I understand what 1st party, 2nd party and 3rd party developers are, but there's a nebulous group that still confuses me. Those developers, like Hal and Game Freak, that (to quote Wikipedia) "develop games exclusively for Nintendo".

Is the relationship really as woolly as this? Is it just like a couple of friends having a tacit agreement, or is there a more substantial business relationship underlying this description?

What's the deal here?

I think their nintendo studious (like retro) , but I can be wrong

Nintendo owns Game Freak iirc (or owns Pokemon, who owns Gamefreak).

Nintendo doesn't own HAL afaik, but they have a close relationship (Iwata came from HAL) and Nintendo owns their biggest hits (Kirby & Smash Bros). HAL also owns a controlling stake in the Kirby licensing company (Warpstar Inc.)

Nintendo is the pimp.

HAL and Game Freak are both the whores.

It's just like with Sony and Naughty Dog or Insomniac - some companies just have a great working relationship.

They're both second parties.

Nintendo owns Game Freak while HAL Lab has to renew their license ever so often.

I thought they did own HAL outright. How else could a HAL dev become CEO?

They didn't own Game Freak for quite some time, though. They wholly-bought them sometime this generation.

And Naughty Dog is a proper Sony subsidiary, it's Insomniac that's a nominally-indie-yet-exclusive partner

neither Game Freak nor HAL are subsidiaries. but Nintendo does own stock in these companies.

Nintendo also owns their workplaces (which they built specifically for them), funds development for their games, publishes them and is responsible for all the decisions that involve them.

nauhgyt dog is owned by sony, insomniac is second party r3 will probably be their last sony eclusive game, as for game freak i think ninty owns them and hal is second party.

heh, what better way to keep a developer like HaL than to promote it's owner. He certainly isn't going to change his mind what machine to develope for when it comes to HAL :P