Nintendo’s backlog for games that need porting is massive

Multievolution · Jul 1, 2021

Nintendo more than any of the other big two has hundreds of games (don't think that's an overstatement) that are inaccessible on their current gen, while true their systems did have features the switch doesn't such as duo screens and true motion controls it's still staggering to think about how many they're are.

We have dozens of Zelda and Pokémon games for example that would sell like hot cakes, a little work here and there is needed to get them running nicely on the switch I'm sure, but if priced fairly and maybe as bundles they'd not only make a decent profit but buy themselves time with their big development projects.

having to dig out my old systems to play these classics never gets easier, and when they start to fail, my choices are slim.

alexi52 · Jul 1, 2021

Nintendo needs to start making more collection(without a limited time period) of all their lesser titles

Strings · Jul 1, 2021

I think what you meant to use as the title was NINTENDO'S BACKLOG OF GAMES TRAPPED ON DEAD HARDWARE.

purseowner · Jul 1, 2021

'need'

Like, sure, it's important for game preservation and general future enjoyment for games to not remain left behind on old hardware, but some games were designed in a way that was highly hardware specific, and not everything can be brought over with every gen. The Switch will someday be old hardware too.

I'd love more ports, but let's stop acting like every port would be the definitive version or that we're entitled to ports and remasters of everything.

Efejota · Jul 1, 2021

Strings said:
I think what you meant to use as the title was NINTENDO'S BACKLOG OF GAMES TRAPPED ON DEAD HARDWARE.

It's more like this.

If you have a 3DS+WiiU combo the only Zelda game you can't play without modding is Four Swords Adventures.

It's really weird that they decided to ditch the virtual console now that their main console has finally reached a new audience.

Aurica · Jul 1, 2021

I miss the virtual console. I remember when the wii was out, and I thought the wii u would get GameCube games on VC. Then I thought maybe the switch would... Also, I feel like a fool for thinking they'd let me transfer my VC games between wii u and switch like they allowed between wii and wii u (although there was a fee—bastards). I feel like I'm mostly keeping my wii u at this point because I have like 5 Fire Emblem games on it and various other Gameboy and SNES games they won't let me play on switch.

Imagine what the library could have been like if they kept letting us move the VC games to subsequent consoles while more games and systems were added to the store. Sucks.

RedDevil · Jul 1, 2021

purseowner said:
'need'

This, specially seeing there's lot of stuff that won't sell not everything they do is a success commercially.

Napalm_Frank · Jul 1, 2021

Thank god for emulation. I miss the Wii VC days.

That goes for Playstation as well these days. Homebrew Vita and SNES Classic ftw.

GamerJM · Jul 1, 2021

I'm still frustrated that the Nintendo fanbase didn't know how good they had it with the Virtual Console.

kimbo99 · Jul 1, 2021

Wish they would have kept VC as a carry over from system to system. One can only dream

purseowner · Jul 1, 2021

GamerJM said:
I'm still frustrated that the Nintendo fanbase didn't know how good they had it with the Virtual Console.

Gamers will always be obsessed first and foremost with the new. Indeed, a lot of people only realised the value with its absence.

Dyle · Jul 1, 2021

As always expect the amount of money they would make would be less than you expect and the amount it would cost to port them would be a lot more than you expect. If they thought releasing more retro content would be more profitable than what they're doing now they would do it.

starfoxxxy · Jul 1, 2021

The problem with nintendo post wii is porting hardware specific games is a nightmare

games like Madworld or sin & punishment will remain in limbo

Deleted member 64609 · Jul 1, 2021

The amount of money these ports would make is less than it would cost to make them.

Efejota · Jul 1, 2021

GamerJM said:
I'm still frustrated that the Nintendo fanbase didn't know how good they had it with the Virtual Console.

It was a bit steep in pricing, and for some reason Square Enix never released a single RPG outside of Japan on the WiiU despite teasing us via Miiverse, but I loved discovering new games through the service. Ufouria (Hebereke) was one of the best surprises I had on the WiiU, Drill Dozer and SuperMario RPG finally released in Europe, and back when the 3ds was new the GB virtual console saved it from being an useless brick.

Dolce · Jul 1, 2021

GamerJM said:
I'm still frustrated that the Nintendo fanbase didn't know how good they had it with the Virtual Console.

Wii VC was pretty popular. People complained from day one with how it was handled on the 3DS and Wii U, literally starting from square one and dripfeeding.

Labor said:
The amount of money these ports would make is less than it would cost to make them.

Definitely not true for a lot of the bigger titles. I mean, Super Mario 3D All stars sold 9 million alone. But Nintendo can only re-release these games so often, and they save a lot of re-releases for software droughts and stuff.

