http://wii.ign.com/articles/972/972642p1.html

April 14, 2009 - At this year's Game Developers Conference a talk called Independent Game Sales revealed that Nintendo has a minimum download threshold for WiiWare games that must be met before the developer is paid. The speaker, Gamasutra publisher and Independent Game Festival chairman Simon Carless, said this number is somewhere in the mid-quadruple digits for America and low quadruples for other territories. Unless a game passes over this number of downloads, the developer doesn't get paid at all. Sources in the WiiWare development community have confirmed this information to IGN.

Carless estimated that multiple independent WiiWare games will not pass the threshold and not return any of the developer's investment. He also guessed that this threshold is in place to deter developers from tossing loads of shovelware onto the service. One developer, speaking anonymously, recently told IGN that this deterrent makes the threshold a good thing.

There have been two primary barriers for little-known games on WiiWare. Until recently, storage has been an issue on the Wii. This is now fixed as of last month, but another hurdle remains: WiiWare games don't offer any sort of trial, so gamers can't check them out first to see if they like them as they can on Xbox Live Arcade.

As of this writing, Nintendo could not be reached for comment. The company has not released any official information about the sales of WiiWare games. Carless has heard that Nintendo might be changing this minimum threshold policy so that developers can eventually cash a paycheck from WiiWare.

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Sounds weird that this was done for quality control.

wow, never heard of this, and it sounds a little scary. i was hoping i could maybe one day make a small game for that service or one like it [a dream, really] and this could really keep me away from trying to do that.

Seems harsh. Would be more fair for them to just get a percentage from each download.

I support this. It means more effort has to go in to WiiWare. Look at the apps for iphone/ipod touch. They're littered with shovelware apps (apple fanboys don't flame, they have plenty of good ones too). I wonder if something like this is in place for DSiWare as well.

Maybe this has something to do with Nintendo covering its costs for publishing the game online, whereas Microsoft and Sony may charge a higher initial fee. We have no idea what's going on in these contracts, that's my point.

It could well be cheaper to publish a game for WiiWare than XBL/PSN (which includes those bandwidth fees).

This article could be incomplete or misleading.

I would agree with this if there was the opportunity to try out a game before downloading.  This would mean you only download games you think are good.  But there isn't.  There could be a game which is very good but doesn't get the requisite number of downloads simply cause it gets lost in the crowd or doesn't have an interesting name or for any other reason unrelated to the quality of the game.

The dev only gets a % as well, after the initial numbers have been reached. Nintendo is just taking a cut for the use of their system and network with the % and this initial sales prereq.

I think MS does something similar, although I don't know that you have to meet a certain number of downloads before the % kicks in.

Sony's program is different than the others, I hear, but I don't really know much about it.

ouch, that's harsh. I would think passing a Nintendo requirement would be a little nicer and here I thought MS was being rather draconian with their Live stuff. Sounds like Nintendo has a bit of smasher themselves.

While I understand the idea, i'm not sure if I can agree with it. At least it sounds like the 40mb limit has been lifted.

What kind of wiiware game doesn't sell in the thousands.
Unless its total shovelware, has a horrible name and picture, some morons are going to buy it.

??? Not getting paid O_o! How i'm I going to make any money?