President Says Game Dev Will Get Longer and More Complex; Devolver Digital Thinks the Japanese Giant Is Pro-Indie Platform

Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa believes that video game development is bound to get longer, more complex and more sophisticated in the future. He also suggests that a possible solution for this would be mergers and acquisitions. Meanwhile, publisher Devolver Digital’s co-founder Nigel Lowrie believes that Nintendo Switch players are more likely to buy indie games as compared to Xbox and PlayStation owners.

Furukawa shared his opinion in a recent interview with Japanese magazine Famitsu (via My Nintendo News). He said that Nintendo is looking to “develop human resources who will be responsible for Nintendo’s development in the future.” (Machine translated from Japanese).

He was also quizzed about the Nintendo Switch, and whether its description as “the successor to the Nintendo Switch” implies if it will inherit the predecessor’s game style and concept. Furukawa responded, “I have nothing more to say at this stage.” It seems like more official information on Nintendo Switch is likely to be reserved for later this year.

Devolver Digital co-founder feels Switch players are more open to indie games

Devolver Digital co-founder Nigel Lowrie told GamesIndustry.biz during a GDC interview that indie games perform much better on Switch than on other consoles such as the Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5. Lowrie attributed this to Nintendo’s efforts to cultivate a player base which is relatively more “open to interesting concepts and gameplay ideas.”

Lowrie added that while there’s a fanbase on PlayStation and Xbox that has responded well to their game Cult of the Lamb, “the large majority of those people buy those platforms to show off what they can really do.”

Devolver’s stance on Xbox Game Pass and PlayStation Plus Game Catalogue

Lowrie further added that Devolver is not inclined towards the concept of releasing their games on day 1 on subscription services. This is in relation to services such as Xbox Game Pass and PlayStation Plus Game Catalogue, which offer a huge library of games in exchange for a recurring subscription fee. “We still really strongly believe in selling games first, because over the past 15 years, we know there’s an audience to buy these games,” Lowrie said.