Topic: Do you prefer 3rd party over 1st party Nintendo games?

@Snatcher
I personally have different ideas about 1st party Nintendo games and 3rd party games.
The reason I still don't have higher interest with certain 1st party Nintendo games because their games diversity are very limited.
For example Mario games.
Are the games good enough for me ?
Maybe yes maybe no because some of Mario games in my opinion not really fun to play regardless of the score from Metacritic, but I don't depend on Mario games only to play similar games.
I will actively looking for 3D / 2D platformer alternative games that offer something je ne sais quoi, something that made me interested more than Mario games.

And so far from genre diversity, 1st party Nintendo games are still lack of interesting games with genre that I like more from 3rd party games (Rhythm, Life Sim, Farming sim, Minecraft style sandbox, Cooking games).
Have Nintendo ever make their own Farming Sim game like Story of Seasons / Harvest Moon?
Have Nintendo ever make their Rhythm games like DDR / Beatmania IIDX?
They don't have games like that so far but 3rd party games have.
And the ideas from 3rd party developers really win my heart in term of their game genre I want to play.
I didn't say Nintendo 1st party games are suck but I don't buy Nintendo machine for only playing 1st party games. I will get bored quickly and it will limiting my gaming experiences.
I want to mix up with 3rd party games but 3rd party games really impressed me more than 1st party Nintendo games.

@Anti-Matter Yeah if you just stuck too first party’s I’m sure you would get board, however they said the fact that you can, (which I agree with) just shows you how good there games are, sure animal crossing isn’t a farm sim, but animal crossing give you a daily routine, while boring to some, it is different, Mario odyssey is a vary unique platformer, with an amazing mechanic, while sure it might not be like something like crash, it’s mechanics make it vary unique, and like no other game! Metroid literally made a genre, and Legend of Zelda still provides a unique experience you won’t be getting anywhere (and yes there are open world games like it, but they don’t feel like it)

Saying Nintendo isn't a good developer because they don't make a specific game is dumb. It's like saying that the Beatles weren't a good band because they didn't make a Rap album. Or that Christopher Nolan isn't a good director because they haven't made a Romantic Comedy. Of course art is subjective, you can well argue that you don't like the content that those artists produced. But to argue that they are bad because they didn't make something in a very specific genre? It's a pretty weak point to be making to say the least

However, if person who for whatever reason blocked me wants to make that point? Then lets make a point of eviscerating that argument even further:

Rhythm Games
Donkey Konga
Warioware
Rhythm Heaven
Also worth noting Elite Beat Agents, Nintendo published

Life Sim
Animal Crossing (social sim including farming sim elements)
Tomodachi Life
MiiTopia
Also worth noting Fantasy Life, Nintendo published

Tower Defense
Dillon's Dead Heat Breakers
Star Fox Guard

Simulation more generally
I mean, how broad is our definition here? Hard one to list out. You could argue that Pokemon Snap is a photography sim. Would you count the Wii Sports series as sporting sims? Maybe. Pokemon Pinball was definitely a pinball sim. Then there are the titles like Art Academy, Brain Training etc which are kinda "sim adjacent"? I guess you could argue Wii Fit and Ring Fit are exercise tools so maybe these count?

DDR-Likes specifically
Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix (drops mic)

That was just a cursory look, I'm sure there are others I've forgotten about or somehow missed along the way. Really, what I want to know is where is Sony's RTS. Nintendo has Pikmin, Sony doesn't have anything like that. And what about Action RPGs? I mean sure Sony has heaps of them, like lots, but you know none of them have that je ne sais quoi of Fallout 76. You know? Therefore by the logic I dictate right here third party games are better than 1st party Sony titles

Let me breakdown about DDR Mario Mix with DDR on PS1, PS2, XBOX, XBOX 360 and Arcade.

