That feels very chicken and egg to me. Nintendo owners don't buy 3rd party games because there aren't very many. And there aren't very many because owners don't buy them.
The SNES had extensive 3rd party support. Obviously it's hard to compare 25 years ago to today, but the SNES and Genesis were really "even". Supporting both systems was a no brainer for most game companies. The N64 threw a curve ball with carts, and 3rd party support tanked. Anecdotally, the GameCube seemed to have better 3rd party support, as it was a very equivalent system to the Xbox and PS2.
>> That feels very chicken and egg to me. Nintendo owners don't buy 3rd party games because there aren't very many. And there aren't very many because owners don't buy them.
Not sure it's about quantity, it's more about quality. When Nintendo's first party software sets a high bar for quality, it makes most of the non AAA titles sold by third parties look like crap, and they usually are.
Third party AAA titles like Just Dance, FIFA, Madden, Tiger Woods Golf etc. sold well enough on the Wii that some sequels were still being produced even after the Wii had become an afterthought. IIRC, Street Fighter IV on the 3DS sold very well too.
The SNES had extensive 3rd party support. Obviously it's hard to compare 25 years ago to today, but the SNES and Genesis were really "even". Supporting both systems was a no brainer for most game companies. The N64 threw a curve ball with carts, and 3rd party support tanked. Anecdotally, the GameCube seemed to have better 3rd party support, as it was a very equivalent system to the Xbox and PS2.