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StarTopic Nintendo First Party Software Development |ST| Nintendo Party Superstars

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TheMoon said:
this is missing (most notably) NERD (formerly Mobiclip) and all those non-dev companies they bought that nobody cares about :)
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Okay, now look here... I legitimately forgot to put down NERD and iQue, and am completely unaware of any other company Nintendo bought or has a majority stake in, since I don't see anything else on their company profile, so there. <_<
 
OctoSplattack said:
Okay, now look here... I legitimately forgot to put down NERD and iQue, and am completely unaware of any other company Nintendo bought or has a majority stake in, since I don't see anything else on their company profile, so there. <_<
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Only one I remember in the last 10 years outside of these are them buying a company that distributes their products in Japan, the name was Jesnet

www.nintendolife.com

Nintendo Acquires Japanese Company JESNET To Gain Control Of Product Distribution

Will result in "rapid decision-making and an improvement in sales service"
www.nintendolife.com www.nintendolife.com
 
Blue Monty said:
Only one I remember in the last 10 years outside of these are them buying a company that distributes their products in Japan, the name was Jesnet

www.nintendolife.com

Nintendo Acquires Japanese Company JESNET To Gain Control Of Product Distribution

Will result in "rapid decision-making and an improvement in sales service"
www.nintendolife.com www.nintendolife.com
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thought there was another one but I probably thought about the joint venture with DeNA that formed Nintendo Systems or something but mostly yea that sales company was what I was thinking
 
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OctoSplattack said:
Just to go down the list of Nintendo acquisitions:
  • Retro Studios: Nintendo had a stake in the company from day one, as an alliance between them and Jeff Spangenberg. They just bought out Spangenberg's part of the company as part of the salvaging operation, when it became more than clear he wasn't managing the studio well at all.
  • Monolith Soft: Their relationship with Namco was souring due to the executive that championed their work at Namco retiring. Since a managing director at Nintendo was already pretty fond of them, with Monolith having already done a few Nintendo exclusive projects on top of that, they used that connection to push for Nintendo to purchase a controlling stake in them.
  • 1-Up Studio: Their work on Super Mario 3D Land seems to be what directly led to their restructuring into a Nintendo support studio (primarily for EPD Tokyo stuff) after years of working closely with Nintendo, going back to their very first game being published by them.
  • Next Level Games: The owners wanted to sell the company. By this point, NLG had been making games exclusively for Nintendo for a decade, with almost every game they delivered being a million-seller and Nintendo directly approaching them to produce projects like Luigi's Mansion 2.
  • SRD: Not sure what prompted this purchase, since Toshihiko Nakago hasn't retired yet, but maybe they just wanted to get it out the way before he does, who knows? In any case, SRD has exclusively worked as a support studio for Nintendo, programming on countless games going back to the Famicom.
  • Nintendo Pictures: I think Dynamo Pictures is the only company that didn't have strong ties to Nintendo prior to the purchase. They made the Pikmin shorts, and Miyamoto praised their work on that project, but Dynamo was pushing out work for dozens of companies. No special bond here, as far as I can tell. This was a case of Nintendo expanding their multimedia efforts, needing a good company under their belt that can help manage and lead those efforts, and knowing from past dealings that Dynamo fit the bill perfectly due to their experience with everything from gaming cutscenes to film to VR to live performances.
EDIT: It has been brought to my attention that I forgot NERD and (technically) iQue. To make it quick, NERD (formally Mobiclip) was a Dynamo Pictures situation, as Nintendo loved the hell out of their video compression tech. iQue was them gaining full ownership of a joint venture company they made to sell games in China. Anything else that isn't related to game dev, I'll let others chime in on.
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Good summary. A minor correction -- 1UP was already 100% Nintendo (as Brownie Brown), they repurposed the studio during 3D Land development, and the original crew left. Another acquisition was ndCube. Nintendo already had partial ownership, they bought the rest and staffed the company (which at that point only existed in name only) with Mario Party staff leaving Hudson.

