Nintendo publishing to other consoles would only be a short-term fix, says Iwata

Satoru Iwata is adamant that Nintendo not publish its first-party franchises to other consoles because the move would be detrimental to Nintendo's long-term plans and core values, the Nintendo boss said in a recent interview with CVG.

Iwata said he would never consider putting the company's "precious resources" on other platforms, as games like those in the Mario and Pikmin franchises are vital to Nintendo's future. Publishing its games to other consoles would only be a short-term financial solution, he said.

"If I was to take responsibility for the company for just the next one or two years, and if I was not concerned about the long-term future of Nintendo at all, it might make sense for us to provide our important franchises for other platforms, and then we might be able to gain some short-term profit," he said.

"However, I'm really responsible for the long-term future of Nintendo as well, so I would never think about providing our precious resources for other platforms at all," he added.

Iwata added that publishing to other consoles would go against Nintendo's values of introducing new software and hardware together.

"What I believe is that Nintendo is a very unique company, because it does its business by designing and introducing people to hardware and software — by integrating them, we can be unique," he said. "And because we have hardware and software developers in the same building, they stimulate each other.

"And those kinds of conditions have enabled us to create something that no other companies can create," he added. "Those kinds of backgrounds are there behind the fact that such a number of great Nintendo franchises exist, and those great franchises always shine for people around the world."