I still don't understand why these threads exist. Nintendo just won the last generation with the measly Wii that was pretty much a game cube with motion controls. In terms of software sales they blow Microsoft and Sony out of the water. Mario Kart outsold all 3 Uncharted's combined twofold for example. Nintendo tried going with the best graphics and both times it backfired and PlayStation handed their butts to them. Then with the Wii they took a new approach and won the gen by 19 million and absolutely destroyed them in terms of 1st part software sales. My point is that Nintendo made so much money of the Wii and DS too for that matter that the Wii U could move 15 million units in its lifetime and they would still be rolling in the dough.

dahuman said: lower entry price point is good for a lot of people, and they are the only company that can carry their own consoles with their own games, I honestly haven't seen another console maker able to do that.

This times 10000000000. When the best selling titles on your consoles are from Activision and EA and your major 1st party stuff like Uncharted only managed to sell 6 million then eventually you are going to have a problem. Same for Microsoft. They better hope that people are still as interested in Halo as they were when Halo 3 came out or Microsoft is in trouble too. Consoles don't make these companies anything, games do.

With the possible exception of 1 or 2 times they have been making very good profits from their hardware for the last 30 years. I find much more likely that Sony or Microsoft go 3rd party. We have been hearing rumours about MS execs not being very happy with their xbox division and the ps3 almost put Sony on the same situation.

I know a lot of people would like to play Nintendo's games as they are the best in the world but let's be realistic here. They aren't going anywhere when they are making profits 95% of the time even with their awkward business model.

its an interesting question and seems to have struck a chord with some people. Some reasons make sense others dont. The Sega comparisons make no sense as they were messing up LONG before they got out the console buisness, Satur and 32x say hi.

No one can say for sure if Ninty would be worst off being 3rd party, because no one here has access to an alternate dimension where that is the reality. So its just speculation on that part.

IMHO in terms of actual advantage over the competition, the only thing Ninty has is being reliable and cheaper, the cheaper part is a double edged sword yes thats good but you get what you paid for which is sometimes a system that is just not as good(online features power etc.) all around. IMHO. Reliability comes with time on the SOny and MS machines something they need to work on.

IMO i dont get it, there is very little Ninty can do on their own systems that they couldnt do on the others. Hell its not like they are really utilzing the gamepad as is. They kinda slacked a bit on the motion itself toward the end of the Wii's life and by then the competition had just as capable motion tech(well maybe not Kinect) N64 and GC were regular consoles.

Im surprised that more people dont want Ninty to go 3rd party. Fact of the matter is Ninty consoles miss out on a LOT of games, thats just a fact and its been that way for a while. Looking at the sales most people are at least 2 console owners anyway. So maybe people dont really mind buying two consoles(i personally dont), but then i would have to ask what difference would it make anyway? Instead of buying two you just buy one.

Nintendo's best games wouldn't be made. A lot of Nintendo games are developed because in order to push console sales. Gran Turismo for PS3, and Forza for X360 are great examples, they weren't first developed for a profit, they were developed in order to generate sales. It took a few entries before the games made a profit.

Same goes with Nintendo, the profit margins on XenoBlade, Fire Emblem, Metroid Prime, etc are tiny. If Nintendo went 3rd party, these games would cease to exist. Then slowly Mario's name will diminish, much like Sonic beforehand.

dahuman said: lower entry price point is good for a lot of people, and they are the only company that can carry their own consoles with their own games, I honestly haven't seen another console maker able to do that.

It is untrue.

GC/N64/WiiU proved you're wrong, nintendo cant really carry their own consoles with their own games.

The lower price is the only thing, but it should be much lower...

Oh and alot of people say low price entry point, but they are putting way too much stock into that. That only works if people WANT the product to begin with. And the WIi U proves that. PS4 ane Xbone are much more expensive. and they both had WAY better launches than Wii U. And it looks like PS4 might pass it at least and that system is retailing for 400 and i dont see the price dropping. Hell i think GC was cheaper than PS2 at one point and look at what happened their.

Such a transition could perhaps have some short term benefits, but in the longer run it could actually be very harmful to Nintendo. Look at Sega in comparison. As a combined hardware and software company Sega was one of the main driving forces behind the industry, as a software company Sega has a completely different agenda. And to me there is a quality difference between Sega today and Sega of the 1990s. There is no way Sega woould have produced mediocre Sonic-games in the 90's, because they knew that the main purpose of Sonic was to drive hardware sales (they could not afford a bad game).

I believe we would see reduced software quility from Nintendo if they became a third party. Some games would of course be amazing still, but there would still be a difference.

They would go PC or handheld only.

No reason to pay other people who don't have a market for your games.

oniyide said: Oh and alot of people say low price entry point, but they are putting way too much stock into that. That only works if people WANT the product to begin with. And the WIi U proves that. PS4 ane Xbone are much more expensive. and they both had WAY better launches than Wii U. And it looks like PS4 might pass it at least and that system is retailing for 400 and i dont see the price dropping. Hell i think GC was cheaper than PS2 at one point and look at what happened their.

If we were to go only by what happens at launch then the PS3 should have only sold 12 - 15 million. X1 and PS4 have won the launches but before those 2 consoles the Wii U had the best launch other than the PS2 ever. Let's wait and see what happens once no new games come out for months on end and when all the shooter fans already have their console, and a brand new Mario Kart and Smash Bros are released. If that doesn't move the needle for Nintendo then they have serious problems.