DDR Mario Mix was still weak from my DDR gaming experience for 20 years.
From the game itself, how the hell I play DDR Mario Mix with Gamecube controller which the button patterns doesn't even looks like DDR panel position?
That was one biggest mistake of DDR Mario Mix.
Second mistake was the difficulty rating that seems pretty weak compared with DDR on PlayStation / XBOX / Arcade.
Third mistake was the lack of speed modifier and arrow color option when DDR on PS2 and Arcade already have speed modifier to speed up the arrows movements and make the gap between arrows less crowded so it will be easier to read.
From the songlist on DDR Mario Mix, it seems the songs itself by collectively still weak for my taste compared with DDR on PS2, XBOX, Arcade with more banger musics and more challenging stepcharts to step.
Will I consider DDR Mario Mix for my Gamecube collection?
Maybe yes... If only I can use PS2 controller + adapter from PS2 to Gamecube slot, but it still weak DDR game for my collection when DDR on PS2 are the strongest.
Do I think Nintendo good enough to ask Konami to make their Nintendo songs arrangement by Konami artist?
I think the songslist was not bad but not strong enough for my taste.
Maybe the Nintendo fans with less experience in DDR games have no problem with any Nintendo music entry and Mario characters on the screen, but for me as DDR veteran those are not enough to be called good DDR games.
Still not good enough for me, I expected something better.

And for other Rhythm games by Nintendo, I still do not like Rhythm heaven as I want Rhythm games with interface at least like Beatmania IIDX or DDR or Pop'n Music or Drum Mania which I can see the notes falling down or going from down to up and I have to press them with right buttons and right timing.
Why I really ask for this?
Because my Rhythm gaming experience from DDR, Beatmania IIDX, Pop'n Music, Para Para Paradise, Drum Mania, etc set my expectations really really high and Nintendo Rhythm games still way under my expectations bar.
They are still not good enough for me.
Gimme something like DDR / Beatmania IIDX by Nintendo (not by 3rd party developers) and I will happily to dig in that new Rhythm game by Nintendo.

I'm not even going to open this in incognito to see what that post was. I'm sure it's replying to my post as the other one was. But if you want to enter into a discussion with me you probably shouldn't have blocked me. Just, you know, that's not really how that works

edit: was curious if I had somehow blocked Anti and didn't remember. Not something I'd do but I don't know, maybe I did? Had a look. I don't have anyone blocked, I had one user ignored, a user with a random number as their account name. Presumably a spam account. I unignored them and can't see any of their post history so I assume the one post they made that caused me to ignore them was deleted by a mod

Frankly, I'd be happy to see that feature removed from this site entirely.....

@Snatcher
The games that rated really good by a lot of peoples and Metacritic, probably are not for me.
Let's take one example Super Mario Galaxy.

The games was rated 97 by Metacritic, but for me it was like 65.
Why?
Because the game wasn't really fun for me.
It was pretty difficult and a lot of planets in Mario Galaxy were frustrating to play so it made me never want to replay the same stages anymore after cleared them.
Also, we cannot even keep the accumulated lives in Mario Galaxy games as it will be reverted back 5 lives when you load the game again. It was lame in my opinion as it made the games became harder and tedious to recollect again multiple lives. I already dislike that idea.
I have finished the game long time ago but it wasn't a fun journey to beat Final Boss Bowser so I didn't touch the game since I finished the game. It was enough for me. With some disappointment from Mario Galaxy, I gave the score 65 as the game felt too hard for me to enjoy. In this case, I really disagree with the statement of Mario Galaxy being the best 3D platformer. I believe the 3rd party games might have even better gameplay that will be suitable for me.

And for Super Mario Odyssey, it was quite good for me but it was like baby step of No Game Over screen while the 3rd party games already did that features long time ago before Mario Odyssey. I called it too late.
While the game itself already quite good for me, but I still found the 3rd party games for the same genre have something that made me more engaged than 3D Mario games, from character design, storyline, voice acting, the gameplay concept, etc.
The games I meant are Spyro Reignited, Kao the Kangaroo, The Smurfs Mission Vileaf.
Side notes, I already bored with high pitched Mario voice by Charles Martinet. I prefer Chris Pratt voice as Mario with brotherly voice.

I prefer 3rd party over 1st party games on Switch. My favorite game on Switch is SMT V. I playing in Diablo III and Fatal Frame IV on it now. But mostly I buy a 3rd party games on Playstation because it's my main platform and games have a better quality on it.
I like Nintendo games too, but it's' not a usual nintendogames like mario or zelda. I like a Fire Emblem and Xenoblade series.

