Nintendo has experienced moments throughout its history where it has had to rely solely on first-party content to get by, but thankfully things have improved over the Switch generation – with many major third-party publishers showing their support for the hybrid device.
This is emphasized in The latest financial results of the Japanese companyand the company explains that one of the main changes it has made this generation is the relationship it has with these “other” software publishers – noting that “significant improvements” have been made in terms of the “development environment and support for developers”.
“Thanks to these efforts, our partnerships with software publishers are now stronger than ever.”
This was achieved by opening the ‘Nintendo Developer Portal’ – a dedicated site for developers and publishers to make it easier for creators to develop software on the Switch. Nintendo also helped third parties by providing “a variety of middleware” – including commonly used game engines (such as Unity and Unreal Engine) and “more accessible” developer kits.
As a result, its third-party partnerships have flourished and are now “stronger than ever” – with the Switch receiving a wide range of releases from publishers such as Microsoft, Electronic Arts, Bandai Namco, Capcom and Epic Games.
Below is some information and graphics highlighting the success of third-party physical sales on the Nintendo Switch:
“As a result, about half of the software units sold since the fiscal year ended March 2021 are titles released by other software publishers. This figure does not include the numerous download-only titles released by software publishers. Sales of both first-party titles and those released by other software publishers continue to achieve high levels of sales.”
There’s more to come, with slides in the latest presentation reaffirming a slew of big third-party releases on their way to the Switch in in 2025. This includes games like Dragon Quest I&II HD-2D Remake, Suikoden I & II HD Remaster, Guilty Gear Strive, and Atelier Yumia. Additionally, Microsoft has also made a 10-year commitment to bring Call of Duty games to Nintendo platforms.
This latest update follows rumors that claim Nintendo will rely heavily on third-party support for the Switch in 2025.
