Soundwave said:
For whatever reason handheld games ... even mobile iOS/Android platforms ... are dominated by cartoony games that generally are easy to pick up and play. Things like Real Racing, Infinity Blade, etc. do OK on mobile, but no where close to big guns. So no, Halo or Gran Turismo on mobile probably wouldn't be as big of a hit as say Mario Kart or Animal Crossing or Pokemon iOS (for example). Nintendo's aesthetic and design philosophy do match up with mobile in some ways. I'm not saying it's a good idea, but I think Nintendo would fare far better in that space if forced than Sony or MS would. |
Halo and Gran Turismo are bad examples. How about Ratchet and Clank? Or Jak and Daxter? And that's if you want mascot games. Things that do better on smartphones tend to not even really need characters. Things like Patapon would probably do well on smartphones. Pokemon isn't casual enough, there are Pokemon rip-offs that appeal better to casuals out there. Mario is too complicated of a platformer and would have to be very dumbed down, it'd hardly be Mario anymore. Sonic would, and in fact has done better on smart phones than Mario ever could. Animal Crossing I could see working, but it'd be way too simplified and lose much of its appeal. There are better alternatives. Basically, if Nintendo wanted to truly go into smart phone games, they'd have to invent completely new franchises for it. There are some franchises they own now that do horribly on their own consoles that would probably do better on smartphones, but that's probably exactly what they'll end up doing now that they do want to do more with smart phones. Sony and Microsoft have an advantage that Nintendo doesn't though, in that while sure, Halo and Gran Turismo don't belong on phones, each could easily make something for a smart phone, and since they own and control the app markets for their own phones, could promote their smart phone games unlike Nintendo ever could. They could promote their phone games much more cheaply and effectively than Nintendo could.