Topic: Why won't nintendo invest in new game studio acquisitions?

I mean they spent all this money on getting into the mobile game market (which I don't care for, but hope it works out well for them), but won't invest in new game development studios. This is one of the areas that they're lacking in. Currently Sony has more development teams. You'd think that since they aren't getting third party support, that they would balance it out by increasing their internal studios. They've talked about it before, but so far no results.

http://mynintendonews.com/2014/01/31/nintendo-is-now-consider...
http://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/229824/Nintendo_on_acquisi...

Platinum games
Next level games
Monster games
Level-5
Wayforward
Playtonic

All good candidates, that would help bridge that 4 month gap in between first party releases. Anyone agree?

Not really. Owning half of those won't make much difference since they work closely anyway. They would spend their money on little return.

Level 5 is also too large to buy out.

You don't get anything for your money. They could 'buy' those studios and the next week the staff could all leave. What are they left with then?

I don't think that'd accomplish much. Most of these companies aren't in financial trouble, and they'd probably end up a bit limited if they were bound entirely to Nintendo consoles.

I don't know about those devs in particular but what I've been saying repeatedly for the last few years, to seemingly little agreement, is that Nintendo should start making exclusivity contracts with their best indie developers.
The fact that games like Shovel Knight and Steamworld Dig both started as Nintendo exclusives but then went to other platforms is a big missed opportunity in my opinion. Given how popular and successful those games were, and given that they'd already shown a desire to favour Nintendo, the amount of incentive they'd need to remain Nintendo exclusives would surely have been small.
Thoughts?

^

Its alot of money. I think nintedo buying IP's and creating their own game studios would be better for them in the long run actually.

I think you need to have a clear plan on what to do with the IP you purchase if you're not just going to sit on it and in that case there's no point (how's it going with those Hudson Soft IPs Konami?)

Creating new studios is viable in the long term, but it also means it's going to take years before you get to see any results.

The reason in my opinion is because they have plenty of IP and there is no guarantee the talent won't leave leaving them with nothing. (The majority of people who made Metroid Prime are no longer at Retro they didn't like it).

People who have worked together for a long time is what Nintendo has that the Western developers lack. You cannot just buy more of that. (They took on the Mario Party workers that were with Hudson).

Maybe I am wrong and the Japanese are just harder working but I don't think it is that.

Because it costs money.

Anyway, why is everyone so obsessed with Nintendo buying out another developer? It benefits the consumer far more if they just strike exclusivity agreements. When they buy a developer, competition goes away.

lol @ buying Playtonic.

Let's allow them to finish the damn game and see if it's any good before people start crowning them.

It would be cool if Nintendo bought some unused (and once popular) 80'-90's franchises and revived them, but then again, Nintendo already has dozens of their own that they don't know what to do with anymore.

So instead of having these companies make their games on Nintendo, Nintendo should spend a ton of money to own them so that...they can put their games on Nintendo.

Becuase its dumb. Buying a company outright that you have no prior relationship is asking for a Rare where you watch the talent drop. With playtronic we don't even know if they're game will be good.

A good purchase for Nintendo would be someone like next level or do what Microsoft has been doing in recent time and straight up build new studios from scratch.

See the thing about the deal with DeNA is that there are benefits for both sides. DeNA gets to develop content with Nintendo's IP with Iwata specifically saying that he didn't want to devalue their premium content on dedicated devices. People seem to be ignoring that last bit entirely, it makes it pretty clear what is and isn't happening. In exchange DeNA is going to develop some cross-platform infrastructure for them, which almost certainly means some sort of cross-buy and cross-play.

If they brought a share in some of these third party developers what would each of them get out of it? Presumably that would basically just mean that they were sharing IP. I don't see how in most case that can't be just done with some sort of temporary agreement.

I don't see a point in Ninty buying studios but I would like to see Ninty start working with more Euro/US developers, whilst there is Retro, Next Level and Monster what Ninty needs more of is Western style games (as well as sports games) since Nintendo charm and nostalgia will only take them so far at this point. Saying that Ninty are making steps in the right direction with Splatoon.

Nintendo needs to allow NoE and NoA to set up their own dev studios, simple as that really. Doing this, they can start using some of their older IP again, even if they're just smaller eShop projects. Heck, even with the new direction Nintendo are heading in, they could even use the older IP as smart phone games.

Nintendo isn't in short of IP in order to purchase studios to make new ones. Beside, exclusivity agreement has less risk nowadays.

Actually NoA does have its own development studio: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_Software_Technology

I don't think the idea is all that bad, but Nintendo could instead work with these studios and give them Nintendo IP to make games with… as a way to test the waters of their potential relationship, it just as an alternative to conpletely buying them out.

Isn't that going on though, Next Level has had Punch Out & Lugi's Mansion, Monster has had Pilotwings & Excite, Good-Feel have has Kirby & Yoshi etc but wouldn't it be better for them to work with companies to make games that Ninty can't/wont make like Bayonetta 2, Last Story and Sin & Punishment?