Rumors have been swirling about Nintendo's mystery console, codenamed NX, for quite some time now, and it appears Nintendo is quite content on having everything remain as just rumors, even going so far as to not show off the new console at this year's E3, as many had once expected.
It's one thing for fans to not know anything concrete about the Nintendo NX, but one would think that at least third-party development studios (i.e. the people who will be making games for the console) would be privy to more information. Well, as it turns out, many developers are just as clueless about the Nintendo NX as everyone else.
In an interview with EGM, developers at Toys for Bob (Skylanders) and Ready at Dawn Studios (The Order: 1886 and recently-announced Deformers) revealed they know absolutely nothing about the NX, despite many indicators suggesting that they should.
First off is Paul Yan, Toys for Bob's associate creative director, who revealed that Nintendo hasn't informed the team behind the upcoming Skylanders Imaginators about the Nintendo NX — odd news considering that a Skylanders title has been released on every major console, including the Wii/Wii U, ever since Skylanders: Spyro's Adventure debuted in 2011.
"We haven't heard any news from Nintendo, so we don't have any announcements."
Associate Producer Lou Studdert said much of the same, stating that Nintendo is well known for keeping information about new consoles to a minimum before they're ready for an official reveal.
"I don't know what [the NX] is, Nintendo keeps a very, very, very, very, very tight lid on everything."
Meanwhile, Mark Stanley, VP of Internal Development at GameTrust, the GameStop subsidiary publishing Deformers, revealed the company has been in talks with Nintendo about the system. However, even with those talks going on, Ru Weerasuriya, co-founder of Ready at Dawn, the company that will actually be developing Deformers, said he doesn't know much about the NX, nor does the company even have a developer's kit for the system — which, once again, is odd considering that the upcoming multiplayer arena brawler looks more at home on a Nintendo console than on the Xbox One, PlayStation 4 or PC.
“The day one plan [for Deformers] is to launch on Xbox [One], PlayStation 4, and PC … What about NX? That’s the thing. Honestly, we are waiting.”
With all that said, it's clear Nintendo is being highly selective about who it shares information about the upcoming console with, and that actually makes sense, since there is no benefit in sharing such information with companies that don't intend to support the new platform.
However, this has the potential to do more harm than good. Nintendo is also well known for its icy relationship with many third-party developers, and with NX representing a chance for the company to start on a new note, it might be in its best interest to share access and info about the NX in order to give third-party developers incentive to produce new games for the upcoming system. The last thing Nintendo wants to do is make the same mistakes that hampered the Wii U.