In any case, acquisitions like SRD or Next Level change absolutely nothing for us customers. They were already Nintendo developers before the acquisition. Likewise, for the inevitable acquisitions of Intelligent Systems, HAL and maybe Camelot when the owners want to sell.

I don't think Good Feel and MercurySteam are in that position yet. Good Feel seems to enjoy their autonomy (HAL and IntSys also have independent projects, but they are very minor), and Mercury only made 2 games for Nintendo, both with very troubled development.
Blue Monty said:
Only one I remember in the last 10 years outside of these are them buying a company that distributes their products in Japan, the name was Jesnet

www.nintendolife.com

Nintendo Acquires Japanese Company JESNET To Gain Control Of Product Distribution

Will result in "rapid decision-making and an improvement in sales service"
www.nintendolife.com www.nintendolife.com
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Even that company fits the NERD / SRD / NextLevel pattern -- they worked with Nintendo for years before being bought.

Nintendo Pictures is the only exception. There was an existing partnership, but nothing major.
 
BlackthornOrion said:
I also think when it comes to Nintendo, there's maybe an element of not wanting to deal with all the "this studio is basically a 1st party in practice but is still technically a 3rd party and it'd be easier to talk about if they were all actually just 1st party" cases. Again, more of a problem for people that talk about video games more than they play them.
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What many people seem to forget is that Nintendo has historically been driven by its internal development. Most of the best and critically acclaimed games were made in-house at their Kyoto offices. Studio acquisitions really don't make sense for Nintendo because it's more rewarding to them, to hire and expand the in-house development they already have, rather than buy a bunch of studios.
 
Gingerbread Man said:
Good summary. A minor correction -- 1UP was already 100% Nintendo (as Brownie Brown), they repurposed the studio during 3D Land development, and the original crew left. Another acquisition was ndCube. Nintendo already had partial ownership, they bought the rest and staffed the company (which at that point only existed in name only) with Mario Party staff leaving Hudson.
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Thanks for the correction! I wasn't 100% sure about 1UP's situation due to having games published by other companies when they were Brownie Brown, so I threw it on the list just in case, and ndCube was another oversight on my part.
 
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Gingerbread Man said:
Good summary. A minor correction -- 1UP was already 100% Nintendo (as Brownie Brown), they repurposed the studio during 3D Land development, and the original crew left. Another acquisition was ndCube. Nintendo already had partial ownership, they bought the rest and staffed the company (which at that point only existed in name only) with Mario Party staff leaving Hudson.

In any case, acquisitions like SRD or Next Level change absolutely nothing for us customers. They were already Nintendo developers before the acquisition. Likewise, for the inevitable acquisitions of Intelligent Systems, HAL and maybe Camelot when the owners want to sell.

I don't think Good Feel and MercurySteam are in that position yet. Good Feel seems to enjoy their autonomy (HAL and IntSys also have independent projects, but they are very minor), and Mercury only made 2 games for Nintendo, both with very troubled development.


Even that company fits the NERD / SRD / NextLevel pattern -- they worked with Nintendo for years before being bought.

Nintendo Pictures is the only exception. There was an existing partnership, but nothing major.
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Mercury Steam is probably the longest shot for acquisition considering Nintendo’s tendencies & circumstances with MS. They’ll be the oft fantasized one along w/ P*
 
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I'm pretty sure most people who want a MercurySteam acquisition want it purely because they desire a studio dedicated to 2D Metroid.
 
What were even the most recent nintendo acquisitions? NLG, SRD and Nintendo pictures in the last 3 years? Nintendo does so few of them that its hard to remember when they happened
 
Nemesis24 said:
What were even the most recent nintendo acquisitions? NLG, SRD and Nintendo pictures in the last 3 years? Nintendo does so few of them that its hard to remember when they happened
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I think it was NLG in 2021, with SRD and then Nintendo Pictures in 2022 as the last three.
 
