I also just realised that over here in the UK, I've hardly seen a Nintendo advert, save for having seen 3 last year based on 3DS adverts, I can't say I've seen any Wii U specific advertisements though.

Nintendo could definitely do with more money and effort going into TV adverts and viral ones for bigger releases, including on the internet, this seems to be Ninty's weakspot at the moment (apart from the 3rd party problem)

I'm kinda 50/50 on this. I know that SOME games really need bigger budgets, but others are pretty decent.

The only franchises that might need bigger budgets are Metroid and Zelda, but lets withhold judgment until Zelda is released. Hmmm thinking about it, maybe Xenoblade X could have used moar money

They don't need higher budget since most of the time, they just re-use the assets or make simplistic games.

The wiki list does only state the alleged marketing budget for the North American release of Pokemon Red/Blue. http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=U7hthImoc5AC&pg=PA66#v=snippet&q=million&f=false (page 66)

Nintendo's strategy seems to be maximizing profits, not maximizing sales at any cost. Nintendo manages to sell enough games even with low budgets, so it should be OK.

Yup, I noticed that it didn't have a cost in the development column, only the marketing. So we actually have no idea of Nintendo's development budget on games, we're just trusting a wikipedia article to tell us they don't spend as much as certain other companies.

Nah, to be honest, other developers and publishers need to take the Nintendo route when it comes to budget, a higher budget won't mean that we'll get higher quality games, it just means that they'll be prettier, and that their development time will be longer.

Was looking at the list
Why in the holy mother of ass did pokemon red and blue cost $75m to make?

They never reveal budget, especially, Pokemon red/blue....