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

Reader mode
Related to Retro Studios involvement in Mario Strikers, they haven't updated their web like they did with MK7 to add it to the games they have worked on. Their involvement must have been minimal and probably related to just DK Assets as speculated
www.retrostudios.com

Games

www.retrostudios.com www.retrostudios.com
 
MasterGold said:
Is that true? I know for a fact none of the level designers left for Nintendo expect for one who seems to be just a contractor now
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no, just one guy really went to nintendo,some to monolith,ndcube,gamefreak,etc a lot of artists worked on botw and xenoblade 2 but they were from outsourcing companies
 
Tye said:
This is absolutely coming sooner or later, or I’d hope so at least. We got Miitopia on Switch, after all. The only thing that worries me as a potential reason for why they may not continue the Tomodachi franchise on Switch is if they’re afraid, for whatever reason, to fully commit to making all areas of the game totally inclusive regardless of a Mii’s gender, as they’ve promised to do if the series continues… Like, they did it with Miitopia (only wish they would have avoided using gendered pronouns as well…), but then the “relationships” in that game are more vague and don’t include stuff like marriage and having children together, so I worry that Nintendo might potentially be avoiding going back to Tomodachi Life for that reason… Not that they should be avoiding it, of course, but also with gay marriage still not being legal in many regions (including Japan…) and LGBTQ+ issues becoming increasingly under attack as of late…I just worry Nintendo may be afraid to go there. =/
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They're made steps in the right direction recently (they did a recent ad with Neil Patrick Harris' family IIRC that was quite well received) but that could also just be NoA and not Japan. Either way, I hope we get the game on the Switch in some form and in a manner that is inclusive of everyone that would like to play it
 
Tye said:
Not that they should be avoiding it, of course, but also with gay marriage still not being legal in many regions (including Japan…) and LGBTQ+ issues becoming increasingly under attack as of late…I just worry Nintendo may be afraid to go there. =/
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For what it's worth, Nintendo are at least ahead of their own country's law; hasn't totally translated into their games perhaps but at least one aspect there isn't a concern.

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www.nintendo.co.jp

Employees: Working to build an environment where each and every employee can realize their potential. | CSR Information | Nintendo Co., Ltd.

This page introduces a variety of initiatives for creating an environment where each and every employee can take advantage of their strengths and realize their maximum potential.
www.nintendo.co.jp www.nintendo.co.jp
 
MetalLord said:
no, just one guy really went to nintendo,some to monolith,ndcube,gamefreak,etc a lot of artists worked on botw and xenoblade 2 but they were from outsourcing companies
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Yeah that’s what I thought the claim seemed like a easy way to explain why to some sonic went downhill post Generations despite keep a majority of staff leads
 
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lootjuggernaut said:
They're made steps in the right direction recently (they did a recent ad with Neil Patrick Harris' family IIRC that was quite well received) but that could also just be NoA and not Japan. Either way, I hope we get the game on the Switch in some form and in a manner that is inclusive of everyone that would like to play it
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MondoMega said:
For what it's worth, Nintendo are at least ahead of their own country's law; hasn't totally translated into their games perhaps but at least one aspect there isn't a concern.

CZkcGSL.png


www.nintendo.co.jp

Employees: Working to build an environment where each and every employee can realize their potential. | CSR Information | Nintendo Co., Ltd.

This page introduces a variety of initiatives for creating an environment where each and every employee can take advantage of their strengths and realize their maximum potential.
www.nintendo.co.jp www.nintendo.co.jp
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Yeah, my concern isn’t with Nintendo not being inclusive, ‘cause I know they’ve been pretty good in that regard in the time since Tomodachi Life—it’s with potential business decisions that could come as a result of regions that Nintendo does business in being hostile towards queer matters like that, and that giving them cold feet on releasing a game that would prominently feature queer relationships (that can’t simply be erased in localization like Fire Emblem support conversations) as a central mechanic, which a new Tomodachi Life absolutely would if Nintendo sticks to what they promised.
 
Found some things about Kazuyuki Endo, he has the Lead Enviroment artist for Resident Evil 7 and gave talks in graphics conferences about the Photometric system used on RE7 which he devised


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Old graph I made(so missing 2021 and 2022) but Nintendo is closing in on 2000 new employees since the launch of the Switch.
 
