Why will Publishers not release most of their backlog?

[casterofdreams]

I purchased Sonic Adventure on Steam along with SA2 a long time back and Jet Set Radio more recently. These are the games I fondly remember playing for the Dreamcast years ago. I just started getting down with SA playing a first couple of levels and memories come back. Good times! But I realize that Sega published one "time sink" around this time: Phantasy Star Online. Love this game to pieces.

Simple question: Why will Publishers/Developers like Sega and Nintendo NOT release their considerably large backlog of games more frequently? Why do they hold back?

I mean they do release games through download services but they cherry pick the games and they do so in such low numbers at a time.

Could it be licensing issues? Nintendo has published a considerable amount of games for the NES, SNES, N64, etc. that use proprietary characters they own. Why don't they just toss all of the games in one shot on the Wii U? or Wii? or 3DS? With the release of GBA VC games and later DS, just toss all of the games they developed and published instead of this nonsense "IV Dripping" we see now?

Wouldn't it be advantageous to release older titles of a series with an impending release of the latest iteration to spur interest?

It may be because of possible market cannibalism. Releasing a lot of games in one shot might over saturate the market too quickly?

Coding issues maybe? Although this has nothing to do with this I don't have another example: Bioware could not release a piece of DLC for the first Mass Effect on the PS3 because the source files became corrupt. Do we have a similar situation here with these older titles? Maybe stability issues because the games aren't running original hardware?

I now realized this may have turned into a rant. Maybe a baseless one who knows. My thoughts aren't collected together to string a cohesive start to this topic. But I hope you guys can share insight or thoughts on this topic.

[Violent By Design]

They don't think they'd make a lot of money doing so.

[noiseredux]

money.

[casterofdreams]

They don't think they'd make a lot of money doing so.

I thought about cost being a factor but I don't know much about it really. What would the cost be? Does the ESRB require a fee and/or a re-rate on these games? Does server costs to hold and facilitate the downloads of such small games (the largest GBA game is 32MB I think) factor into overall cost? This I know nothing about.

Edit: The ESRB does require a fee to rate a game. So does Nintendo have to go through the rating process again? DAAAAA soo many questions! (Apologies in advance)

[Violent By Design]

They don't think they'd make a lot of money doing so.

I thought about cost being a factor but I don't know much about it really. What would the cost be? Does the ESRB require a fee and/or a re-rate on these games? Does server costs to hold and facilitate the downloads of such small games (the largest GBA game is 32MB I think) factor into overall cost? This I know nothing about.

Edit: The ESRB does require a fee to rate a game. So does Nintendo have to go through the rating process again? DAAAAA soo many questions! (Apologies in advance)

Well, they would have to port the games, that cost money to do.

Keep in mind, the developers they are using to port a game means less developers they have to work on higher priority projects.

Of course the server cost money, but old games aren't going to break the bank or anything like that.

If the game has online play, then they have to factor in if it will have enough traffic to warrant its servers.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

Even if they're just selling roms and emulators, they've got to test every release. It's not like an unofficial emulator and no money is lost if there are horrible glitches.

[CavZee]

You will buy only the latest and greatest releases and YOU WILL LIKE IT.

[BrokenGeode]

Notably smaller market for some games than others. A lot more people want to see what older sonic games are like than something such as Chu Chu Rocket. Although Space Channel 5 got a rerelease so maybe I'm wrong.

[Erik_Twice]

To be frank, it's very often the case that publishers aren't interested in their backlog. They simply don't care for it and don't want to even bother to see if it would be profitable. Not every company has the insight of Warner Brothers when it comes to their libraries :/

[theclaw]

Not to mention internal politics. The games are sent through approval channels yet again.