@Anti-Matter That means that Nintendo doesn’t fit your taste, which I have to be honest is vary specific. Sure it’s opinion based wether Mario galaxy is good or not, but it did do something different, it did do well, and it did leave a good memory in a lot of players minds.

I know people have an issue with game over screens, but I never saw the issue with them, just like you can lose a game of chess, cards, Uno, you lose, I feel like it hands some reason not to just plow through the game, however I think Mario odyssey it did it well, because it took your money instead, so at least I couldn’t be reckless.

Those game you mentioned are no Mario games, sour is great, but it’s pretty dated in design, and the other three I haven’t played so I can’t comment on them. But as the and it’s ok for you not to like any of this, but the comment I quoted was talking about how these games can provide you with such different experiences that you, might not never need to play 3rd partys, key word is might, doesn’t mean everyone is, heck I don’t even they half of players do, but it’s something you could do, just because of there sheer diversity.

@Professor_Plumber Nintendo is a one of a kind, I really don’t know how they do it lol. We wait a long time for these games but it’s usually always is worth it, Botw took forever, pikmin took forever (it’s not out so can’t say for sure) Metroid prime is taking forever, and that’s because the dev didn’t like how it was going, because of stuff like this we get quality content, now is that to say Nintendo has never made a bad game? Of course not, but there good outweigh the bad in my opinion.

@Snatcher
But as a human, you know one thing maybe never enough so the unique experiences from 1st party Nintendo games still not enough for me as I keep expanding my gaming experiences from other games so I can adapt with new games quickly.
Sometimes, the different experiences from 1st party Nintendo games are not interesting for me after I got the comparison from 3rd party games for similar games. Let's say Rhythm Heaven vs DDR.

From my perspective, the Rhythm concept from Rhythm Heaven was unique by using random characters to show the rhythm patterns that you must press the button, but Rhythm Heaven is not the right model for a decent rhythm games for my taste as the rhythm games like DDR / Beatmania IIDX / other Rhythm games by Konami already set the bars really really high and those Rhythm games became my standard by providing banger musics, interesting U/I design, difficulty degrees, challenging stepcharts, scoring system, etc.
Rhythm Heaven is unique rhythm game but without the design like DDR or other Rhythm games by Konami, Rhythm Heaven looks straight flat and boring for me.
The uniqueness from Rhythm Heaven just simply useless for me as I want something cool from Rhythm games, not the weird looking things.
And thus I still prefer 3rd party games over than 1st party Nintendo games when the uniqueness from 1st party Nintendo games don't even working on me.

While I disagree with the premise of why this thread was even created (just an echo chamber to re-emphasize one's distaste for Nintendo games) I do actually think it's a valid discussion to have, at least for the open minded people looking for discussion rather than an ego boost.

This is a complex topic to address. I'll start by saying that, generally speaking, Nintendo is my favorite company that makes video games. In terms of both quality and quantity, no other developer/publisher matches their output.

Thats not to say they nail it every time. I'd estimate 40% of their games are middling (definitely not "bad" but, not extraordinary either) and 10% are genuinely bad. But the other 50% range anywhere from great to spectacular. And perhaps more importantly, they tend to appeal to my tastes. Be it Metroid, Zelda, Fire Emblem, Xenoblade, 3D Mario, DKC, Splatoon, Mario Kart, Pikmin... they make a lot of games that rank on my all time faves list.

Having said that, I love 3rd party games too. It's just that, the majority of modern AAA does not appeal to my taste, so modern trends have resulted in fewer and fewer 3rd party games interesting me. The ones I tend to like fall in a certain subset. Games like Persona, Trails, Monster Hunter, Final Fantasy (the older stuff), Resident Evil, Platinum Games action (Bayonetta, Astral Chain, Nier Automata, Wonderful 101), DOOM and Wolfenstein, Triangle Strategy and Octopath Traveler, Ori games, Portal, Sniper Elite, etc.

