Has the Unthinkable Happened?

[Tommy Tallarico]

Yes, Nintendo sucks, but they're still better as a first party than Sony.

Animal Crossing + Metroid Prime > Ico + any of Sony's generic platformers.

[Yoshi]

FYI, my intent was to include 2nd party devs in this discussion.

[Kinopio]

Has Sony supplanted Nintendo as the king of first and second party games?

No. Most of Sony's games are developed by 3rd party developers like Level 5 or Harmonix.

The only Nintendo published game I can think of that wasn't developed by a Nintendo company was Fzero GX. Oh, and Wario World. Crystal Chronicles tecnically was developed by a Nintendo-owned company.

[jarrod]

No, Retro is 2nd party.

2nd Party = anything not done by an internal development team, but instead by an team that was formerly 3rd Party but was purchased by the company.

Naughty Dog is also 2nd party... I'm not entirely sure about the GT team Polyphonus Digital... did Sony purchase them, or were they developed internally?

"2nd Party" was a term Nintendo invented to explain the exclusive Rare relationship they started in the mid 1990s. It's just PR. Any company that's majority owned is generally considered a 1st party developer. Retro is 100% owned by Nintendo. Rare is 100% owned by Microsoft. Naughty Dog is 100% owned by Sony. All 3 can be considered 1st party teams.

Polyphony Digital is what evolved of the game R&D division at Sony Music Entertainment after Sony Computer Entertainment took over their game department. They're considered a first party team too, though they were a later aquisition like ND.

[Dyne]

SFA is the most tedious game I've ever played. It was like Wind Waker's ocean crawling on land, but slower and a much worse battle system.

*hugs the white dragon*

[Kinopio]

No, Retro is 2nd party.

2nd Party = anything not done by an internal development team, but instead by an team that was formerly 3rd Party but was purchased by the company.

Nintendo owns 100% of Retro. They were never 3rd party.

[bbobb]

No. Most of Sony's games are developed by 3rd party developers like Level 5 or Harmonix.

No that's also wrong... they do have quite a few 2nd party games... J&D, Sly Cooper, Ratchet & Clank and so on... in fact I think most of their games are 2nd party... but I'm not willing to bet on it.

[jarrod]

FYI, my intent was to include 2nd party devs in this discussion.

Then why list SOCOM or Sly Cooper? Both were outsourced to 3rd party (ie: external) teams.

[bbobb]

Then why list SOCOM or Sly Cooper? Both were outsourced to 3rd party (ie: external) teams.

To the best of my knowledge Sony owns Sucker Punch now... I don't know about SOCOM.

[jarrod]

No that's also wrong... they do have quite a few 2nd party games... J&D, Sly Cooper, Ratchet & Clank and so on... in fact I think most of their games are 2nd party... but I'm not willing to bet on it.

AFAIK, neither Insomniac or Sucker Punch have any level of Sony investment. They can literally make games for whomever they choose, even Nintendo and Microsoft.