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Anonymous Indie Devs speak out on the growing pains of Switch eShop Curation

maxcriden

Member
Not long ago, however, we were contacted by and followed up with multiple respected and established 'Nindie' developers unhappy with aspects of Nintendo's approach to the Switch eShop. Issues related to curation and communication have been at the core, and we were painted a picture of an arrangement and set of policies that undoubtedly pleases those in the door, but has left those on the outside at times frustrated, ignored and in some respects embittered. Some were hesitant to be quoted even anonymously due to upcoming business with Nintendo, while others were happy to share their perspectives - directly and indirectly quoted - while being un-named.

In addition to Nindies with notable track records of quality eShop releases on previous systems, we've spoken to a small number of other developers that are new to Nintendo hardware and making their first steps. In talking to these developers, with records of high quality and intriguing download titles on various platforms, we agreed to share their perspectives anonymously. There's a willingness to discuss aspects of Nintendo and the Switch eShop, but not at the risk of damaging future business and publication hopes. We're naturally respecting this.

That said, some have tempered complaints and issues with on-the-record moderating remarks on the challenges Nintendo undoubtedly faces, so we'll also reflect that perspective. The goal is to show that, underneath the 'Nindie' PR and positive talk of curation, Nintendo faces challenges in order to avoid alienating some of the developers and projects that will be needed for the eShop's future success; that's the story to be told.

Anonymous Indie Dev #1

I've had a long-standing relationship with Nintendo for many years. We've gone out eating and drinking multiple times, and I consider many of them to be my friends. I've always brought my A game to Nintendo platforms and have been responsible for some of the highest rated games on their systems, so it had always been a good relationship. I reached out to them very early on back when the Switch was still called NX and people didn't even know if it was a handheld or a console. It was a bit of a slap in the face that after all of the years of partnership, I would get very formal corporate responses to my emails.

I had always felt that Nintendo was trying to help us succeed in the past, but now that they're the only platform with a new system, they're just turning their backs on their most loyal partners. It felt very impersonal and arrogant. I'll still probably make games for the Switch once I'm let in, but as soon as the honeymoon phase for the system is over, they are going to be way down on my list. From this point on, I no longer feel like I have a personal relationship with Nintendo. It's 100% transactional.

Anonymous Indie Dev #2

There's no doubt that Nintendo systems have been plagued by shovelware over the years. But Nintendo's solution to this is broken. First, they're being very inconsistent. Their stated policy is that they're not allowing any ports. And yet, about half of the games are ports! Second, because the people in charge of making the decisions are marketing people with no experience on the development side, they don't know how to evaluate games that are still in development. They look at a game that's 20% complete and then they can't extrapolate what it will be like after an additional year or two of development.

It's a huge step backward for the industry for indies to be put in a position where we have to pitch games to a marketing guy who's never made a game before. That's the way the industry was ten years ago when the only way to release a game was through a publisher. Now indies should be able to go directly to consumers. And it's the height of arrogance for Nintendo to think that it can predict where the next big hit is going to come from. Didn't they learn anything from Nintendo 64? They tried this same approach back then and lost virtually all publisher support.

Great feature, and much, much more here:

Nintendo Life: The Growing Pains of Curation on the Nintendo Switch eShop

(summary courtesy GoNintendo.com)
 
Never change Nintendo. Keep sticking that knife in your leg.

It can hardly be called growing pains when their storefront on the Wii U is better.

Why as a developer would want one to work with Nintendo when at the end of the day, they really don't give a shit about anything except their own?
 

cyberheater

PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 PS4 Xbone PS4 PS4
Mediocre hardware, fantastic games, shit company.
 
I have a feeling I know who that second anonymous dev is. He's been complaining about the same points on twitter. Not gonna say his name to keep anonymity though.
 

poodaddy

Gold Member
Fascinating accounts that shed some much needed light on the BTS decision making involved with Nindies. I can't shake the curiosity of who the anonymous devs are....but I have theories.
 

wrowa

Member
The quotes in the OP are actually from the same person. Both of them are attributed to "Nindie 1" in the article.
 

NOLA_Gaffer

Banned
So the Wii U and 3DS eShops are wall-to-wall garbage and the Switch eShop is so tightly curated that Nintendo is cutting off some long-time collaborators?

That's kinda hilarious. Find a mid-point, Nintendo.
 

BigEmil

Junior Member
Fascinating accounts that shed some much needed light on the BTS decision making involved with Nindies. I can't shake the curiosity of who the anonymous devs are....but I have theories.
Maybe Dan Adelman of Axiom Verge but doubt it:
C-M2-fGXoAEvjR7.jpg:large
 

Jackano

Member
Painful really.
It looks like in the past 12 months, Nintendo of America simply destroyed all the hard work that took years to Dan Adelman to build.

Remember that pre-launch Switch threads were pretty positive and full of hope for Switch eShop after the improvements seen on 3DS and Wii U.
I'm really starting to think there are some huge problems at several key positions at NoA.
 

RedBoot

Member
They said they didn't want ports? Why??