I'd say there's more 3rd party games I like in terms of quantity, but in terms of quality, I think 4 of my 5 top games of all time are Nintendo or Nintendo-adjacent. There's still some very good 3rd party games that rank among the best I've ever played though. (notably Monster Hunter).

Overall, I'd say it's a 50/50 preference. There's more 3rd party games I like, but that's because there's more of them. It's comparing every game across the entire industry vs one company. Of course higher quantity is expected. But in terms of quality, my favorite Nintendo games tend to rank higher for me than my favorite 3rd party games. Not always, mind you. But generally speaking. Like, Zelda Tears of the Kingdom is better than any 3rd party open world adventure game Ive played, Metroid Dread is better than any other 2D metroidvania I've played (Ori is respectably up there though), Metroid Prime Remastered is better than any 3D metroidvania I've played, Splatoon 3 is better than any competitive shooter I've played, DKC is better than any 2D platformer I've played, Mario Odyssey is better than any 3D platformer I've played, Pikmin 3 is better than any RTS game I've played, Fire Emblem is better than most strategy games I've played (though Mario Rabbids and Triangle Strategy are probably just as good imo), Xenoblade Chronicles is better than most JRPGs I've played (Persona 4/5 and Final Fantasy X are just as good if not better), Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is better than any cart racer I've played. Etc etc.

And the 3rd party games they secure are typically exactly the kinds I'm into. So like, Monster Hunter Rise, that's all me baby! Portal Companion Collection- some of my fave games of all time. Triangle Strategy and Mario Rabbids- 2 of the best strategy games I've ever played. Bayonetta 2/3, Astral Chain and Nier Automata- probably my top 4 action games of all time.

At the end of the day, it's all preference. But I appreciate games regardless of who makes them. As long as they fit the criteria of what I like and avoid the things I dislike (overly cinematic, slow forced walks with over the shoulder view, in-game cutscenes integrated with gameplay so control is constantly stolen from the player, online-only games, looter shooter games, games where story is 90% of the reason people consider it great but if gameplay was isolated it would be mediocre, racing sim genre, life sim genre, games requiring aiming as a core mechanic that don't offer gyro, and more).

@JaxonH
I personally have some interest with certain 1st party Nintendo games like ARMS, ACNH, Animal Crossing Amiibo Festival, 1-2-Switch, Mii games, Mario games, Dillon's Dead Heat Breakers, etc as those games are the only 1st party Nintendo games I have interest about.
I have zero interest with other 1st party Nintendo games like zelda, fire emblem, metroid, xenoblade, splatoon, earthbound as they are not even look interesting for me from every aspects.

When I bought Nintendo machines, I still looking for more 3rd party games I can play on Nintendo machines with 1st party games as the bonus for complementary, even my Wii / NDS / 3DS games are dominated by 3rd party exclusives on those Nintendo machines so when Wii U have very few 3rd party games to pick, I really frustrated to get more Wii U games to play so I ended up by limiting the maximum of Wii U games I can pick until 20 - 30 games.
Currently I have 18 Wii U games but I think I will make it 20 Wii U games before the end of year 2023.

Personally as someone who owns too many games I have dozens of Nintendo exclusives and literally 100s of random third party games. I really like the variety that cheap indies (or AAA games which go on better sales than Nintendo) give for the same price as a single full price game. And I agree they can often have their own unique charm. That said, more than half of my overall favorite games are Nintendo exclusives which is why I only have a Switch and not any other consoles.

My top genre is platformers and I have a zillion 2D and 3D platformers. Nintendo platformers definitely aren't the only ones I love, but the pure amount of polish in games like Kirby and the Forgotten Land and the huge amount of variety and community in games like Super Mario Maker 2 keeps Nintendo at the top of my list in this category.

Of the categories highlighted in the first post, my very favorite platformers, racing games, party games, and life sim games are all Nintendo games. My favorite farming and rhythm games are non-Nintendo and I'm not really a fan of tower defense.

In terms of music, I love Nintendo music, but I do think that some other games (final fantasy is a good example) have more songs that are just overall great songs rather than just great background-while-playing-game songs.

In terms of story-based games, Nintendo definitely has some, but I think my favorites tend to be non-Nintendo games, with a mix of Indies and the usual suspects like Square Enix. To be fair, I just don't play most Nintendo games for the story, I play them for the gameplay and overall fun.

