Nintendo's never had a great relationship with small developers; something its most recent strop only highlights.

The Japanese company contacted Richard Hill-Whittall, owner and director of Icon Games Entertainment, after he had revealed the company's 2011 download numbers - including for Nintendo platforms - on his blog and Gamasutra.

Hindrance

"Yesterday Nintendo got in touch to ask us to remove the figures for the WiiWare titles from the blog," Hill-Whittall told Gamasutra.

"Apparently they don't allow developers to publish the sales numbers of their self-published titles."

"As to why, I can't really be sure – are they scared to reveal how their online services perform or do they just dislike developers being able to run effective businesses? It is a tricky one – and incredibly unfair and damaging to indie developers publishing on Nintendo stores."

Think of the little guy

Hill-Whittall goes on to explain how he believes this tactic can be damaging for smaller developers, especially those who reside under Nintendo's umbrella exclusively.

"This data helps to build a release and development strategy," he wrote.

"Without the data they [publishers] would not be able to make a considered decision and would have to hope for the best with each and every title they release."

Along with the damage this might cause, Hill-Whittall also highlighted that a lack of published sales figures can harm the potential to gain future investment.

Show some respect

"Nintendo's policy actively makes life as difficult as possible for the smaller studios, putting jobs and livelihoods at risk," he concludes.

"Without transparency of digital sales data developers are perpetually in the dark. How long are indie studios supposed to put up with this sort of thing - is it too much to ask to be treated with respect and allowed to run a business in a professional manner?"

Yet, hilariously, although the download figures for individual WiiWare games have been removed, because there's an overall total and platform breakdowns for iOS and PSN, it's easy to work out that Icon Games had 40,810 WiiWare downloads in 2011.

[source: Icon Games / Gamasutra]