Template talk:Nintendo developers

Recent edits

@Arkhandar and Boyohboy231: I also support the version without the "publishees" grouping that adds bloat (not to mention it is an awkward and uncommon word), so its neither "unfounded" nor "vandalism". If the "Affiliated is both incredibly subjective and a poorly source rationale" argument is being kept, then we can simply remove all non-first party studios/divisions/subsidiaries from the navbox. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 19:01, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar: So you're saying that we should remove verifiable and notable information just because you don't agree with the way it's presented? I mean, if you have a better term than "publishees" go ahead and suggest it. Otherwise, what you're proposing is ridiculous. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 19:15, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar:, @Dissident93: I like the info and wish that row would be displayed in some way, but I agree with what Dissident is saying. The publishees have no formal affiliation with Nintendo and can easily make games for other publishers on a whim. PlatinumGames does exactly that. And to include the section, where do we draw the line? Every publishee should be added, which would be far too much for that section.. Or is there a year cut-off? Only someone who has been published by Nintendo in the last 10 years? How do we know when Nintendo aren't publishing their work anymore? Just seems like a subjective section to include, unfortunately. --Bchill53 (talk) 19:30, 4 March 2019 (UTC)

@Bchill53: The publishees do have a formal a verifiable affiliation with Nintendo in the form of publishing contracts. They're "Nintendo developers" in the sense that they have developed games published (and most likely financed) by Nintendo. Every publishee has already been added and I don't think the template is bloated. There are far worse cases. Finally, there shouldn't be a year cutoff because that's not encyclopedic. The template is just a collection of links. If the reader wants to check if a given developer is currently developing games for Nintendo, they should visit the corresponding article. Now, if you'd like to add an additional "Affiliate" section, I don't oppose to that. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 16:39, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar: Maybe I'm misunderstanding what you're considering a publishee, but I am thinking of several studios that have been published by Nintendo for multiple games that aren't listed in the template as current or past publishees. Pax Softnica worked on a large number of games in the NES and Game Boy era. Mole Mania is one. Sculptured Software did a good number of the sports games during the Super NES era. Such as NHL Stanley Cup (Super NES). Capcom has worked with Nintendo on multiple occasions. One is The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap. From what I've read from your explanation, these should all be included. And I'm sure there are more that I'm not thinking of at the moment. Please correct me if I'm wrong. --Bchill53 (talk) 17:04, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Bchill53: Pax Softnica and Sculptured Software don't have articles, so there's no reason for them to be in the template. As for Capcom, I'm assuming you're talking about Flagship. If it's missing feel free to add it to "Former" since the company no longer exists. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 18:33, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar: Not trying to poop on this idea, just testing how this may be abused in the future. That's fair enough if they don't have pages. I figured they'd be included and have a redlink, since otherwise the list is incomplete, but I'll go with that thinking.

Either way, some more developers to throw at you, all published by Nintendo:

• Jupiter Corporation worked on Picross DS
• Arzest worked on Hey! Pikmin
• Mitchell Corporation worked on Polarium Advance
• Prope worked on Wii Play: Motion
• skip Ltd. worked on Chibi-Robo!
• Square (company) worked on Final Fantasy (video game)
• Bullet-Proof Software worked on Tetris (Game Boy)
• Capcom worked on Mega Man 6 that was published by Nintendo in NA
• Irem worked on 10-Yard Fight
• Bandai Namco Studios worked on Wii Sports Club
• Tantalus Media worked on The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess HD
• Atlus worked on Tokyo Mirage Sessions ♯FE

, etc. All of these are current companies that could collaborate with Nintendo again whenever they choose to. It sounds as if they should all be included. --Bchill53 (talk) 19:33, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

And I'm kinda scared to list how many companies that don't exist anymore that meet the conditions... :/ --Bchill53 (talk)

@Bchill53: Most of those are safe to assume that should be added, noting that companies that no longer exist should go to the "Former" section. As for the red links, they shouldn't be added. This isn't a list, we have List of Nintendo development teams for that. This is a hub of related articles, so it doesn't make sense to add articles that don't exist. Finally, I don't think it'd be appropriate to add developers whose game was only "published" by Nintendo in certain regions. Most of the times they're just distributing it and had nothing to do with game financing and development (ex: localization). But I think that's another discussion. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 23:04, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar:Every developer that Nintendo has ever published a game from has signed some form of a "publishing contract" with them, so this argument is flawed. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 18:57, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Dissident93: The fact that you're throwing Nintendo-published and Nintendo platform-published games in the same bag is hilarious. Please enlighten me with a better argument than that. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 19:15, 5 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar: What? A game like Dragon Quest 9 being being published by Nintendo (besides Japan) would make Square Enix just as much as a "publishee" as Konami and PlatinumGames, so where is the line drawn? ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 04:42, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

