Well for a long time Nintendo and Sony have talked about the threat that mobile gaming poses to their ability to survive and keep their gaming dedicated handheld platforms on the market. Yet many users here on VGChartz have stated mobile gaming is not a threat at all to Nintendo or Sony siting lack of evidence to suggest that they are not.
Well recent research shows that mobile gaming is indeed killing Nintendo and Sony, I'm not talking a gradual slow death I am talking an all out slaughter. Analytics firm Flurry released their annual report on mobile and handheld console gaming based on both Flurry's research and NPD sales information. Their report is damning and painting a very bad picture for the survival of Nintendo and Sony's handheld operations in the United States.
According to Flurry's research "iOS and Android games have tripled their market share from roughly 20% in 2009 to nearly 60% in just two years. Simultaneously, Nintendo, the once dominant player, has been crushed down to owning about one-third of market in 2011, from having controlled more than two-thirds in 2009. Combined, iOS and Android game revenue delivered $500 million, $800 million and $1.9 billion over 2009, 2010 and 2011, respectively."
Flurry has a warning for Nintendo, if they do not adapt to the mobile markets increasing dominance by making the jump to cell phones or creating a handheld platform that offers services capable of competing with Smart Phones they could face a "Nokia-like" decision. Either adapt to the competitors or watch as their market share continues to erode until the business of handheld gaming platforms is no longer existent.
Personally I think Nintendo has a good chance of surviving in the future. Though I do agree they will need to adapt to compete with the competition or lose market share and profit margins steadily in the future. Though I wouldn't agree with the idea that handheld consoles will be completely eradicated as long as Nintendo's first party software remains exclusive to Nintendo's handheld hardware. But Nintendo's ability to bring in DS level profits and dominate the handheld industry might be over.
What do you think about this latest data? Do you think Mobile will kill handheld game dedicated platforms from Sony and Nintendo? Or can both live side by side in harmony?
-JC7
"In God We Trust - In Games We Play " - Joel Reimer