GamerJM · Jul 1, 2021

Gravijah said:
Wii VC was pretty popular. People complained from day one with how it was handled on the 3DS and Wii U, literally starting from square one and dripfeeding.

During the Wii days, people complained on forums as well, saying the release schedule was too slow and that prices were too steep. In retrospect it was a lot more reasonable than I think we realized, especially with how high up retro games are now.

Terraforce · Jul 1, 2021

Labor said:
The amount of money these ports would make is less than it would cost to make them.

Doubtful. Metroid jumped to the top of the charts on both Wii U and 3DS after Dread got announced. Even if it's piggybacking off of an announcement, that's a lot of sales that could have been had on Switch. The same will and has often had for Zelda games.

Not to mention Pokémon charts literally every single week on the eshop for 3DS. There's not a single doubt in my mind that ports of those games would sell like hot cakes.

EatChildren · Jul 1, 2021

I suspect that many, like myself, were holding on to some hope that Nintendo had finally invested in the concept of a "legacy archive" accessible via subscription services thanks to the Switch Online, and were doing away with the needless gatekeeping and hardware bottlenecking that ports and packages lead to. Virtual Console was fantastic, but the idea of enticing a customer base to subscribe to a service that routinely updates with legacy titles that are 20+ years old fosters a sense of commitment to an ecosystem.

But, you know, here we are over 4 years into the Switch's life cycle and neither the NES nor SNES archives are complete, and there's not a whiff of any GameBoy -> Game Boy Advance titles coming across. It's how we do result in a situation where fans have new titles like Zelda and Metroid to look forward to, but no easy access to the enormous archive of legacy titles. And while I can understand the reluctance in Nintendo to add games to a subscription service if those titles are viable for ports (see: Skyward Sword), I can't imagine The Minish Cap or Metroid Fusion ever getting remade or re-released in the near or distant future in a way that would be economically viable. Maybe bundled into something, but I see it more likely they'll continue to rot into obscurity, inaccessible to most people who want to actually play them.

Switch Online back catalogue updating would be the most ideal option, in my opinion, to archive and create that legacy. Virtual Console is the next best thing to, at minimum, port and sell individual titles as-is. But that's Nintendo for you.

LegendofLex · Jul 1, 2021

GBA games would go a long way toward giving more pick up and play content to chew through. It's kinda miserable to go back to old hardware for those games at this point.

And obviously I'd take the N64 4-player library too. But IMO I think they'd need a wireless controller or custom remapped emulation to make it truly comfy.

Alas, the big bottleneck here is probably dev resources and willingness of third-party devs to hop on board, not dollars. But I'd happily pay premium subscription $$ forever to have a NES + SNES + GB + GBA + N64 + GCN + Wii library at my fingertips, even factoring out games that will get ported separately.

Antrax · Jul 1, 2021

purseowner said:
that we're entitled to ports and remasters of everything.

Consumers are entitled to whatever they want. Moving forward, games should be backwards compatible (indeed, there are console ecosystems that promise this), and so the simple solution is to promise the same thing, and then create Switch versions of their back catalog as best they can. I get the commercial argument for some titles, but that's laughable for things like Pokémon or Mario. Buying the old hardware is fine if it was decent, but asking anyone to buy a Wii U was a tough sell in 2013, let alone 2021.

scare_crow · Jul 1, 2021

purseowner said:
'need'

Like, sure, it's important for game preservation and general future enjoyment for games to not remain left behind on old hardware, but some games were designed in a way that was highly hardware specific, and not everything can be brought over with every gen. The Switch will someday be old hardware too.

I'd love more ports, but let's stop acting like every port would be the definitive version or that we're entitled to ports and remasters of everything.

Thank you. This idea that every game should be playable on every thing is a little silly.

Tochtli79 · Jul 1, 2021

Would have been amazing for them to bring back VC or expand NSO last year to pad out the release calendar due to covid delays. "But VC takes resources too", I know, still would have been amazing.

scare_crow · Jul 1, 2021

Antrax said:
Consumers are entitled to whatever they want. Moving forward, games should be backwards compatible (indeed, there are console ecosystems that promise this), and so the simple solution is to promise the same thing, and then create Switch versions of their back catalog as best they can. I get the commercial argument for some titles, but that's laughable for things like Pokémon or Mario. Buying the old hardware is fine if it was decent, but asking anyone to buy a Wii U was a tough sell in 2013, let alone 2021.

No one is asking you to buy a Wii U and no, you are not entitled to whatever you want.

Antrax · Jul 1, 2021

scare_crow said:
No one is asking you to buy a Wii U and no, you are not entitled to whatever you want.

If you want to play Wind Waker HD (for example), yes, you're required to buy a WiiU.

And yes, consumers are entitled to ask for whatever they want. It's a free market. Nintendo can of course not make whatever they want too.