More likely they want some sort of exclusive content or timed releases. Shovel Knight was one of the headliners for launch, and it was a port, but they got Specter Knight as a timed exclusive.

Platforms should know by now that such terms don't really help anybody, but here we are. :p
 

borghe

Loves the Greater Toronto Area
it seems like they opened the doors wide open for wii u, heard the complaints about shovelware flooding the system, then massively overcorrected for the switch launch.

surely this doesn't seem like something that is even difficult to fix. at the very least, all developers with a proven track record on Nintendo systems should receive preferred status. put the formal canned emails and extra hoops to jump through for those with unestablished or shitty track records.
 
Anonymous Indie Dev #2 said:
Their stated policy is that they're not allowing any ports. And yet, about half of the games are ports!

I honestly don't get Nintendo's rationale for (mostly) not allowing straight ports. I mean, I guess it's better that ports are enhanced or added to in some way for the Switch, but isn't the fact that Switch is portable enough of a differentiating factor to justify straight ports? Is anyone going to look at the system poorly because games that debuted on the PS4 or X1 a year or two ago are now on a portable system?
 

Xando

Member
Disappointing that nintendo still is this shitty company policy wise. Why don't they learn from their mistakes

it seems like they opened the doors wide open for wii u, heard the complaints about shovelware flooding the system, then massively overcorrected for the switch launch.

surely this doesn't seem like something that is even difficult to fix. at the very least, all developers with a proven track record on Nintendo systems should receive preferred status. put the formal canned emails and extra hoops to jump through for those with unestablished or shitty track records.

Sony and MS can do it without being full of shovelware. This is just nintendo being nintendo
 

LordKano

Member
Wouldn't even surprise me if it's another dumb NoA's decisions. European studios doesn't seem to have any difficulties getting a Switch devkit, even if they aren't a longterm partner with Nintendo.
 
The Switch eShop has been pretty good so far though it's a bit weird to turn down past collaborators.
Wonder if Nintendo Life tried contacting Damon Baker about it.
 

Papacheeks

Banned
I honestly don't get Nintendo's rationale for (mostly) not allowing straight ports. I mean, I guess it's better that ports are enhanced or added to in some way for the Switch, but isn't the fact that Switch is portable enough of a differentiating factor to justify straight ports? Is anyone going to look at the system poorly because games that debuted on the PS4 or X1 a year or two ago are now on a portable system?

Sure you do. Doesn't it sound like a familiar Indie Clause Microsoft had when this generation started?

Because they had a clause stating you had to have some new content with the game if it was coming to their platform later or after it was released prior on another platform.
 
Reading the article there are actually only 4 devs with complaints. OP is attributing the same devs complaints as 2 different ones.

One dev's complaints were about the difficulty in getting a dev kit without a publisher, which we already knew about and were told was only a temporary thing during this early period in the Switch's life, not a new policy going forward indefinitely.

The other complaints about lack of communication and marketing guys being in charge definitely seem annoying and detrimental to garnering good relationships, but again they seem to stem back to the main issue/policy of Nintendo currently only really wanting curated content. However it seems like how they go about choosing it can be improved.
 

-shadow-

Member
I find it hard to believe that Nintendo won't let ports on the console when most games announced and released so far are all ports either from themselves or other studios. Wonder where that came from.
 
Wut. Other than Bomberman I'm struggling to think of a single third party Switch game that ISN'T a port.
I imagine port means "late port" without enhancements.
Blaster Master is a 3DS port but they launched simultaneously. Shovel Knight had timed exclusive content. Tomorrow Corp games have some joy con functionality. Etc.
 

RedBoot

Member
Wut. Other than Bomberman I'm struggling to think of a single third party Switch game that ISN'T a port.

Besides what I said in my earlier post, I think it's more of an issue with late ports. Like, Has-Been Heroes and Snake Pass both launched on multiple systems alongside the Switch, so that's probably okay. Meanwhile, something like Axiom Verge is already out elsewhere, so they don't want that without something like extra content, probably.

Will be interesting to see how that goes down the line. Off the top of my head, Yooka-Laylee will be a "late port" for Switch. Will that be allowed?
 

Cerium

Member
Wut. Other than Bomberman I'm struggling to think of a single third party Switch game that ISN'T a port.

This is about indies and the eShop.

The following games are either brand new or some form of exclusive and I can recommend them all:

Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap
Graceful Explosion Machine
Shovel Knight: Spectre of Torment
Fast RMX
Blaster Master Zero
VOEZ

Snipperclips

Kamiko is coming out tomorrow.

Has Been Heroes had mixed reviews but some people swear by it.
Mr. Shifty is a fun game with some performance issues, a patch is supposedly forthcoming.

There is a new indie eShop release every single week. Next up is TumbleSeed.

I know because making these OTs is kind of my hobby at this point.
 
Adelman keeping it classy with that last tweet. That should help.

I really hope Nintendo are paying attention if this is as bad as some are saying.
 