Also I wonder if the jump is in part due to acquiring NLG? Or did that number already count for the past FY, I don’t remember when the deal closed
 
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Blue Monty said:

The drop in average salary is probably the result of the combination of closer of SF officers, higher JP ratio of employees and higher ratio of new employees.
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  • In a conspicuous non-change, Nintendo, which along with a contracting firm is subject to a current National Labor Relations Board complaint, repeated the following language used in last year’s filing: “Labor unions do not exist in the Company but have been formed at some of its consolidated subsidiaries. Labor-management relations have been good, and there are no particular matters to be noted.
Thats interesting.
 
Mr Doggo said:
  • In a conspicuous non-change, Nintendo, which along with a contracting firm is subject to a current National Labor Relations Board complaint, repeated the following language used in last year’s filing: “Labor unions do not exist in the Company but have been formed at some of its consolidated subsidiaries. Labor-management relations have been good, and there are no particular matters to be noted.
Thats interesting.
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I have to assume Next Level Games is one with a labor union if any. Maybe Retro also?
 
Blue Monty said:
I would imagine that some of the european divisions are also under unions
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NERD (and even NoE directly maybe)? I think employee protection/laws are super tight in EU countries so that's super likely. But they say none in the company (meaning Nintendo's main branches?), so wouldn't NoE fall into that, or perhaps that's only in JP HQ.
 
Hero of Legend said:
NERD (and even NoE directly maybe)? I think employee protection/laws are super tight in EU countries so that's super likely. But they say none in the company (meaning Nintendo's main branches?), so wouldn't NoE fall into that, or perhaps that's only in JP HQ.
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I was thinking NERD yep and maybe some of the country ones (like Nintendo Spain or Nintendo France), the chances of NoE being unionized is probably low. In most cases even if they are not unionized it shouldn't be an issue due to labor laws being more strict but even then it isn't ideal, thankfully even if they are not unionized in most countries unions are common enough worker rights should be protected anyway
 
Blue Monty said:
I was thinking NERD yep and maybe some of the country ones (like Nintendo Spain or Nintendo France), the chances of NoE being unionized is probably low. In most cases even if they are not unionized it shouldn't be an issue due to labor laws being more strict but even then it isn't ideal, thankfully even if they are not unionized in most countries unions are common enough worker rights should be protected anyway
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Ah, interesting, thanks!

Also, your avatar made me look it up and here:

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In case you never found these before. :) (from Spriters Resource)
 
Here's a question; do we think these acquisitions were only really done thanks to Furukawa, or would Kimishima have done them had he stayed?

Next Level Games, SRD, Dynamo Pictures, all have been done in the last year and a half, so I'm curious if this is possibly Furukawa's main claim to fame/accomplishment as president, as he's otherwise mostly kept the ship sailing straight. But he's also possibly been the one to get those pro-employee programs (the Partnership Program for example) started as the aforementioned program only came to be last year.

Kimishima was chiefly responsible for making sure the Switch hit it right out of the gate. It's hard to know how much influence Iwata had on the Switch's total plan and subsequent marketing and deals. He died just under 2 years before the system launched.

Thoughts on the above?
 
Hero of Legend said:
Here's a question; do we think these acquisitions were only really done thanks to Furukawa, or would Kimishima have done them had he stayed?

Next Level Games, SRD, Dynamo Pictures, all have been done in the last year and a half, so I'm curious if this is possibly Furukawa's main claim to fame/accomplishment as president, as he's otherwise mostly kept the ship sailing straight. But he's also possibly been the one to get those pro-employee programs (the Partnership Program for example) started as the aforementioned program only came to be last year.

Kimishima was chiefly responsible for making sure the Switch hit it right out of the gate. It's hard to know how much influence Iwata had on the Switch's total plan and subsequent marketing and deals. He died just under 2 years before the system launched.

Thoughts on the above?
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SRD/NLG acquisition seem the type of acquisition Nintendo has always done. Owners of ‘2nd party studios’ wanting to sell due to retirement and at a low cost for Nintendo in NLG case especially it made sense because how volatile studio relationships in the West can be compared to Japan. I think under Iwata/Kimishima they would have happened, they are just really close one to each other because it is a sellers market

DP on the other hand it shows a complete different M&A policy from Nintendo probably the first of it’s type. I think under the old guard of Nintendo that wouldn’t have happened, while they have worked in the past it was just two times and most of DP work was for other companies (including PlayStation Japan) there isn’t the ‘Nintendo DNA’ you would expect. It can be that this is the result of their ventures outside of gaming which are in a different environment than the gaming industry where it is established force so they might be forced to break some rules, but is still something that goes against the usual M&A Nintendo policy we will see if this is a one time thing, restricted to non-videogame ventures or it will also happen in their gaming divisions. I expect this change to be only for for non-gaming purposes
 
