Can there be too many indie games?

The recent Nintendo general shareholders meeting saw the topic of indie titles, among many other things, come up. One of the more interesting revelations was the goal of having 20-30 indie game titles released per week for the Nintendo Switch. (Source) While it's easy to just say, of course more games are good, let's play devil's advocate for a bit and look at some potential pitfalls of such a push in future content. Is more really better?

The most obvious and pressing issue where this come to fruition is the state of the Nintendo e-shop. The current iteration of which works for the time being, but as titles pile up finding games that I know are there becomes more difficult and time consuming. There have been improvements to the e-shop already, but it will need to keep pace to make finding existing titles along with discovering new ones a worthwhile endeavor. One needs to look no further than Steam to see adverse effects of having such an expansive library to choose from. A mountain of titles doesn't just make it hard for consumers to find what they want, let alone browse, it's hard on creators as well.

While it's been reformatted for nearly a year at this point, the Steam Greenlight program highlighted issues for developers as well, namely exposure. 2017 saw 7,672 titles launch on the platform, that's 21 a day if you're counting. (Source). Getting potential customer eyeballs on any game, especially an indie one, in that environment is difficult. Now, Nintendo is talking that kind of addition per week, not daily, but games do pile up quickly. The chance at being in the forefront of the store fades fast. Sure, competition can be healthy, the best theoretically should rise to the top. Steam has in the past likened success stories of games navigating it's ever expansive store to a meritocracy. There is some truth to that, good games have a way for finding their audience, but they still have to be known about. Apart from something included in a bundle, it's impossible to buy a game that no one knows exists, part of that includes getting even a sliver of time in the spotlight.

In Steam's case, there was the notion of a meritocracy, quality, like life, finds a way. There was a time where this rang more true. Take The Binding of Isaac, a slow build up of users that kept rising and rising, a good title that kept bringing in a larger and larger audience based on it's merits. That was a different time, one with far less competition just to be viewed by potential buyers. Is Nintendo's plan of 20-30 indie releases a week in the right range to allow for the cream to rise to the top? Maybe, but it is going to need to rely on one last important factor, actual quality.

It's easy to assume that the Nintendo Seal of Quality actually implied a quality product, it's right there in the name after all, but in truth it never did. While the "Seal" has changed over time it simply implies that it's an officially licensed product and not something unlicensed like many of the Tengen games from the NES era. Actual quality of the games is important as well though. Right now interest is high in getting titles to the Switch. There are a lot of developers itching to get more popular indie titles on the platform. In theory one would expect that the best of the best be given first crack at it, with a healthy mix of new and old(er) titles to round things out. Is that what we'll get though? It would a little unfair of me to speculate any further down the line on this as we simply don't know at this point. There is already a somewhat surprising amount of not so great titles of the Switch, no one really likes the idea of gatekeepers to get on the platform, but then again, who really wants to go on a treasure hunt every time just to find 1 good game in a field of duds.

Hopefully I'm being overly cautious and everything works out for the best in this scenario. Done in a good way, this really has the potential to bring a lot of work that previously never would have been able to be on a Nintendo system to a wider audience. Indie games have certainly rekindled my interest in gaming many years ago and maybe, just maybe, this is something that is not just a benefit to developers, but Nintendo and players alike.