Consumers should never be empathizing with corporations though; I don't care what reason Nintendo has for not porting games trapped on the Wii U over. That's not my problem to care about.

Rosebud · Jul 1, 2021

purseowner said:
Like, sure, it's important for game preservation and general future enjoyment for games to not remain left behind on old hardware, but some games were designed in a way that was highly hardware specific, and not everything can be brought over with every gen. The Switch will someday be old hardware too.

That's why BC is crucial. Like on PC you just need to port it once and it's there forever.

texhnolyze · Jul 1, 2021

Labor said:
The amount of money these ports would make is less than it would cost to make them.

Where did you get that idea? Porting games costs a fraction of developing them from scratch. They can sell them at full price, or at least $40, and they don't need to sell millions to recoup the porting cost. Switch is a very successful system, everything sells on it anyway.

Tavernade · Jul 1, 2021

Feels worth noting that, for the most part, everything outside of GCN, VB, G&W, and Super Scope has been made available in the past ten years somehow, and is still available on a live game store (admittedly on dead hardware). I'm still (perhaps stupidly) hopeful that at least N64/GB/GBA makes it to Switch somehow.

GamerJM said:
I'm still frustrated that the Nintendo fanbase didn't know how good they had it with the Virtual Console.

I swear I remember nothing but complaints about everything being overpriced.

D.Lo · Jul 1, 2021

Multievolution said:
that would sell like hot cakes

Citation needed.

If Virtual Console was some massive money spinner, for so little effort, they would have continued it.

They haven't abandoned it out of spite. Almost certainly ROI was poor.

Antrax said:
Consumers are entitled to whatever they want.

Lol

Deleted member 64609 · Jul 1, 2021

D.Lo said:
Citation needed.

If Virtual Console was some massive money spinner, for so little effort, they would have continued it.

They haven't abandoned it out of spite. Almost certainly ROI was poor.

Lol

That can't be the case, developers and publishers hate consumers so much that they'd rather make less money than please people

Multievolution · Jul 1, 2021

D.Lo said:
Citation needed.

If Virtual Console was some massive money spinner, for so little effort, they would have continued it.

They haven't abandoned it out of spite. Almost certainly ROI was poor.

Lol

Pokémon crystal VC last I check was still selling like crazy years later, it featured on every weekly top sales for 2019 and I believe 2020 if not this year too, the switch is a more popular console than the 3ds therefore it stands to reason it would be more effective here.

Or are you telling me a cartridge/digital collection of all the pre ds Pokémon and zelda's or if they found a way to get past the second screen 3ds/ds era ones wouldn't sell? I would stake near enough anything that they would make a lot of money.

Even if that wasn't the case though, theres going to come a point (and we are arguably close) where link between worlds is going to be harder to access than link to the past, and that's a little sad.

slothrop · Jul 2, 2021

It's their insurance policy for unexpected software droughts basically.

purseowner · Jul 2, 2021

Antrax said:
Consumers are entitled to whatever they want. Moving forward, games should be backwards compatible (indeed, there are console ecosystems that promise this), and so the simple solution is to promise the same thing, and then create Switch versions of their back catalog as best they can. I get the commercial argument for some titles, but that's laughable for things like Pokémon or Mario. Buying the old hardware is fine if it was decent, but asking anyone to buy a Wii U was a tough sell in 2013, let alone 2021.

And artists, people, make this stuff. An entitled attitude is toxic - it breeds situations like the Pokedex controversy for Sword and Shield, the Mass Effect 3 ending redux.

And there's nothing 'simple' about it - backwards compatibility is a hard thing to get right from an engineering perspective, and can often constrain experimentation in future hardware.

WhoaIsThatMars · Jul 2, 2021

Multievolution said:
but buy themselves time with their big development projects.

And take away resources from big development projects...

Multievolution · Jul 2, 2021

WhoaIsThatMars said:
And take away resources from big development projects...

That's not how that works, smaller teams can port games and allow the rest to focus on said big projects, otherwise we'd never game old rereleases ever.

Dolce · Jul 2, 2021

Multievolution said:
That's not how that works, smaller teams can port games and allow the rest to focus on said big projects, otherwise we'd never game old rereleases ever.

It's more that resources are finite. The reason you don't see these constant ports or anything is that well most people Nintendo are hiring are working on other projects.

That's why having something like a VC/NSO where most of the work is building a longterm emulator is important, as the games themselves (though they of course still need it!) require less hands on work.

Multievolution · Jul 2, 2021

Gravijah said:
It's more that resources are finite. The reason you don't see these constant ports or anything is that well most people Nintendo are hiring are working on other projects.

That's why having something like a VC/NSO where most of the work is building a longterm emulator is important, as the games themselves (though they of course still need it!) require less hands on work.