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Blue Monty said:
SRD/NLG acquisition seem the type of acquisition Nintendo has always done. Owners of ‘2nd party studios’ wanting to sell due to retirement and at a low cost for Nintendo in NLG case especially it made sense because how volatile studio relationships in the West can be compared to Japan. I think under Iwata/Kimishima they would have happened, they are just really close one to each other because it is a sellers market

DP on the other hand it shows a complete different M&A policy from Nintendo probably the first of it’s type. I think under the old guard of Nintendo that wouldn’t have happened, while they have worked in the past it was just two times and most of DP work was for other companies (including PlayStation Japan) there isn’t the ‘Nintendo DNA’ you would expect. It can be that this is the result of their ventures outside of gaming which are in a different environment than the gaming industry where it is established so they might be forced to break some rules, but is still something that goes against the usual M&A Nintendo policy we will see if this is a one time thing, restricted to non-videogame ventures or it will also happen in their gaming divisions. I expect this change to be only for for non-gaming purposes
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Definitely some good points. It's just prior Nintendo let a lot of devs slip from their grasp, like AlphaDream, Skip, Monster Games, Cing, etc. (granted AD and Skip closed in the current era to be fair). Plus Yamauchi/Iwata didn't opt to buy Rare when they literally needed to to retain them, so it's hard to know how certain the same acquisitions would've still happened prior.

Iwata expressed how strict and rare the idea of acquisitions were and really the only major ones under him were Monolith and Mobiclip/NERD (maybe Retro, not sure). Plus the Hudsonification of NDCube to be fair, that was a biggie.
 
Hero of Legend said:
Definitely some good points. It's just prior Nintendo let a lot of devs slip from their grasp, like AlphaDream, Skip, Monster Games, Cing, etc. (granted AD and Skip closed in the current era to be fair). Plus Yamauchi/Iwata didn't opt to buy Rare when they literally needed to to retain them, so it's hard to know how certain the same acquisitions would've still happened prior.
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First I want to address the RARE/early 00s situation
Yamauchi era and letting Rare go was the result of his plans to recover Japan, in which he basically tried to repair the destroyed relationships with JP publishers abandoning almost all the western 2nd party studios, only one saved was Retro and that was because they already co-owned it and Prime 1 success. RARE GC output was poor and the money they could make selling shares was great for the ‘cheap’ Nintendo of that era

He decided to focus more on repairing the relationship with the JP publisher he had destroyed in the past. That resulted on the Capcom Zelda titles, F-Zero GX with SEGA (and pushing to make Nintendo hardware Sonic new home), Bandai failed takeover plus the start of them making games for Nintendo , Namco Baten Kaitos and Star Fox, Capcom 5 , etc While it didn’t work out as intented to recover market share in Japan it did something more important in the long run: repair the relationships with the JP industry.


Now the other ‘abandoned’ studios especially JP ones, in my opinion, are just the result of Nintendo for better or worse seeing no value in them, especially in AD case they were already making a game outside of the Nintendo umbrella so less reason for Nintendo to care about. Nintendo does see value in NLG/SRD, especially as subsidiaries
 
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ILikeFeet said:
the Dynamo acquisition feels like something that was long in the making through Iwata's initiatives
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I think it is the result of Iwata initiatives but it wouldn’t happen under Iwata. Iwata started it but only under a new board such move would have been possible, they would probably have just partnered and exchanged some share like they did with DeNa or CyGames
 
Blue Monty said:
I think it is the result of Iwata initiatives but it wouldn’t happen under Iwata. Iwata started it but only under a new board such move would have been possible, they would probably have just partnered and exchanged some share like they did with DeNa or CyGames
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I don't know. this isn't similar to how games are made. a production studio, even if just for oversight would have definitely been needed. so establishing one or purchasing one was inevitable. buying a studio already experienced in the industry is the best course of action. and then there's dancing around the studio's contract work and in-between if they weren't completely brought out
 
Blue Monty said:
DP on the other hand it shows a complete different M&A policy from Nintendo probably the first of it’s type. I think under the old guard of Nintendo that wouldn’t have happened, while they have worked in the past it was just two times and most of DP work was for other companies (including PlayStation Japan) there isn’t the ‘Nintendo DNA’ you would expect. It can be that this is the result of their ventures outside of gaming which are in a different environment than the gaming industry where it is established force so they might be forced to break some rules, but is still something that goes against the usual M&A Nintendo policy we will see if this is a one time thing, restricted to non-videogame ventures or it will also happen in their gaming divisions. I expect this change to be only for for non-gaming purposes
Click to expand...

