Nintendo Finally Acknowledges 3rd Parties Are important?

[BreakABone]

Nintendo cuts royalty rates to woo game developers
Thursday April 10, 3:46 pm ET
By Franklin Paul

NEW YORK, April 10 (Reuters) - Nintendo Co. Ltd. (7974.OS) on
Thursday said it has trimmed the royalty rates it charges outside
game developers, in an effort beef up the roster of hit titles
available on its flagging GameCube console.

Japan's Nintendo, third behind Sony Corp.'s (Tokyo:6758.T - News)
PlayStation 2 and Microsoft Corp.'s (NasdaqNM:MSFT - News) Xbox game
console, said that in March it adjusted its royalty rate structure
for all licencees to make it competitive with its rivals.

"Before our royalty rate was a little more aggressive so to the third
party publisher it was a little less attractive to make games for
GameCube," George Harrison, senior vice president of marketing for
Nintendo of America, told Reuters.

Software is a catalyst for the gaming industry, with hit titles
spurring sales of boxes on which they are exclusively available. In
turn, consumers then seek to buy more games for the particular
machine they own.

What is more, games developed by console makers are a profit engine,
while major third-party publishers typically pay a royalty to the
console maker and keep the lion's share of profits for themselves.

Nintendo earlier this week blamed a slump in profits on GameCube,
whose sales fell short of its target of 10 million by 44 percent for
2002.

The company admitted that new titles in its long-running 'Mario'
and 'Metroid' series were overshadowed by blockbuster demand
for "Grand Theft Auto" (GTA) games, developed for the PlayStation 2
by publisher Take-Two Interactive Software Inc. (NasdaqNM:TTWO - News)

"Grand Theft Auto: Vice City," released in the United States last
October, was the best-selling game of 2002 and has sold about five
million units worldwide.

"The biggest games of the year last year were games like GTA and they
came from an independent publisher," Harrison said. "We need to make
sure that we have good relationships with all the independent
publishers, because you never know where the next big hit game is
going to come from."

Nintendo intends to place more emphasis on third-party game
developers at the upcoming E3 trade show in Las Vegas in May, the
largest annual exhibition for Gaming industry. Several developers,
who see a large installed base of a game platform as a guarantee that
audience exists for their titles, have complained about GameCube
slack sales.

"Games from Namco Ltd. (Tokyo:9752.T - News) and Sega Corp.
(Tokyo:7964.T - News) and Capcom Co. Ltd. (Tokyo:9697.T - News) ...
we think are going to be just as important in helping to sell our
hardware system this year as much as our own games," he said. "We are
going to sell a lot of GameCube and its our job to convince them that
we are."

So they are finally realizing they need big games other than their own to sell systems, I wonder if they will start to see more 3rd party games or is it too late?

[Jason1]

Well this is good news. Hopefully we will see something come out of it...but as long as nintendo keeps pumping out their top-quality titles, I cant complain.

[Dyne]

Ed from Ed's Rumour report was RIGHT. Oh my god. What a conspiracy.

[Perfect Stu]

Originally posted by Dyne
Ed from Ed's Rumour report was RIGHT.

:eek:

I remember him from back in the N64 days...I would always trust monkeys spinning giant wheels over him

This is a good step for Nintendo. I think it will influence their next system more than it will Gamecube (if they continue with the lower rates). So now, I'm guessing, all three next gen console makers charge approx the same royalty fees? (I didn't read much of the article )

[tarakan69]

A step that SHOULD have been taken a longtime ago... M$ is actually PAYING for game development.

[viruscool]

Thats only because no one wants to work for them. They have to actually pay for them to work on theie console.
LOL

[bobcat]

Originally posted by tarakan69
A step that SHOULD have been taken a longtime ago... M$ is actually PAYING for game development.

Well if you are a company that rich, of course you would.

But yeh shoulda been done a long time ago!

Maybe I can make a game for the gamecube?

The King of Bobcats........2003

Yes should be a good game

*begins making the game*

[tarakan69]

Originally posted by viruscool
Thats only because no one wants to work for them. They have to actually pay for them to work on theie console.
LOL

Not anymore... X-Box owners are software whores. Even when their is a period of no good games third party crap and shovelware is selling. This REALLY appeals to developers... Look at your cloettion of GCN games. How many do you, which are not first or second party games??

It's not like Nintendo couldn't buy a few exclusives and make even more profit on them in the long run.

Nintendo is a victim of their own success.

[Jonbo298]

This is both good and bad news to me. Good news is that companies will think about releasing their software on the 'Cube, but also that could be the bad news. More crappy software which 'Cube owners won't buy because (from what I have seen so far), 'Cube owners usually know when a game is bad and not to buy it, and when a game is good, they buy it. I am one of them.

[GameKinG]

Wait if MS is still paying for their fees, it would be free to develop for cube. I think that was the case when it first came up that MS would pay for every game they work on. So whats the problem with bringing that game to cube? I always figured that was a limited time thing from MS, but they have the $$$.

[Idiot]

Nintendo in third place? Hmm, seems someone got their numbers wrong.....

[TheGame]

Originally posted by BreakABone
So they are finally realizing they need big games other than their own to sell systems, I wonder if they will start to see more 3rd party games or is it too late?

Acctually, I think Nintendo already knew this at the creation point of GCN. Like it or not, GCN's third party support is light years ahead of N64's... but sadly that isn't enough. I don't see how backing behind third parties even more will fix Nintendo's skid.

[Dyne]

Originally posted by TheGame
Acctually, I think Nintendo already knew this at the creation point of GCN. Like it or not, GCN's third party support is light years ahead of N64's... but sadly that isn't enough. I don't see how backing behind third parties even more will fix Nintendo's skid.

Well, PS2 is almost all third party, and we know how successful that plan is.