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jnWake said:
I don't really understand people's obsession with acquisitions. If Alpha Dream and Cing went under is because they had a lot of debt and, hence, were terrible purchases. The better option is for Nintendo to hire employees from those companies into their already existing internal teams.
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For AlphaDream, Cing and other partner studios it's often not much more complicated than people wanting more of the games that they like and fearing another Rare situation where you "lose" a developer's output and IPs like Donkey Kong lose their de facto home.

In most other cases it's just (not so) thinly veiled fanboyism.
 
The Giant said:
Add Platinum Games. I reckon PG will stay independent as they are now. Until something goes wrong and that Nintendo has first claim to buy the company
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i dont think Platinum Games want to be owned by someone, Platinum Games belogining to Nintendo limit them so much, they would be forced to just make software for Nintendo consoles, imagine they want to make a game for Xbox/Playstation, belogining to Nintendo will make them unable to do that(i would rater prefer then stay independent, rater then be limited to a single console)
 
ItWasMeantToBe19 said:
Yeah, a 3D Mario game taking 8 years is massively more reasonable than a 2D DK game taking that long.

The next 3D Mario should be expected to sell 25m copies and sell tons of hardware.

The next DK should be expected to sell 6m copies and not really sell much hardware.

Unless "development" here means like 3 people prototyping (but then how would it leak?)
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After a theme park and likely a movie dk doing 6mil may just be the disappointment of the decade.

I would hope they are at least trying to target returns and country 1, so 9 million
 
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OctoSplattack said:
Just to go down the list of Nintendo acquisitions:
  • 1-Up Studio: Their work on Super Mario 3D Land seems to be what directly led to their restructuring into a Nintendo support studio (primarily for EPD Tokyo stuff) after years of working closely with Nintendo, going back to their very first game being published by them.
Click to expand...
Gingerbread Man said:
Good summary. A minor correction -- 1UP was already 100% Nintendo (as Brownie Brown), they repurposed the studio during 3D Land development, and the original crew left. Another acquisition was ndCube. Nintendo already had partial ownership, they bought the rest and staffed the company (which at that point only existed in name only) with Mario Party staff leaving Hudson.
Click to expand...

I wanted to use these two posts to give value to the great work that 1-Up Studio does for Nintendo. Already as Brownie Brown with Mother 3 and, above all, as 1-Up Studio Inc. since Super Mario 3D Land, Super Mario 3D World, Captain Toad, Ring Fit Adventure and of course the phenomenal Mario Odyssey.

We haven't seen them in the credits of any game since 2021, but I'm looking forward to know what they are working on (I guess the next 3D Mario adventure).

brownie-brown-1up-studio.jpg


logo.jpg
 
Gingerbread Man said:
Another acquisition was ndCube. Nintendo already had partial ownership, they bought the rest and staffed the company (which at that point only existed in name only) with Mario Party staff leaving Hudson.
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NDCube was a start-up subsidiary conceived by Nintendo and their ad partner Dentsu. Nintendo had controlling interest 79% from day 1, so it was always a subsidiary. Dentsu eventually sold their shares back to Nintendo, but it didn't change much.

The notable change came when Nintendo retooled Monegi (a Nintendo joint-venture with Hudson) and hired several former members of Hudson, to basically restructured the entire staff and direction of NDCUBE.

I feel like the Nintendo late 1996-2000, was a time when Nintendo was starting and investing into a lot of companies.

Nintendo Start-Up Companies
Randnet, Monegi, Mario Company, Mobile 21, NDCube, Nintendo Software Technology, Nintendo Software Canada, Marigul Management

Nintendo Q-Fund
Genius Sonority, Alpha Dream

Nintendo Minority State Investments in Affiliates (20-25% equity)
Silicon Knights, Left Field Productions, Rareware, Retro Studios (which was soon after bought out by Nintendo), HAL Laboratory (which was later sold back to HAL when Nintendo and HAL did joint-venture Warpstar)





Gingerbread Man said:
Nintendo Pictures is the only exception. There was an existing partnership, but nothing major.
Click to expand...

