Nintendo Might Become the Main Partner For Third-Party Publishers

Analysts are predicting Nintendo Switch 2 could have an install base of 100 million units by 2029.

Once upon a time, Nintendo hardware was the destination for third-party software. It was the Nintendo 64 era when that started to fall apart for the House of Mario, with heavy-hitters like Square Enix pulling up stakes and switching over to Sony's new PlayStation consoles to take advantage of its disc-based games. Nintendo has had ups and downs since that time as a platform for third-party publishers to hock their wares, but if a recent report is to be believed, the company might soon be the number one partner once more in coming years.

Research and consulting firm DFC Intelligence has declared that "The next few years could see Nintendo for the first time becoming the primary partner for third-party game publishers." Of course, that isn't wholly accurate—again, Nintendo has previously been in that position—but it would be a change compared to recent times, certainly. DFC's reasoning is that the firm believes Nintendo will be able to shift between 15 and 20 million Switch 2 units within the console's first fiscal year. If it manages to follow a similar trajectory as the original Nintendo Switch, Switch 2 could have as many as 100 million units sold by 2029.

That's a very larger install base, one that would be so tantalizing that third-parties would be wanting to have their games on the system. Throw in the fact that Switch 2 is a much more powerful piece of hardware and it makes sense that publishers could come to flock to Nintendo to sell their software. However, one mustn't forget Sony, which is likely gearing up to launch its own PlayStation 5 successor, as well as Microsoft and its own post-Xbox Series X|S plans—might they not be more appealing partners?

Possibly. However, there's no ignoring that other than the misfire that was Wii U, Nintendo has been the dominant company in the industry since the days of Wii. Even now, PS5 and Xbox Series sales are lagging behind the original Switch. Pundits like to say that Nintendo is in its own "ecosystem," but at the end of the it's a video game hardware and software manufacturer just like Sony and Microsoft. And recall that once Nintendo started throwing around $70 and $80 MSRPs as the new norm, everyone else rapidly started to follow suit. As Nintendo goes, so too does the industry. Thus, it's not all that unrealistic to think that DFC's predictions could become reality.

Source: Eurogamer