@Dissident93: See my answer above. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 10:19, 6 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar: I did and I disagree with it, as do two others. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 05:07, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

@Dissident93: No. That's a harmful simplification. While others are trying to come up with a good solution and consensus, you're just poorly denying everything. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 16:37, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar: I gave you my suggestion though, which was to eliminate any non first-party subsidiaries/partners/studios just to be non-subjective about it. If you don't agree with that fine, but you claiming I'm just "poorly denying everything" is simply false. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 04:48, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

@Dissident93: What part of "publishees" is subjective though? As far as I know "first-party subsidiaries/partners/studios" and "affiliates" is far more subjective. Besides Nintendo's core (almost) wholly owned subsidiaries, everything else is changing all the time. Couple that with the fact that you'd be omitting a lot of information from the reader and not showing them the whole picture, I think it just doens't make sense. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 13:36, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

@Arkhandar: Because it can go back to the list provided by Bchill53. For example, why draw the line with Konami and not Square Enix? Especially since Nintendo has localized some of their games themselves. There is simply too much subjectivity for this sort of thing. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 18:42, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

@Dissident93: There's no subjectivity there either. Nintendo either was directly involved in development or not. This is a list of links of Nintendo developer articles. So, in my opinion, localization doesn't involve development itself, but I'd be willing to accept it if it has enough editor support. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 17:39, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

I'm sure there are more. A lot of those listed above were one-time collaborations with Nintendo and I doubt that they have any definitive intent on working together in the future. That's what I was alluding to, at least. Listing literally every company may lead to fluff, but let's say we only list the companies if they have at least 3 games with Nintendo, then it's getting more subjective as to what counts. If you would like to list every single one, that's fine. That's definitely objective. I can look through to see who else counts as a publishee, but I'm afraid it may be weird to list some of the obscure ones I'm sure to find haha. --Bchill53 (talk) 22:05, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

This would basically lead back to how the list originally was though, which was my original point. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 17:24, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

@Bchill53: But why would we limit it to that though? This isn't a list of developers Nintendo is currently working with. This is a comprehensive list of links to articles of devs that have been involved with video game development for/with Nintendo. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia. If the reader wants to know what are the current Nintendo developers, a fan-wiki would be the best place to go to for speculation-driven articles. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 17:45, 11 March 2019 (UTC)

• Another person chiming in with an anti-bloat, pro-better-defined-inclusion-criteria stance. Unless you plan on closely maintaining this until the end of time, if we don’t define this well, it’s going to be bloated with every company who is tangentially related to Nintendo. I dont believe multi-platform third parties like Platinum or Atlus have any business on templates like this. Sergecross73 msg me 17:42, 16 March 2019 (UTC)

Beyond first-party development teams

Given the recent edit conflicts regarding teams beyond first-party developers, I'm starting this discussion so we can reach a consensus. Historically, this template has had various terminology to address those. Here's a rundown of the main ones, and my reasoning as to why they're appropriate/not appropriate for use:

• Second-party: As discussed in the past regarding other articles, this definition is the "weakest" of all. There doesn't seem to be a consensus among WP:RSs as to what qualifies a developer to be classified as second-party or not. There are multiple conflicting opinions out there, and give that this is a table, it's hard to make a good point of theses views.
• Affiliated: By definition, "companies are affiliated when one company is a minority shareholder of another". Although this could be a nice solution, it's very hard to track which companies are affiliated with Nintendo as that information is not freely available for every single case. Furthermore, it doesn't include companies that have had historical ties with Nintendo such as HAL Laboratory or Intelligent Systems.
• Partners: Although it looks like a good solution at first side, in that it includes teams that could be classified as both "second-party" and "affiliated", there are some issues with this classification. The classification is vague and can't be reliably sourced for all cases.
• Publishees: By definition, "one to whom something is published". IMO this is the best classification for the fact that it includes all previously stated cases for development teams, while classifying them in a factual way, easily backed-up by WP:RSs, and avoiding crossing into WP:OR altogether. All without removing notable development teams, such as exemplified before. As a video game publisher, Nintendo has worked with different studios in the past, just as for example a movie production company works with different film studios to developed its published works. This is notable information, and should be included in the template.