I would argue Nintendo Pictures and Monolith Soft are on a similar level of going from some minor history to unexpectedly becoming subsidiaries. There are several Japanese companies with an extensive history of contracted work and assistance like Eighting, Grezzo, Good-Feel, and others that are currently independent and still freelancing/commission to other publishers.
 
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EAD Ninja said:
I feel like the Nintendo late 1996-2000, was a time when Nintendo was starting and investing into a lot of companies.

Nintendo Start-Up Companies
Randnet, Monegi, Mario Company, Mobile 21, NDCube, Nintendo Software Technology, Nintendo Software Canada, Marigul Management

Nintendo Q-Fund
Genius Sonority, Alpha Dream

Nintendo Minority State Investments in Affiliates (20-25% equity)
Silicon Knights, Left Field Productions, Rareware, Retro Studios (which was soon after bought out by Nintendo), HAL Laboratory (which was later sold back to HAL when Nintendo and HAL did joint-venture Warpstar)
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This was primarily due to the Nintendo 64 not getting enough third party support. So Yamauchi had to get a bunch of new investments going in order to keep it supported.

It was basically a proto Microsoft approach of using tons of money to invest in new studios to disguise a lack of content.

I feel like Iwata had the better long term approach by using Nintendo SPD to incubate and forge strong relationships with independent studios.
 
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EAD Ninja said:
NDCube was a start-up subsidiary conceived by Nintendo and their ad partner Dentsu. Nintendo had controlling interest 79% from day 1, so it was always a subsidiary. Dentsu eventually sold their shares back to Nintendo, but it didn't change much.

The notable change came when Nintendo retooled Monegi (a Nintendo joint-venture with Hudson) and hired several former members of Hudson, to basically restructured the entire staff and direction of NDCUBE.

I feel like the Nintendo late 1996-2000, was a time when Nintendo was starting and investing into a lot of companies.

Nintendo Start-Up Companies
Randnet, Monegi, Mario Company, Mobile 21, NDCube, Nintendo Software Technology, Nintendo Software Canada, Marigul Management

Nintendo Q-Fund
Genius Sonority, Alpha Dream

Nintendo Minority State Investments in Affiliates (20-25% equity)
Silicon Knights, Left Field Productions, Rareware, Retro Studios (which was soon after bought out by Nintendo), HAL Laboratory (which was later sold back to HAL when Nintendo and HAL did joint-venture Warpstar)







I would argue Nintendo Pictures and Monolith Soft are on a similar level of going from some minor history to unexpectedly becoming subsidiaries. There are several Japanese companies with an extensive history of contracted work and assistance like Eighting, Grezzo, Good-Feel, and others that are currently independent and still freelancing/commission to other publishers.
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Definitely was a time they did a lot with creating studios and acquiring them. I think after that post yamauchi they changed their motto
 
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Giancarlo said:
i dont think Platinum Games want to be owned by someone, Platinum Games belogining to Nintendo limit them so much, they would be forced to just make software for Nintendo consoles, imagine they want to make a game for Xbox/Playstation, belogining to Nintendo will make them unable to do that(i would rater prefer then stay independent, rater then be limited to a single console)
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“So I would not turn anything down, as long as our freedom was still respected.”
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“I agree, you don’t see that a lot [of acquisitions] in Japan and personally, I think it’s weird,” Inaba said. “For some of these big companies with all their money you sometimes think, ‘come on! Buy some companies up already!’ It does feel strange to see Japanese companies being passive all of the time.”
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www.gematsu.com

PlatinumGames open to acquisition talks ‘as long as freedom is respected’

PlatinumGames would be open to acquisition offers by another company as long as it gets to maintain its freedom, company CEO Atsushi Inaba has said.
www.gematsu.com www.gematsu.com
They’ve definitely changed their tune but I imagine the realities of being an independent publisher have smacked them in the face. Given their release record I don’t think Nintendo owning them would be the worst thing for them.
The Giant said:
Add Platinum Games. I reckon PG will stay independent as they are now. Until something goes wrong and that Nintendo has first claim to buy the company
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If something has gone wrong then Nintendo most likely aren’t gonna buy them they’ll just poach instead. I can only see an acquisition if it was something like a NLG situation where they want out & go to Nintendo first.
 
