Nintendo's poor approval process the reason for lackluster titles on Wii and DS?

I recently read an article in the latest EGM regarding the craptacular games that are constantly showing up on store shelves for the Wii and DS. They apparently did some digging, and found out that Nintendo basically does not have an approval process for games, unlike Microsoft and Sony. In some cases, that is good, because it gives developers more freedom, but at the same time that is the biggest reason we see crappy games constantly appearing on store shelves for the Wii and DS. You see, in the NES days Nintendo was very strict with their "Nintendo Seal of Quality", and really did only let quality games come out on their machines. Then, in the SNES days, Nintendo cut back some restrictions, and finally in 2003 eliminated the "quality" part of the Nintendo seal. In fact, I say that literally.... go check a Wii or DS game box for yourself, it doesn't say Official Nintendo Seal of Quality, it says Official Nintendo Seal.

I don't particularly trust EGM's reports for most things, especially since they are so anti-Nintendo (they compared MP3 to Halo in their review, and this is the second anti-Nintendo report they've done in the past two or three months), but it does shed some light on things. Nintendo really should work on putting quality back into that seal, especially if it means we'll see less of crappy games like Chicken Shoot, Escape from Bug Island and more.

Man, that is mighty ridiculous if they don't approve games anymore. Not only are they toning down some of the best franchises on their consoles, they are now allowing other people to bring the reputation of the system down even further. When will it end?ihateelvis

I really don't care. I know which games are crap before I even see them on the shelf. Approval or not, it's good for indy devs to have games (dragonblade comes to mind) on a commercial console.

Besides, I'm pretty sure we all know which games we like before we even buy them. I am rarely ever on the fence with a game.

Who cares about the crappy games? We aren't forced to buy them, so they don't affect us at all. We drive up demand of the quality games by buying them, so the developers get the message.murlow12

Well, with the Nintendo Wii a lot of the crappy games will probably still end up selling very well, and perhaps the third-party developers will realize that they can get away with making a low-quality game, and focus more time on making them. Any way you look at it, it doesn't bode well for us more hardcore gamers.

[QUOTE="murlow12"]Who cares about the crappy games? We aren't forced to buy them, so they don't affect us at all. We drive up demand of the quality games by buying them, so the developers get the message.ihateelvis

Well, with the Nintendo Wii a lot of the crappy games will probably still end up selling very well, and perhaps the third-party developers will realize that they can get away with making a low-quality game, and focus more time on making them. Any way you look at it, it doesn't bode well for us more hardcore gamers.

Nintendo wants third party support and they can't afford to be picky. There's plenty of good games for the systems but games like "Hannah Montanna" and "That's so Raven" they're crap, but companies want tomake money on the name and Nintendo wants to sell games and have a large library. Kids like Nintendo and they'll play crappy games based on Spongebob and they don't care which is why the Wii will continue to sell. There's a lot of people who go into a store, don't read magazines or blog on Gamespot who ask "what has the biggest library?"

I mean there's a ton of crap DS and GBA games but last year "Hannah Montanna" on the DS outsold every PSP game, so what does that tell you? Kids like Nintendo, and they don't care about quality. In the past parents bought PS1 and PS2 for their kids but what parent is going to spend $600 so their kid can play Spongebob? Think about it.

If you look at sheer numbers, the Wii has many more games coming out for Christmas. Sure a lot of them are shovelwear and liscenced games but it isn't like Sony and Microsoft don't have their share of crap. Mobile Suit Gundam Crossfire anyone? And the PS3 and 360 have their share of crappy liscenced games too.

You have this hardcore gamer audience who is mad because a systemthat is low priced, fun, doesn't have HD graphics or a DVD player or some massive online network, it outselling the overpriced HD boxes. What these critics fail to understand is the hardcore demographic of 18-35 year old males makes up only 25% of the population and as far as Nintendo is concernedthey'd rather have 75% of the pie. Nintendo gave up on the hardcore gamers because they gave up on them. I'm talking about these fairweather Nintendo fans who had a NES and SNES but traded their N64s for PS1s and passed up the childish Gamecube and then the Wii came along and offered something new and these guys are like "I like Nintendo again!" But they are like the guy who dumped his girlfriend only to come crawling back to find she found someone new and said "you had your chance. Get lost!"

The Wii is selling well and the hardcore community is upset. Well, stop your crying and get over it.

Well,if they did start being more strict with game quality,you know where third party support would go????WAY down.Not good.789shadow

You're right there. Back when the NES had all third party developers bowing down to them, it was easy to have quality control but then Sega came along and allowed a lot more games and was known for more crap games too (Shaq Fu anyone?) but if they're too strict about the games, developers won't want to make games. Also, even if a lot of games are crappy, analysts have already said that there are more Wii games coming out this Christmas than on the PS3 or 360 and when people go into stores asking about a console and they realize that the Wii has the most games, it seems like a good buy. That idea helped the PS2 win the race the last time. It's head start gave it some edge but as its sales grew, all developers wanted to make games for the console with the largest market.

Developers and publishers want money. That's what it comes down to. They see who's buying Wiis, and it's a casual market that doesn't read the magazines, or blog on websites. It's kids and their parents, just as a lot of kids have GBAs and DSs and they buy those Disney and Nickelodeon games and don't care. Sure the hardcore gamers can whine and cry that the Wii is ruining the gaming market but it doesn't change the fact that the Wii is selling like crazy and will probably sell like crazy this Christmas.