting another Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. I suspect its going to end up with a series of NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams.

But let us assume that the C-team goes out there and hits a homerun. It does not logically follow that mass third-party support will flow in through the backdoor. Recall the myriad of "test games" we saw on the Wii. Successes did not breed Big IPs on the Wii. They bred more spinoffs and test games. Occasionally, they'd breed ports and sequels for the other systems. But failure rarely if ever failed to cut off further support. Recent history shows that trying to get big support by entering the backdoor creates nothing but hollow victories and utter defeats.

Furthermore, I believe you're overestimating the likelihood of these projects' success. You asked me to consider Megaman. I have. It is part of my pessimissm. Legends 3 only "existed" because its creator was passionate about the project. It no longer exists because its owner does not think it is commercially viable. They assigned it no resources, and repeatedly tried to kill it. Some people on the internet are confused by this desire to terminate it. They want to play it! There are other people on the internet that want to play it! And in 2000, when Legends 2 released in Japan, it was the 138th best-selling game for that year. Worldwide, it went on to sell half of what its predecessor had. The PSP release in 2005 was a financial disaster. It's a series that suffers from Snake-On-A-Plane syndrome: the internet loves it, the public doesn't buy it.

And that holds true of all the dead series. Shenmue gets a lot of love online, but the original's sales don't approach the internet hype and the sequel sold like crap, even after Microsoft pushed for an Xbox port. Crazy Taxi's an awesome game. Its multiple sequels argue that the world has moved on. Jet Grind Radio? Future's fate says everything we need to know. As for Killer Instinct, it's been a long time since a revived Rareware title has done anything worth noticing. And while Seaman did okay, we should take a look at how its sequel compared. Don't worry if you're surprised to learn a sequel existed. It's a secret to most people!

I admit that I can not say for certain that this strategy won't work. Stranger things have happened, after all. But I have two main questions for everyone who likes this news. What part of the Wii's library makes you believe that the success of minor titles will inspire third-parties to bring their big guns to the system? And if the games' owners have no faith in these titles, why should you?