TL;DR: IMO, adding the Publishees category is the only way to avoid WP:OR while including notable development teams tied with Nintendo. Other categorization has issues and omission altogether doesn't cover the whole picture. What do you think? ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 15:49, 17 June 2020 (UTC)

@Dissident93, Sergecross73, Ferret, Smuckola, Boyohboy231, Namcokid47, Izno, and Captain Galaxy: Pinging for input. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 16:42, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Why exactly have I been tagged for this? I made like two edits here back in January and have never touched it since. Namcokid47 ^(Contribs) 17:14, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Similar, I don't watch this template and have no particular opinion or deep knowledge of Nintendo development structures. WP:VG may provide a better opinion than the set of pings done here. -- ferret (talk) 17:18, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

I think we're here because we are active members of WP:VG. As for the discussion at hand, I don't have an opinion on this at the moment. Captain Galaxy (talk) 17:24, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

@Captain Galaxy: Precisely, thanks! And especially since this has been a topic that has spiraled into a lot of discussion with me and Dissident93 (talk · contribs) as the main (and sometimes only) debaters. Outside input is crucial to crack this. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 21:56, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

• As stated on your talk page, the best way to avoid WP:OR (and awkward wording/groupings) is to only list actual Nintendo studios, subsidiaries, and divisions. Any "2nd-party" company could just be added on a case-by-case basis, which would include the likes of HAL Labs, Alpha Dream, and Intelligent Systems. Including a (multiplatform) company because one or two of their games got published by Nintendo should be avoided. I'm pretty sure this is exactly what the navbox used to do before you started adding these type of companies a while back. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 19:04, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

@Dissident93: But what you're suggesting is WP:OR in itself, as explained above. As editors, we should not be the ones making judgements on notability, especially in a template which has the goal of aggregating related articles. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 21:53, 18 June 2020 (UTC)

Then omit them entirely. You are the only one who seems to prefer this, as seen by the same discussion we had a year ago. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 23:39, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

• I agree with Dissident, having a "publishees" category feels pointless. It feels like too big of a scope for a template that really should only include actual Nintendo development teams like Entertainment Planning & Development, or subsidiaries like 1-UP Studio and Monolith Soft. I gurantee that most readers looking at this would be very confused to see companies like Bandai Namco and Hudson Soft listed, since they have no relation with Nintendo aside from the occasional collaboration. This proposal you're making just creates an unnecessary amount of work and feels like a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. Namcokid47 ^(Contribs) 02:29, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

• Question, would Sora Ltd. count for the template? Even though they are a free lancing company, they have only ever worked on Nintendo games such as the Super Smash Bros. series since Brawl, Kid Icarus: Uprising and Meteos. Captain Galaxy (talk) 16:26, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

@Captain Galaxy: With the current consensus, no, as they're not owned by Nintendo. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 15:26, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

• I think I've created a nice compromise with the creation of Template:Nintendo publishees. This way, this template can be for strictly Nintendo-owned developers, including: divisions, subsidiaries (majority ownership) and affiliates (minority ownership). ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 15:25, 25 June 2020 (UTC)

  Arkhandar, that template still has the notability issue of just being companies who have had their games published by Nintendo. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 00:45, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Dissident93: I don't see what's not notable about it, taking into account that Nintendo is one of the biggest video game publishers in the industry. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 00:48, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

  Arkhandar, we might as well make one for every big publisher using that logic then. A single game by Random Studio Inc. got published in one region by Nintendo? They get dumped in the navbox. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 00:54, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

  @Dissident93: If it's notable, encyclopedic, and helps the reader navigate between related articles, then I don't see why not. As for regional-exclusive publishing, if there are enough examples that would otherwise bloat and take visibility out of other development studios that have developed a game that was exclusively published by Nintendo, then I would agree to not include them as well. ~ Arkhandar ^{(message me)} 09:59, 29 June 2020 (UTC)

  Arkhandar, well I don't consider it notable to begin with (and it seems like the others who have commented here don't really either?) But that being said, at least it's separated from the studio/division navbox now. ~ Dissident93 ^(talk) 17:33, 29 June 2020 (UTC)