Summary:
In the 3DS's first two and a half years or so of life, the big creator of hit games has, without a doubt, been Nintendo itself, along with various Nintendo-published games like Professor Layton and the Miracle Mask. It alone is responsible for about 70% of points in the final results. However, it would be unfair to say that third parties have not left their mark. Atlus and Capcom in particular were big winners, with a few notable games each and over 100 points total. Another five publishers made a notable mark, along with eight more publishers making a modest appearance.
The winner, by a narrow margin, was Fire Emblem: Awakening, with 176 points, narrowly beating out Kid Icarus: Uprising's 170 points. Although both games were from Nintendo, they were also both created by the company's periphery, aka Intelligent Systems and Project Sora. Nintendo EAD, the "core" of Nintendo, did surprisingly poorly, with only their 2011 3D platformer Super Mario 3D Land scoring over 100 points. The remaining huge hit was Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon, which was developed by a Western developer under Nintendo's supervision.
Nintendo's big point-earners were KI: Uprising, FE: Awakening, various Mario titles, 3DS ports/remakes such as Ocarina of Time 3D, and the ocassional oddball like Animal Crossing: New Leaf or Pushmo. This makes for a combination of predictable results (Mario being popular? What's New?) and surprising ones (Kid Icarus and Fire Emblem being big hits? That's New!)
Atlus and Capcom were the only 3rd party publishers to score over 100 points. Atlus had 4 games score a combined 114 points. SMT4 was mostly responsible for these, but other RPG's and Code of Princess also contributed. Capcom's success was led by Resident Evil: Revelations, but was again supported by Monster Hunter and Street Fighter.
Other notable 3rd party hits included Zero Escape from Aksys, Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars from Ubisoft, and Tales of the Abyss from Namco Bandai. Surprisingly, Square Enix games did fairly poorly, despite the release of a couple of notable titles in 2012 alone.
Looking at the 3DS over time, it is obvious when it was a good or bad time to own the system. The launch period of Q1 was the second barest quarter in system history, with only Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars redeeming the launch. Q2 only had two games chart, but since one of them was Ocarina of Time 3D, the fifth best placing game, it was a decent quarter. Q3 was the worst in 3DS history, with only remakes of Star Fox 64 and Devil Survivor lighting things up. However, things exploded in Q4, with the release of the massive Super Mario 3D Land and the major Mario kart 7. It is around this time that eShop titles such as Pushmo also began to appear.
Q1 2012 was the best quarter in 3DS history, thanks to the combined powers of Kid Icarus: Uprising, Resident Evil: Revelations, Zero Escape, Kingdom Hearts, Theatrhythm, and Rolling Western. It is at this point, however, that one may notice that the above chart is based off of initial release dates, not just Western ones. Some of these games would only be released in the West later on. A prime example of this is Q2's Fire Emblem: Awakening, the only big game of the quarter, which released a year later in the West. Q3 was another low point, albeit saved by New Super Mario Bros 2 and Etrian Odyssey 4. Q4 was a decent quarter, but games like Paper Mario: Sticker Star and Animal Crossing: New Leaf failed to live up to the Mario Land/Kart combo of yesteryear.
Q1 of 2013 lacked titles, but seeing as one of them was Luigi's Mansion 2, it was a good quarter nonetheless. Q2 was barren, with only Shin Megami Tensei 4 leaving an impact. Q3 was only slightly better, with the star game being Mario & Luigi 4.
2013 is not a bad year though. It just so happens that many of the Western releases of games in 2013 were 2012 releases in Japan, and Japan's 2013 releases haven't come West yet. Furthermore, with Pokemon X/Y and Zelda coming out in Q4, there's no reason to think 2013 will be remembered as a bad year for the 3DS.
There is little notable relationship between a game's performance in this poll and its actual sales. The best-received games did exceed a million copies each, but the two best point-earners got a fraction of the sales of Super Mario 3D Land or even Mario Kart 7.