@Anti-Matter Nah, it's not a genre issue. I am open to a large variety of genres, the issue is that 3rd parties tend to chase the same subgenres and gameplay mechanics and tropes in those games instead of mixing things up and doing something fun and new. For example, shooters tend to be war-based multiplayer games, racers tend to be car sims, and RPGs tend to be open world fantasy adventures. It feels like (and again, this is probably true to some degree) these game concepts were decided on by their executives in a boardroom based on what everyone else is selling. Nintendo, on the other hand, does not operate like this (or at least not as much). They approach a genre and tend to think about how they can make it fun and unique. Take Splatoon for example, that is very much unlike the CODs and Halos of the world in just about every way and that makes it stand out more in the shooter genre (or at least it did until Ninjala and Foamstars started chasing THAT trend, but they haven't been/probably won't be popular enough to be serious competition). There's little to no sense of uniqueness among third parties and it makes them feel like homogenous, generic mush, the games feel relatively indistinguishable from each other. Whereas Nintendo keeps trying new things and their games tend to do unique and interesting things that their peers do not, so I keep coming back to them. Now again, there's exceptions on both sides, there's some third parties I've felt are relatively unique and standout and there's some first party games that feel like they're phoning it in, but it's enough of a trend that my gaming preferences tend to lean about 80% Nintendo/20% other (and on Nintendo platforms it's more like 90/10).

Just thought it'd be worth re-iterating this one point I made that seems to be getting lost. Nintendo isn't a group of people in a garage making games. Games that will fit underneath that umbrella of "first party Nintendo games" in the minds of some of the commentors here are made by a variety of development studios. Sure these studios have the ability to draw from Nintendo's IP which they sometimes do and they sometimes don't. But they're different studios. Literally

There are something like half a dozen groups within Nintendo itself making games. The people making Mario, Zelda, Animal Crossing? They're all different groups. Then beyond that there are about a dozen companies that Nintendo has a controlling stake and/or some other agreement which involves making games just for Nintendo. Retro, Intelligent Systems, Monolith, Game Freak etc. Then there are titles like Mario & Rabbids, I mean Ubisoft is definitely NOT part of Nintendo but Nintendo owns half of the IP in that game and would've had strong influence in how their IP could be used

So where on earth do you draw that line? It's a bit of a pointless endeavour

And in any case, I don't think you can legitimately argue that everything Nintendo makes is bad. I mean you could, but whatever your saying is a bit of a bad faith argument. Going to be full of pedantic and arbitrary edge cases you try and worm yourself around the massive holes in that thought process. Because the fact, yes fact, is that the umbrella that is "Nintendo" produces enough content and in a wide enough variety that people do legitimately find a way to be "Nintendo only". I don't think that's really possible with any other company

And for the record, I am not Nintendo only. I'm probably majority Nintendo but not Nintendo only. Thinking about it here are the games I probably played the most over the last ~5 years:

• Cities Skylines
• Overwatch (haven't played 2, don't really intend to)
• Civilisation IV
• Beat Sabre
• Animal Crossing
• Zelda, just all of them
• Hades
• Dirt Rally
• Project Cars 2
• Tomb Raider
• Smash Bros Ultimate
• Mario Kart 8
• War Groove

Would I take all of the "not Nintendo" in that list over the Nintendo stuff in that list? I mean, the fact that it's even a question some feel needs to be asked says more than any answer would. There would be no discussion to be had this thread if you changed the word Nintendo for Ubisoft, Activision, EA, Microsoft or Sony and posted it on an equivalent fan site

@skywake I feel like the distinction is Nintendo exclusives versus other games. Yeah, that is a varied net, but it's still a dividing line. And it's a dividing line which doesn't apply to most game companies. Since a lot of people who buy Switch mostly play a relatively few games with a good chance of most of them being exclusives, it's kind of an interesting question. Switch is cheap and has a zillion games so it still makes sense to buy a Switch even for people who don't like any of the exclusives.