Going to point out that a very similar thing already happened and this isn't exactly unusual.

Nintendo buys Jesnet, Nintendo renames Jesnet to Nintendo Sales Co., Ltd. (2016)

Nintendo buys Dynamo, Nintendo renames Dynamo to Nintendo Pictures Co., Ltd. (2022)

I think we see a clear pattern in some of their expansion M&A formula to strengthen or create certain areas of business.
 
EAD Ninja said:
Going to point out that a very similar thing already happened and this isn't exactly unusual.

Nintendo buys Jesnet, Nintendo renames Jesnet to Nintendo Sales Co., Ltd. (2016)

Nintendo buys Dynamo, Nintendo renames Dynamo to Nintendo Pictures Co., Ltd. (2022)

I think we see a clear pattern in some of their expansion M&A formula to strengthen or create certain areas of business.
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Jesnet was already the main distribution channel for Nintendo in Japan and made sense to make them their own I see that move the same as NERD, Dynamo on the other hand only has one (or two if you count Mother M) projects with Nintendo while having multiple for other companies and being active in all aspects of the creation of visual content in Japan which now will be limited it seems to Nintendo content only this is quite a big change.
 
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I have seen multiple posts of Strikers being a smaller project by NLG but is it really? Haven’t been able to find a count of the people credited in LM3 vs Strikers and NLG hired in 2020 developers for a Nintendo AAA game which I would imagine is Strikers? (Strikers being AAA makes me quite curious about the budget of NLG games but that is another topic)
 
Blue Monty said:
I have seen multiple posts of Strikers being a smaller project by NLG but is it really? Haven’t been able to find a count of the people credited in LM3 vs Strikers and NLG hired in 2020 developers for a Nintendo AAA game which I would imagine is Strikers? (Strikers being AAA makes me quite curious about the budget of NLG games but that is another topic)
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I’m very hopeful that it was and they could juggle something else with it, but I too would like to see receipts.
 
totofogo said:
I’m very hopeful that it was and they could juggle something else with it, but I too would like to see receipts.
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I mean there are some LM3 staff uncredited that haven’t left NLG, I just don’t think is enough to get another game by then quickly. Probably this small team was busy with the pre-production of the game and planning and now that they have released Strikers most Strikers team has moved to the development of that game while they have a small team for Strikers updates. This could mean maybe we get it in 2024? Instead of 2025 as we would expect
 
Blue Monty said:
I mean there are some LM3 staff uncredited that haven’t left NLG, I just don’t think is enough to get another game by then quickly. Probably this small team was busy with the pre-production of the game and planning and now that they have released Strikers most Strikers team has moved to the development of that game while they have a small team for Strikers updates. This could mean maybe we get it in 2024? Instead of 2025 as we would expect
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Prying for a new punch out
 
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Blue Monty said:
I have seen multiple posts of Strikers being a smaller project by NLG but is it really? Haven’t been able to find a count of the people credited in LM3 vs Strikers and NLG hired in 2020 developers for a Nintendo AAA game which I would imagine is Strikers? (Strikers being AAA makes me quite curious about the budget of NLG games but that is another topic)
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Alexis said:
docs.google.com

Next Level Games staff

docs.google.com docs.google.com

Hi everyone. I was curious so I decided to do research on credits of LM3 and MSBL. I have a few questions though on stuff I did not understand.

1. What does "additional work" mean? I've been looking thru a lot of credits lately and these two games were first time I saw this.

2. I left out producers for NLG, as well Nintendo staff, production, and "operations" for LM3, as the former I just did not include and the later I do not understand. I would need help to understand.

3. I also did not include QA staff, as I know what it stands for but wasn't sure if its something people include when doing this.

4. I did not include other studios that were listed or their staff.

I find doing this fun and maybe people can use as a base or learn something? But I would love advice as I have trouble understanding a lot of stuff.
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From the bottom of their link.


