Is it time for Nintendo to go 3rd party?

That is exactly what I was saying, so not only would they keep their rabid fanbase they would also gain more sales from the people that don't want to buy a Nintendo system but want their games.

You both act like the PlayStation/XBOX/PC crowd would buy Nintendo games in droves the way they do AC, CoD, Battlefield, Elder Scrolls, Madden, and Street Fighter. Here's the problem, these games have surpassed Nintendo's popularity in this day and age, Mario and Zelda on those systems would be outsted by those games by a longshot. Not to mention, those begging for it are mostly on the internet (biggest places where I've read such demands were System Wars and GAF; one's Mos Eisley, the other's a totalitarian run forum).

As for their quality, @Madmangamer364 said it better than I ever could.

Might as well give them a fully loaded revolver and have them play Russian Roulette with it.

I'm sure there are enough PS/Xbox players who say they want Nintendo games, but that means no more than Nintendo fans who say they want the AAA third party offerings and end up not buying them. Talk is cheap enough in any walk of life, but in the video game industry, its worth is about as much as a dime a dozen. Also, if all Nintendo players were that quick and easy to migrate from one platform to another, Nintendo's console market wouldn't have declined each and every gen after the NES -except the Wii- and this very conversation would have no significance whatsoever. Nothing in the video game industry is so cut-and-dry these days as the point you're trying to make, my friend, and I'd bet that more than anything, Nintendo leaving the fate of its software in the hands of someone else's console would have at least a negative consequence or two down the line.

Is it time for Nintendo to go 3rd party?

The problem is not Nintendo going 3rd party, the real problem is 3rd party doesn´t want to go Nintendo.

I like so much Nintendo that I have GBA, DS, DSi XL, 3DS XL, Wii and to round it up I recently purchased a GC, I like Nintendo games but Nintendo insists to do things "different", trouble is that being too "different" may not be that great, the WiiU has practically no 3rd party games, developers apparently have had enough of Nintendo´s way.

Nintendo may have great games but ….. I think that I´m not in the mood of playing Monster High, Planes or Ben 10 over and over again.

If you want to talk cut and dry, then it's best not to attempt to cite reluctance to migrate as indicative of the sole (or even majority reason) as to Nintendo's declining marketshare and imply all console owners as too dogmatic to their own respective tastes and choices in what software they would consume on which platform so as to make Nintendo going third party an untenable proposition. There are a multitude of factors at play in Nintendo's continual diminishing marketshare throughout the years that extend far past an audiences' predilection to stick by the software, it's not so "cut and dry" which is exactly how you're positing it to suite your argument.

I think if anything, the only reason Nintendo is still standing today is largely due to the strength of that software and adherence to it by the loyal. Do you really believe that people who make that investment just to have Nintendo games wouldn't be willing to pay out a tiny bit more to have access to them as WELL as having all other third party support to boot on another console? I'd love to hear why they wouldn't. That Nintendo can put out a strictly first party machine, charge what they do for it, and survive as not only a software (but a hardware producer) is a testament to the power of that software. I therefor find it unrealistic and a tad ridiculous to claim that that would suddenly evaporate or diminish to the extent of non-viability from a lack of audience on a different system.

I don't doubt there'd be negative ramifications if Nintendo were to go third party, that's why I don't wish for them to (nor believe they ever would), but that's a different argument altogether.

I don't really want to see Nintendo go third party, I think it would only discourage them even more so from trying new things. And before you say, "What do you mean?! Nintendo just makes the same games over and over already", sure they do. But every once in a while, they will publish something like Pandora's Tower, Xenoblade, Geist, or Eternal Darkness in and effort to round out their console's game library. Once that incentive is gone, Nintendo will do what every other 3rd party publisher does and focus on a couple franchises they can release annually. Forget about Starfox, Metroid, or F-Zero, on any other console they would be considered relics of a bygone era. Nothing but Mario Karts and Parties from here on out.

Nintendoomed.