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Yeah, I don't really see Nintendo acquiring PlatinumGames. They've ballooned in size over the last few years and have yet to prove that this course is sustainable over the long term. Just seems contrary to Nintendo's usual MO. At most they would get a minority stake to strengthen the relationship, I think.

If Nintendo were in the acquisitions game, they should probably look towards Embracer. Not as a whole but parts of this walking corpse seem ripe for the picking.
 
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Sakamoto kicks down Team Cherry's door
throws a sack of gold bars in Ari Gibson's face
Gibson moans on the floor in agony, bleeding perfusely

Sakamoto: We own you now.
Pellen: You're paying millions to hire three Aussies?
Sakamoto: Yes. Now turn Silksong into a Metroid prequel. I desire dozens of teams constantly making Metroids.
Pellen: ...No?

throws another sack of gold bars
Jack Vine lies unconscious with broken nose, probably concussed

Pellen: ...We talking teenage Samus or baby Samus?
Sakamoto: Teenage. I shall now fly to Canada to force Brace Yourself Games to retroactively turn Cadence into Samus Aran.
 
I think it probably goes without saying that Nintendo isn't going to acquire a company that they don't have at the very least a tenuous relationship with.
 
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Dardan Sandiego said:
Yeah, I don't really see Nintendo acquiring PlatinumGames. They've ballooned in size over the last few years and have yet to prove that this course is sustainable over the long term. Just seems contrary to Nintendo's usual MO. At most they would get a minority stake to strengthen the relationship, I think.

If Nintendo were in the acquisitions game, they should probably look towards Embracer. Not as a whole but parts of this walking corpse seem ripe for the picking.
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Even there I have my doubts about them acquiring studios. Too many things in the check list that make Nintendo pass over them.
 
Dark Cloud said:
If Nintendo were to acquire someone I think it’ll be a studio no one was expecting.
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If they ever end up going for a curveball instead of one of the "most people thought they were already 1st party" studios, my personal bet would be on one of the bigger/established indie studios (something like Wayforward or Inti Creates).
 
BlackthornOrion said:
If they ever end up going for a curveball instead of one of the "most people thought they were already 1st party" studios, my personal bet would be on one of the bigger/established indie studios (something like Wayforward or Inti Creates).
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Most likely of these two is wayfoward due to have already collaborated with Nintendo in advance wars: reboot camp.
 
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crashazo said:
What's exactly weird?
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Most companies have way more job openings than this at most times.

Rare and Bioware are the only other devs I can think of that have almost no job openings and Bioware is clearly about to be closed unless Dreadwolf sells a ton. I don't think NGL is any trouble at all, but it's mildly interesting.
 
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crashazo said:
What's exactly weird?
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a single job opening,when a more powerfull console that will need bigger teams is releasing next year,they never had so few open positions before,i been tracking for almost a decade,every other nintendo studio have a lot more even smaller studios like indies zero or nst
 
MetalLord said:
a single job opening,when a more powerfull console that will need bigger teams is releasing next year,they never had so few open positions before,i been tracking for almost a decade,every other nintendo studio have a lot more even smaller studios like indies zero or nst
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given the second listing, they're looking for anyone and everyone. probably easier to just tell everyone to apply than to have separate listings
 
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Could NLG also maybe just not have any need for more specific positions for whatever they're working on?

More than anything I'm just absolutely delighted about the change in topic. Now let's not have the pointless a-word discourse again the at least the remainder of the year. :)
 
NLG putting out a general hiring call is, if anything, good news. They've got the freedom to explore and hire who they want; suggests both autonomy and trust on Nintendo's end.
 
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