Number of staff -

Mario Strikers Battle League- 99

Luigi's Mansion 3- 109

64 NLG staff who worked on LM3 worked on MSBL

45 staff worked on LM3 but not MSBL

35 staff worked on MSBL but not LM3
 
I was curious about some of the studios who are credited for Mario Strikers: Battle League so here are my findings:
  • Retro Studios: We know who they are, they are only listed under special thanks so I presume their contribution was limited, may be related to Donkey Kong stuff similar to what Rare did back in the 90s and early 2000s when Donkey Kong was in other games.
  • SRD Co., Ltd.: Long time partner of, and recently acquired by, Nintendo. They did server development for the game.
  • Waterproof Studios: A CG and VFX studio based in Vancouver founded in 2012 who's previous works include the Mortal Kombat 11 and Injustice 2 story mode cinematics so I am guessing these are the people who made the opening cutscene for the game.
  • Gasket Games Corp: A game studio based in Vancouver founded in 2018 who has currently only released one game known as 'Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Stormground' which is a turn-based strategy game and they are currently working on a second game which is a multiplayer action RPG. This might be just general development assistance.
 
ILikeFeet said:
if Next Level was to work on something, I think it would be a 3D Donkey Kong. in fact, I think that's what Retro might have been working on but got canned
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3D Donkey Kong would be one of the biggest projects by Nintendo in recent times. Is too big to be just a smaller project NLG has been working on the side while working on Strikers. I also don’t know if NLG is even right now big enough for a Prime 4/Odyssey/BOTW type of game that I expect 3D DK to be but there is always the chance of hiring sprees and outsourcing

I also doubt Retro working on a 3D DK because according to reports they were working on a new IP got cancelled even if it was deep in development and they were put into making Prime 1 HD there is no time for DK in that timeline
 
ILikeFeet said:
if Next Level was to work on something, I think it would be a 3D Donkey Kong. in fact, I think that's what Retro might have been working on but got canned
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The reason why I could see the motivation of the next Donkey Kong having a longer incubation period and coming out of the internal EPD hub instead of the outside satellite studios is an attempt to have the cornerstone IP sit in the 10-30 million world wide (1 million+ Japan) club. It's why there is some immediate credence in the idea that the Tokyo branch has been working on establishing a DK team alongside the 3D Mario team - which we can hopefully see the fruits of in the next 6-18 months.

The formula just seems evident that outside of the ad hoc development Smash projects and GF Pokemon, the mega sellers strictly come out of EPD lead projects. That's why it just seems to make sense that DK establishes itself next to the big money EPD teams (3D Zelda, 3D Mario, 2D Mario, Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, Splatoon, Sports/Fitness etc.) going forward.
 
EPD needs to show their hand sometime soon on what their platformer development has been up to between the gaps from their last games (Odyssey, Maker 2) and the job listings from years ago.

I wouldn't think Nintendo would give DK to a studio like say Good-Feel, so if they have any near term plans for the franchise it would have to come out of EPD soon.
 
EAD Ninja said:
The reason why I could see the motivation of the next Donkey Kong having a longer incubation period and coming out of the internal EPD hub instead of the outside satellite studios is an attempt to have the cornerstone IP sit in the 10-30 million world wide (1 million+ Japan) club. It's why there is some immediate credence in the idea that the Tokyo branch has been working on establishing a DK team alongside the 3D Mario team - which we can hopefully see the fruits of in the next 6-18 months.

The formula just seems evident that outside of the ad hoc development Smash projects and GF Pokemon, the mega sellers strictly come out of EPD lead projects. That's why it just seems to make sense that DK establishes itself next to the big money EPD teams (3D Zelda, 3D Mario, 2D Mario, Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, Splatoon, Sports/Fitness etc.) going forward.
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Luigi’s Mansion is a 10m+ seller from NLG, Mario Party is a 10m+ seller from NDCube with potential for 20m.

What Nintendo is trying to do is for the big sellers to be produced by Nintendo owned companies not only by Nintendo EPD. This would explain the investment into Retro so they have their own 10m+ series in Metroid Prime (I’m not saying Prime 4 will be the one), only exception will probably be Monolith Soft due to them restricting themselves to RPGs only but the support they provide for Nintendo EPD is already enough I would guess


I agree that them wanting a DK EPD team makes sense especially inside EPD Tokyo, but is probably more a case that only EPD has the resources to do it plus the devs wanting to do it than them wanting to ensure all big AAA games are made in EPD.
 
I don't think any of us can say Nintendo expected Mario Party and Luigi's Mansion to join the 10 million plus club, or that they planned for it. Will they be pleased, and hope to continue that success? Sure, absolutely.

