Nintendo Finally Working On Games for Smartphones

Several readers sent word that Nintendo is finally bringing its games to mobile devices. It's partnering with Japanese game publisher DeNA to develop games for phones and tablets based on Nintendo's popular game IPs. (Existing games will not get mobile ports, however.) DeNA first approached Nintendo about using the company's characters in mobile games back in 2010, Iwata said, and has been passionately pursuing talks on the alliance ever since. Iwata acknowledged that the transition from the Wii and DS lines to the Wii U and 3DS lines has not gone "as smoothly as we had expected," but he maintained that industry watchers predicting the death of dedicated video game consoles are being too pessimistic. Iwata tied the move to smartphones to Nintendo's historical embrace of TV gaming after decades as a physical toy and card game company during a time when TVs didn't exist. "Now that smart devices have grown to become the window for so many people to personally connect with society, it would be a waste not to use these devices."

Comments

Re:No they aren't being too pessimistic...

[tlhIngan]

If valve can somehow get into console land with steam machines you can expect PC gaming to ultimately take over, not that I'm saying it will but if he finds some way to crack the console market it's a possibility.

All the consoles are basically rebadged PC's with some customization, that's all they are at this point.

No, Steam machines have a fundamental problem - they suck.

First off, the problem with PC gaming is piracy. Face it - 90% piracy has lead to developers targeting consoles. And it's still that high despite Steam (no-Steam hacks are plentiful, and it's why Steam has support for 3rd-party DRM still).

So the PC will remain the realm of secondary for AAA devs and the playground of indie. AAA devs will do console first, make back the big bucks, then do a half-assed port to PC as always. It might be a bit easier to take your Xbone game and run it on Windows 10, but you still have a port. Basically the devs will make their big bucks on the console, then when it tapers off, they'll release the PC version and hope to sell enough to pay for the port. Any extra is icing.

This is only broken by games that DO sell well on the PC where effective DRM is possible - i.e., games where online is a major component. So your Call of Duty or Battlefield will have day 1 ports because there is a sizable PC contingent who will buy it on day one at full price, to whom serial numbers are easily verified by servers, etc. Plus, PC users help bring it to the point of "1 billion copies sold on day one!" type PR announcements. (There are also many valid reasons for releasing on PC, since keyboard+mouse rules FPS world).

But for other games, ... not so much. Couple that with the perchant for steam sales and well, you're hoping to make it up in volume. Hell, I won't buy a PC game unless it hits $5 on sale, except in VERY rare circumstances. It's a race to the bottom, and if you want your PC game to be $70, it's got to have a big customer base who will pay full price. If not, they're going to wait for a steam sale, so better to sell on consoles for $60-70 first, release on PC 3 months later at $40, then a month later discount it to $20 for steam sale and let that be the PC release. Then 6 months later discount it to $5 and pick up the remainder as profit, hopefully.

Steam Machines? No, they're not taking over, unless you can guarantee me a $500 machine will last 10 years with zero upgrades. And seeing the initial batch, the $500 machines are... underwhelming. The good machines are $1200+, and even then you can get a console, get the "plus" (PS+, XBL Gold) services for $50 a year for 10 years, and still be ahead of a Steam Machine.

Or you can pop in a new $200 video card every couple of years and consoles will come out ahead.

Or we're gonna have to put up with an i3 with midrange discrete GPUs for the next 10 years as the "it must run on this configuration" system. Just like how we complained the PS3 and Xbox360 were holding back gaming... 4 years ago.

Re:It's about time

[Schnapple]

The days of selling "kiddie" handhelds with QVGA screens and $40 games are numbered.

God I hope not. Mobile gaming is nice and all but it's a race to the bottom. Every game has to be $0.99 or free, and IAP tied to gameplay (just 5 more moves for $0.99!). This is why there's nothing of any depth in mobile gaming. No one is going to sink millions into an RPG on an iPhone. Square has tried to charge decent prices for their games (like $15.99 for FF3) and no one buys them.

A lot of 3DS games are really good and it's because you can charge $40/pop for them and make a profit. Heck, the stupid AR games that come built into the 3DS are better games than 90% of the stuff on the iPhone.

I agree with your premise that dippy little games on Mobile with Mario will get the kids interested in Nintendo and hopefully pick up a Nintendo system but man I really hope that portable consoles and $40/game pricetags don't go away because otherwise everything is going to be a F2P mess.

People who think portable gaming on the 3DS is in any way analogous to modern Mobile games has no idea what they're talking about. Hopefully the market is large enough to carry both.