Nintendo wanting to release 20 to 30 independent titles on the Nintendo eShop every week is one of the most asinine ideas they have come up with lately, or so a lot of people thought when this was announced during their last shareholders meeting.
It turns out that the main problem here has to do with quality control and overcrowding the eShop with tites that are likely not worth anyone's time, or money. Nintendo lacks a rating system, preventing users to actually know whether the kind of game they're purchasing will be money well spent or a complete let-down. This is, actually, already happening to users on the eShop who purchase games, more in particular games by independent developers. Now, there are amazing indie titles on the Nintendo eShop, and people like myself just can't get enough of them, but the bad ones outweight the good ones.
But the problem isn't just affecting users as it could well end up affecting indie developers themselves, especially the ones that deserve their spot on the Nintendo eShop, not to mention that 20 to 30 titles each week is just ridiculously ambitious and it may end up blowing in Nintendo's face if they don't do it properly. Because of this whole Nintendo announcing 30 titles each week, independent developers and publishers have began commenting on the matter—offering their, more than valid, point of view on the whole situation.
IGN managed to talk to representatives for Yach Club Games (
Shovel Knight), Devolver Digital, Image & Form (
SteamWorld Dig 2), and Team 17, amongst others—who voiced their opinion on this, commenting that it may end up overcrowding the eShop if Nintendo doesn't address this issue properly, and how this could affect the developers and publishers themselves.
Developer for
Mutant Mudds, Jools Watsham, said that "
20-30 games per week seems WAY too much. I can't see how this is positive for anyone, honestly", while also adding that "
the market is already saturated, but the number of titles developers choose to release isn't under Nintendo's control".
Brjann Sigurgeirsson, CEO of Image & Form—responsibles for SteamWorld Dig 2—mentions that 20 to 30 games is a quite manageable number compared to App Store, Google Play and Steam, by adding that "
we've always thought those are pretty overcrowded, haven't we?".
"
This is the nature of digital store fronts, not just for Nintendo but across all platforms", said Team17's Business Development Director Harley Homewood. "
It’s an environment that we’re used to and it’s amazing to see Nintendo supporting all of these incredible indie games".
In contrast to the other developers' points of view, a spokesperson for Devolver Digital said that "
While anyone that launches a game on the eShop would probably prefer to launch amongst less competition I'd still say that the number of games released alongside yours doesn't matter as much if you have an outstanding, anticipated game".
Yacht Club Games' developer David D'Angelo addresses this in a different manner, by proposing a possible solution to the problem.
"
Creating systems to let players find more games related to the games they bought, search by publisher, search by rating systems to find high quality games, discover game by categories, see game popularity by day/week/month, view featured games in different ways". Which is exactly what users have been clamouring for to be added on the Nintendo eShop—pretty much since the Nintendo Switch's launch.
Another very important concern developers have was addressed by Cyrille Imbert, CEO of Dotemu, who hopes that "
they won’t follow Valve's example with ultra-customized featuring. It makes it way harder for us, developers and publishers, to understand how to gain visibility exactly".
By no means, though, does this mean that developers will shun from Nintendo Switch as most agree that they still plan on keep making the best games that they can—like it is the case with Team 17 and Devolver Digital. Yacht Club Games' David D'Angelo also joined them in saying that they will "
keep making the best games we can, regardless if there is one game or a million games released a day. The Switch is an amazing gaming machine, and we will continue to support it with our best efforts".
"
We would worry if the higher numbers meant that all the "extra games" that are coming were better than ours. But I'm confident that games from Image & Form, Zoink and other developers published by Thunderful will hold their own", added Brjann Sigurgeirsson.
Watsham is also confident that things will not change too much for indie games since adding 20 to 30 games per week is not really altering the already saturated market, and that devs have already been facing that challenge for a while.
"
Whatever happens, it’s great that the Switch is here and even with more games coming, it will still stay a very solid option. So we won’t change our plans, for now at least", Imbert said by also warning that this situation could change in the near future as he adds "
we need to stay focus on the games themselves and hope for the best".
What is happening here with Nintendo wanting to release that many games on the Nintendo eShop, and the developers and publishers being vocal about it, will hopefully make the Japanese company that their idea may affect both them and the developers negatively. Hopefully they see this sooner than later and either opt out of their plan, or go back to the drawing board.