Painful really.
It looks like in the past 12 months, Nintendo of America simply destroyed all the hard work that took years to Dan Adelman to build.

Remember that pre-launch Switch threads were pretty positive and full of hope for Switch eShop after the improvements seen on 3DS and Wii U.
I'm really starting to think there are some huge problems at several key positions at NoA.

You might have a point if they were short of content but theres games being released every week on the eshop and there's a huge number coming, i just think a bit of perspective is needed, at this point in the life of the Wii U the floodgates still hadnt opened either
 
Besides what I said in my earlier post, I think it's more of an issue with late ports. Like, Has-Been Heroes and Snake Pass both launched on multiple systems alongside the Switch, so that's probably okay. Meanwhile, something like Axiom Verge is already out elsewhere, so they don't want that without something like extra content, probably.

Will be interesting to see how that goes down the line. Off the top of my head, Yooka-Laylee will be a "late port" for Switch. Will that be allowed?

In what rationale is not allowing a port a bad thing? Axiom Verge is amazing, but let's not allow it on the Switch. This is assinine.
 

Kintaro

Worships the porcelain goddess
Nintendo will Nintendo. None of this is surprising to me. All of it was expected, to be honest. They can't stop getting out of their own way. Not that it hurts them at all, which is the worst part. None of this hurts them and they will not learn because of it.
 

Gummb

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about Rayman Legends Wii U.
It honestly sounds like a capacity issue. Nintendo needs more staff and less protectionist policy. It must be difficult working for Nintendo sometimes...
 

LordRaptor

Member
it seems like they opened the doors wide open for wii u, heard the complaints about shovelware flooding the system, then massively overcorrected for the switch launch.

This is the takeaway, and something the members of GAF who are constantly moaning about "shovelware" and how stores need to be curated should bear in mind.
 

jonno394

Member
I'd be very interested to know what Devs these are and what games they're talking about. One mentions ports but then goes on to complain about Nintendo thinking they can predict what the next big thing is, which didn't sound like a port to me.

I'm slightly concerned one of these may be wayforward :/
 

mjc

Member
Doesn't surprise me in the least. Nintendo also seems to take one step forward in certain areas, then two backwards almost right after. They need a major overhaul to their business side.
 

LordKano

Member
I imagine port means "late port" without enhancements.
Blaster Master is a 3DS port but they launched simultaneously. Shovel Knight had timed exclusive content. Tomorrow Corp games have some joy con functionality. Etc.

I doubt that these devs couldn't just add HD rumble support and call it a day. NoA is probably just using that excuse of "we don't want ports" to refuse early access to some game devs.

I mean, so far the indies content on Switch is well-managed and every week there are cool games to look forward. I'd say that there will probably be more good indie games on Switch at the end of the year than there was during Wii U's whole life. Barring one exception, there hasn't been much shovelware too. So the effects are working, but there's a huge problem if it stops competent devs from releasing their games. How couldn't the launch line-up use Axiom Verge ? Why do they have to wait while Hamster is bringing Neo Geo games every week ? It makes no sense.

NoA's weird. They're nice to people who usually never make indie games for Nintendo consoles but suddenly turn back on the people who were already making games for them. Like, what's the reward for working on Wii U ?
 

Seik

Banned
I imagine port means "late port" without enhancements.
Blaster Master is a 3DS port but they launched simultaneously. Shovel Knight had timed exclusive content. Tomorrow Corp games have some joy con functionality. Etc.

But I did I Am Setsuna entirely and it's the very definition of a late port, there's nothing added to it compared to the PS4 version that came out a good while before it.

I don't think it even have HD Rumble, nothing. :lol

Maybe this works with regions? I see people mentioning NOA....I can't read the article at my job but yeah, it wouldn't surprise me, I hate NOA ever since the Xenoblade Chronicles shit.
 
But I did I Am Setsuna entirely and it's the very definition of a late port, there's nothing added to it compared to the PS4 version that came out a good while before it.
Not an indie, physical Square Enix release. I'm also pretty sure it has exclusive content as well.
 

Toki767

Member
But I did I Am Setsuna entirely and it's the very definition of a late port, there's nothing added to it compared to the PS4 version that came out a good while before it.
Well if you're Nintendo you aren't going to tell Square Enix no if they want to release a late port.

This issue seems to be for indie devs.
 

RedBoot

Member
In what rationale is not allowing a port a bad thing? Axiom Verge is amazing, but let's not allow it on the Switch. This is assinine.

Agreed! But platform holders have kept doing this sort of thing for a while, so I guess they don't quite like it.

Really, it's especially dumb on the Switch since the system basically gives a built-in advantage to most ports due to the portability of the system. If an indie isn't on Vita, it's probably the first "portable" version of the game. That should be more than enough to justify it.
 

DMONKUMA

Junior Member
But I did I Am Setsuna entirely and it's the very definition of a late port, there's nothing added to it compared to the PS4 version that came out a good while before it.

But isn't this issue just considering indie games? I don't think Setsuna falls under that category.

Edit:Oh it has exclusive content as well didn't realize that...
 
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