They also went on a hiring binge and got talent that was being laid off by other companies, and setup partnerships and joint-development opportunities with companies like Platinum and Mistwalker and Namco Bandai and Tecmo Koei - completely changing the way the majority of the game development community in Japan saw them. This took incredible time and effort frankly. Other than that, Nintendo has expanded Monolithsoft, Retro, and fostered relationships with a dozen smaller studios in Kyoto that are offshoots of employees from Konami, Square, etc.
They've also had to build out an entire OS team and built a social network through a partnership which they are managing internally. Nintendo also had to hire, over the past few years, tons of people in network engineering to bulk up on their core software abilities - unlike Microsoft which had people ready to go on that front. They are still lacking on this front but it's come a very long way and will improve - Sony is evidence of that. Even the Xbox has changed dramatically over the years.
More importantly: scaling up creative staff from say 1000 people to 3000 or more, for a company with such a unique workshop-like culture as Nintendo is really hard. Nintendo has the toughest hiring standards in the industry and have a very strong internal culture, and they are very careful about not ruining that - unlike Silicon Valley ponzi schemes that are trying to get bought in a few years and will hire anyone with a Stanford degree just to appease venture capitalists. Nintendo has had to exert tremendous effort to ensure they hire in a sustainable way where people work together and the culture thrives.
First off, good post. I agree with much of what you said about culture, but I have a few problems with some of your conclusions.
While you're right that Nintendo is doing
some good stuff in regards to building themselves up substantially (1000 to 3000 people), Iwata deserves criticism that this wasn't done earlier. Nintendo has been having huge software droughts and lacking third-party support since the N64!
Iwata should've known the when he came in to a position of power. Why wasn't this massive build-up of studios done during his reign for Gamecube? It was
the same situation. Iwata takes the reigns in 2002. GC support dries up.
Okay, maybe they're waiting for Wii. Third-parties aren't there on Wii, and first party droughts happen
again. Then they let the console languish and die with no releases in the last two years.
It's 2013. Iwata took control as president in 2002. He experienced the Gamecube. He saw the third-party situation with the Wii. He let the damn thing die for its last two years. What was he doing for 11 years if these staffing efforts are just starting up now?
Also in 2005, the XBox 360 released. If Iwata was moderately conscious during this time, he'd have noticed that development teams were having problems with the new impositions and budgets of AAA and HD games. Development teams needed a huge boost. So what did he do? Nothing.
They could've increased their staff or bought third-party studios up during the lucrative Wii years, but they didn't. They waited. And here we are with the same problems Iwata has faced since the Gamecube. Few third-parties, first-party droughts.
It shouldn't take 11 years and a console on death's door for the president of Nintendo to realize that they needed to build up their teams, and build up new relationships with third-parties. I'm not saying they had to try to buy Activision. But do something differently.
The response has been way too late, and Iwata deserves criticism.. And it's forced Nintendo to only rely on extremely safe properties, even in the way they treat them. It's a direct sequel to handheld Mario, now with a new suit! So the risky "design company" philosophy you've put out there just isn't holding true for what their actual money-making product is -- software.
Also, in the paragraphs above, you laud them for building up their staff. But later, you go on to lament that buying Western support or building up Western would've taken up too much of NCL's or EAD's time. You claim that Retro is a burden to them.
Here:
So then, what should Nintendo have done in the West? Throw millions into California-based companies for no reason? Buy up studios only for the talent to leave? Money hat a bunch of games from developers that had no interest in making Wii games? I keep hearing all this talk about "Nintendo and West" - but there aren't a lot of compelling things Nintendo could have done. Building studios takes years, and Nintendo isn't just going to throw millions for another nightmare like Retro to occur which consumed incredible time from NCL and EAD.
So what should Nintendo have done? Obviously something different. You can't say:
With what abilities they had and opportunities they saw I think they made the right choices.
They didn't make the right choices. Anything different would've been better because they're digging themselves out of shit right now. Why is hiring in Japan good, but the West bad? Why assume every studio is going to be like Retro?
And we're not talking only about "developers that had no interest in making Wii games." They should have cultivated relationships with the studios that did have interest. Why the hell did Next Level Games have to take a paycheck making a Captain America licensed game for PS3 and XBox360, when that could've been another game for Nintendo? Is anyone still alive at NST?
They had the money to reinvest during the Wii and DS years, and they didn't. To excuse Iwata's delay is just to "please understand."
