Iwata says western companies are yet to show their hand on 3DS...

More American and European third parties will be backing 3DS, bucking the trend of western publishers generally avoiding handheld systems, according to Nintendo president Satoru Iwata.

Iwata had previously said that publishers would increase their support for the system following its price drop last year, but admitted that Japanese studios were ahead of the curve in preparing 3DS versions of their big franchises. Any notion that western third parties would not support 3DS will disappear come E3, Iwata said recently to investors.

"[T]here may appear to be fewer commitments from the U.S. and the European software publishers than those of their Japanese counterparts. This is due to the different timing (between Japan and overseas) when they noticed that the Nintendo 3DS would surely expand widely into their markets and, thus, the different timing when they started the actual development of the Nintendo 3DS software. You will also notice a change in this situation when a richer Nintendo 3DS software lineup in the overseas markets is announced around the time of the E3 show."

The CEO said that this, combined with the "continuous" support from Japanese publishers, leaves him optimistic for the health of the 3DS platform.

E3 commences in Los Angeles on the week of June 4th.