@MirkoS77: Reluctance to migrate may not a sole or primary factor to Nintendo's declining audience, but the reality that Nintendo's track record of bringing players from one system to another isn't one to be counted on should have some significance to the topic at hand. Not to mention that I wouldn't make a major assumption about console owners as an entity, as I believe that the video game market for the most part is anything but totally predictable. My point is that if I had to bet on the most viable avenue for Nintendo to continue to be at its most successful in the near and distant future, I most certainly wouldn't place that bet on some unproven claims from the Xbox and Playstation faithful that they would buy enough Nintendo software to make up for the company not being a hardware manufacturer anymore. That's far from a cut-and-dry statement, really; it's an assessment based on the notion that much like it is with Nintendo loyalists and AAA third party games, it's probably not the best idea in the world to believe everything a group of gamers say.

As for this question:

"Do you really believe that people who make that investment just to have Nintendo games wouldn't be willing to pay out a tiny bit more to have access to them as WELL as having all other third party support to boot on another console? I'd love to hear why they wouldn't."

I believe I can answer that hypothetical inquiry with a very current issue: Wii U. If the system promised nothing else to the Nintendo faithful, it was that the system would offer the developer support that so many claim would make a Nintendo console ideal; and, for the first six months or so, it was doing a respectable job at upholding that promise. So, why did the Wii U not take off and actually taken so many steps backwards from a perspective of support since its release? I think the one thing we can agree on is that the success of Nintendo system certainly isn't reflected by the success of today's third party IPs. In fact, when I look at Nintendo's most successful systems, it's difficult to see how the conventional third party model has impacted them at all -except for the NES, which was also the only game in town for third party developers.

So, how has Nintendo managed to stay in the console market for this long? Again, you can make the claim that its strictly first party software that does the trick, but as I've said in the past myself, Nintendo's hardware philosophies, when properly executed, is nothing to ignore. As great as Tetris and Pokemon have or could be on a console, they have and still flourish on the portable systems. Other widely popular IPs, like Nintendogs and the Wii brand of games, would have been nothing without the hardware concepts that they were built around. Heck, even Nintendo's more traditional gaming concepts, like Super Mario and Zelda, typically don't influence the systems that they're on as much as the systems influence them and how successful they become. New Super Mario Bros. Wii may have been possible technically on the GameCube and even saw sequels on the 3DS and Wii U, but its best impression could have only been possible on the Wii itself. Nintendo has popular games, yes, but the gap between their most successful systems and even their average-selling systems is simply too great to give the company's tried-and-true software lineup all of the credit.

Ultimately, do I think Nintendo would suddenly vanish as video game company if it wasn't making consoles? Nah, not suddenly, but I also don't think that the potential for a noteworthy decline in the company's viability and status wouldn't exist just because video game consoles and players would still exist elsewhere. If we're going to consider the possibility of the action, we also have to weight in every pro and con that would be a possible consequence of that action. In that regard, I don't think it's unreasonable to mention negative ramifications of Nintendo becoming third party at all, especially if it possibly influences the software that you believe makes Nintendo what it is as a video game company. At the moment, it's just easier for me to see the cons of Nintendo becoming outweighing the pros, and this is without digging very deep into the specifics.

They need to stop messing around trying to add "innovative" features to their new systems and just focus on making it as powerful as the competition. There's no freaking way that means they can't make the same great first party games they always do. But I just think it'd be nice if they re-directed all of this energy they keep putting into trying to "revolutionize" their new consoles, and simply stick with the basics and make it a capable machine that dukes it out with the competition.

No Way! Nintendo makes the best games and I don't see the point of third party.

yes.

@nozakuboy09: Are you indicating that Nintendo should just make an inferior PC like Sony and Microsoft are doing? Not gonna happen.

@TJDMHEM: Yeah, cause it did so well for Sega... OH WAIT

Sorry man this is a necro thread. I'm gonna lock it so we don't have to have arguments made last year.