Personally, although I play a ton of non-exclusives, I imagine if it wasn't for the exclusives I love, I might have just played games on my laptop instead of buying a Switch. I would have liked a Switch if I had bought it, but it wouldn't have occurred to me to buy it without the Nintendo games draw.

PS5 has exclusives from various companies as well but I still manage to be near-universally uninterested in the games they made exclusive so I can easily imagine someone who is not interested in most of the Nintendo exclusives-- yeah, they are all different, but the franchises and styles are still (with some definite exceptions) fairly Nintendo-y. Switch (for the most part) aims for a different vibe with their exclusives than PS5 does.

And yeah, you can point out lots of exceptions, but the question of the thread was 'prefer' not 100% love or hate.

If I had to choose between only Nintendo (exclusive) games and non-Nintendo I suppose I would pick Nintendo because they have some of my favorite games I could easily poor hundreds of hours into. It would be sad not to get all the lovely indies though.

@FishyS
Whatever the distinction is it's arbitrary and meaningless. If you extend it out as far as games that are exclusive to Nintendo it becomes even weaker again. And I think my point remains, would there even be a discussion if this was about some other major game studio? I think not

We can point to the Wii U failing as an example of what happens when Nintendo gets little to no third party support. But the fact that the Wii U could still sell 13mill with basically zero third party support? I mean, it wasn't great.... but can you imagine how many PS4s would've sold without CoD, GTA5, Red Dead, The Witcher, FIFA, Fallout, Battlefront? Probably would've been worse than the Wii U I suspect

@skywake While true, keep in mind that a company's leadership strives to partner with people that share their values. When they bring in new employees and teams they want them to work well with the rest of Nintendo. When they partner with an outside company that they don't completely control they want those companies to do justice to their IPs and treat them similarly to how Nintendo themselves would treat them. They'll intentionally look for similarly minded people because that helps maintain the brand (now of course they won't think and act exactly the same, but they want people that think similarly enough that they don't completely clash on the direction on their games).

So it might not even matter much that some "Nintendo" games aren't actually made by Nintendo. If Nintendo disapproves of what an outside company is doing with their IPs, they won't put it out on the market in the first place.

@skywake almost no game studios own their own console which is why there isn't a discussion like this for them. You can bet similar discussions happen with playstation.

As for Nintendo exclusives, there really aren't that many outside of the main franchises, but if you want to be less arbitrary, stick with the main exclusive franchises. Those franchises are what Nintendo is famous for and it's unclear if their hardware would sell well without them. And whether or not you think it's a useful argument to have, it's easy enough to have an opinion of whether you overall prefer Nintendo franchises or games outside of those franchises. Most of us (including the person who started this thread) of course like some of both in practice. Your example of Wii U is interesting — how many people would buy Switch just for Nintendo games if there was nothing else. It makes me wonder how many families own a Switch with just Animal Crossing and Mario Kart. I'm also legitimately interested if people buy Switch and never play a single Nintendo franchise. As for Playstation, I know multiple people buying PS5 only for Final Fantasy 16 😝 And it's only a timed exclusive...

@FishyS
I guess my point is that it's a bit of a one sided equation. We're comparing the output from one company to the output from every other company that releases content. OP wasn't talking about just on Switch, they were talking Nintendo vs everyone else. My point was more that the fact that this can even be a discussion shows how strong Nintendo's output really is. Most other companies don't have their own platform? Well yeah. Most other companies don't have their own platform BECAUSE they don't have the strength of IP and quality of output that Nintendo does

Look at it this way. This is the percentage of top 50 selling games on PS4, XBOne and Switch that were published by their respective platform owners:
XBOne: 16%
PS4: 20%
Switch: ...... 90%

It's not even a competition. Can you buy a Playstation and not pick up Uncharted, Spiderman, God of War, The Last of Us? Sure, seems like a thing people do. Can you buy an XBox and not pick up Forza, Halo, Gears or Minecraft? Sure, definitely. Can you buy a Switch and skip Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, Smash Bros, Mario Kart, Zelda, Poklemon, Mario, Mario Party, Splatoon, Kirby, Donkey Kong, Metroid, Yoshi, Xenoblade, Pikmin etc, etc..... I mean you could, seems very unlikely you would though