I just wish they had more than they do currently is all, even a community aspect for example where you can vote on the next game if your a switch online member would be cool.

KtSlime · Jul 2, 2021

According to folks with too much time on Wikipedia, 3DS, Wii U and Switch are the same gen... So that must mean they are still available for Nintendo's current gen.

oatmeal · Jul 2, 2021

I plugged in the Wii U near my bed so I can play it handheld in bed.

Man, aside from the absolutely HORRIFIC LOAD TIMES in the system menu and boot up - the system is just amazing. And handheld FEELS great. It's absolutely more comfortable than the Switch, and I love how "Nintendo" it all feels. The music, the little touches like MiiVerse.

Virtual Console is amazing. NES Remix 1/2 are amazing. Shame that shit's been left behind.

m4st4 · Jul 2, 2021

Off the top of my mind... Games that would make me a very happy Switch owner:

-EarthBound
-Galaxy 2
-Majora's Mask
-Twilight Princess
-Metroid Prime Trilogy
-Metroid Fusion

Jay_AD · Jul 2, 2021

Sometimes I wish Nintendo would actually work with external developers on this kind of thing. There are a number of studios that are really good at this, and would do wonders if given the proper resources.

Basically give that shit to M2 is what I'm saying. Have them make premium Criterion Collection editions of old Nintendo games.

Dragonyeuw · Jul 2, 2021

The big disappointment for me was the abandonment of the VC. Now I get that alot of companies now sell their titles in collections, but that doesn't stop Nintendo from loading up the Switch with their own games or whatever else they can still license. I don't want access to their back catalog restricted to recurring sub and I don't see why it has to be a zero sum game with them.

I've owned the Switch since 2017, I have no plans to sub to Switch online( no I don't care that its 'only $20'). I would load the hell out of it with some NES/SNES/GBA/N64 titles ala carte, and that option died with the wii U/3ds. I have my NES and snes classics but playing something like ALTTP or Super Metroid laying up in bed or on the go would be perfect( yes those titles are on Switch online, but as I said.....).

WhoaIsThatMars · Jul 2, 2021

thaquoth said:
Basically give that shit to M2 is what I'm saying.

Again, resources are finite lol. M2 is a pretty small studio and they seem to have their hands full working on several projects.

Rocky Road · Jul 2, 2021

Antrax said:
Consumers should never be empathizing with corporations though; I don't care what reason Nintendo has for not porting games trapped on the Wii U over. That's not my problem to care about.

This is like one of the only posts in this thread that's actually right. Why are there so many corporate bootlickers in here?

Jay_AD · Jul 2, 2021

WhoaIsThatMars said:
Again, resources are finite lol. M2 is a pretty small studio and they seem to have their hands full working on several projects.

Yes.

I know that this will never happen realistically. That's not what this was about. It's just wishful thinking. :)

Rodney McKay · Jul 2, 2021

I still have a decent collection of my favorite GameCube games, but I'd be 100% down to rebuy ports of most of them on Switch.

But I have no issue with emulating the games I have. One of the things I'm most excited about with my next phone upgrade is that I can probably play most GameCube games at full speed. My current phone plays a decent amount of them, but F-Zero GX is my favorite GameCube game that I most want to replay, and it still chugs too much to be playable.

Deleted member 51789 · Jul 2, 2021

purseowner said:
'need'

Like, sure, it's important for game preservation and general future enjoyment for games to not remain left behind on old hardware, but some games were designed in a way that was highly hardware specific, and not everything can be brought over with every gen. The Switch will someday be old hardware too.

I'd love more ports, but let's stop acting like every port would be the definitive version or that we're entitled to ports and remasters of everything.

This pretty much. It's a 'nice to have', not an essential.

Roosevelt · Jul 2, 2021

I don't really see the issue. By the end of this year Nintendo will have released upwards of 25 games in the form of remasters or remakes of games from their legacy hardware on the Switch. Sure, a lot of them are more or less re-releases of Wii U games, but the trend is definitely heading towards finding ways of releasing other types of games.

LinkStrikesBack · Jul 2, 2021

kimbo99 said:
Wish they would have kept VC as a carry over from system to system. One can only dream

People don't really care though. There are literally hundreds of classic games on the eshop through various platforms, many of which before were under the "virtual console" brand.

Y'all are fetishizing a brand label over what the actual content was.

evilmonkey · Jul 2, 2021

Antrax said:
Consumers should never be empathizing with corporations though; I don't care what reason Nintendo has for not porting games trapped on the Wii U over. That's not my problem to care about.

You're allowed to want things. But expecting a corporation to invest in something with poor ROI? Not reasonable.

Nintendo’s backlog for games that need porting is massive

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