But it says a lot that the next projects NdCube and NLG were assigned after their big hits were smaller games (51 Worldwide Classics and Mario Strikers). Nintendo aren't banking on their subsidiaries to provide system-sellers the way they bank on EPD to provide that stuff.

When it comes to 'new' EPD mega sellers besides DK, I really think Tomodachi could be one to watch, especially if Nintendo can add some depth to it. In the longer term, once Nintendo have hardware with a camera and microphone, I'm expecting to see Nintendogs with AR gameplay come along.
 
MisterSpo said:
I don't think any of us can say Nintendo expected Mario Party and Luigi's Mansion to join the 10 million plus club, or that they planned for it. Will they be pleased, and hope to continue that success? Sure, absolutely.

But it says a lot that the next projects NdCube and NLG were assigned after their big hits were smaller games (51 Worldwide Classics and Mario Strikers). Nintendo aren't banking on their subsidiaries to provide system-sellers the way they bank on EPD to provide that stuff.
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NLG when they were independent mentioned LM3 being an AAA game and LM2 sold 6M units so it made sense to give a big budget to NLG to make it break the 10m barrier, considering the push it got and the budget it apparently got according to NLG I would say Nintendo expected big things for the franchise.

I agree Mario Party was unexpected but now that they have it as a 10m+ seller they promote it as such as we saw last year being the holiday game of Nintendo just like they did with LM3.

Nintendo studios in general work in smaller games between big sellers so I don’t think it matters that much but I agree EPD is still what Nintendo trust on carrying their consoles.
 
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Blue Monty said:
Luigi’s Mansion is a 10m+ seller from NLG, Mario Party is a 10m+ seller from NDCube with potential for 20m.

What Nintendo is trying to do is for the big sellers to be produced by Nintendo owned companies not only by Nintendo EPD. This would explain the investment into Retro so they have their own 10m+ series in Metroid Prime (I’m not saying Prime 4 will be the one), only exception will probably be Monolith Soft due to them restricting themselves to RPGs only but the support they provide for Nintendo EPD is already enough I would guess
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Think less of the bottom range of the numbers, and more of the higher range potential like the IPs I referenced - especially in Japan. Nintendo has traditionally remained very invested into their domestic sales.

LM was definitely a successful outlier. Surprising one! But one that is safe to say no one banked on. Metroid Prime doesn't really fit in this conversation. It's an expensive AAA game and Nintendo wants it to succeed, but it's not going to hit that mark of success in Japan, and probably teeter in 3-6 million world wide sales. Which is excellent but my argument is Donkey Kong is in the Mount Rushmore of Nintendo IPs important to their films, merchandising, and theme parks. Like they want it to potentially sell 1-2 million in Japan, and somewhere in the 10-20 million world wide this gen? (If it releases this gen, and it is releasing late so that may affect its ceiling).
 
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EAD Ninja said:
Think less of the bottom range of the numbers, and more of the higher range potential like the IPs I referenced - especially in Japan. Nintendo has traditionally remained very invested into their domestic sales.

LM was definitely a successful outlier. Surprising one! But one that is safe to say no one banked on. Metroid Prime doesn't really fit in this conversation. It's an expensive AAA game and Nintendo wants it to succeed, but it's not going to hit that mark of success in Japan, and probably teeter in 3-6 million world wide sales. Which is excellent but my argument is Donkey Kong is in the Mount Rushmore of Nintendo IPs important to their films, merchandising and theme parks. Like they want it to potentially sell 1-2 million in Japan, and somewhere in the 10-20 million world wide this gen?
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LM3 still hasn’t outsold LM2 in Japan the Japanese numbers weren’t surprising, it already was massive in Japan. I could see what you are saying though of wanting DK to be one of the big sellers and them not trusting any studio more than EPD (especially Tokyo that they develop the biggest games of Nintendo mascot) so it makes sense for them to play it as safe as possible with their decision of team and choosing EPD Tokyo for that reason.
 
Nintendo has surprisingly not leaned into the synergistic boon of their IP expansion as much as I thought they would. Super Nintendo World as an example represents the histories of a ton of Nintendo series like 2D Mario, 3D Mario, Mario Kart, Yoshi, Pikmin, and Donkey Kong. Of those 6, only 2 have actually gotten a new installment on Switch (3D Mario and Yoshi).

I do think Mario Kart constitutes a special case, but I'm surprised Nintendo has not asked itself "what are we doing to take advantage of the attention our IP is getting in the parks?" and this will only become more relevant once Super Nintendo World opens in Hollywood and Orlando.
 
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