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Soundwave on 26 March 2015
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spemanig said:
Soundwave said:

I think you're being a bit naive here. 

First of all they didn't say this at the DeNA conference, in fact Iwata said they are aiming to have several hit games on mobile. Mobile is a huge business, companies like Supercell make $2 billion in annual revenue, Nintendo is not in this to give away mobile profits to charity. It will likely become a core component of their business in short order, maybe even eclipsing consoles (not that that's a very high bar at the moment). 

I'm actually kind of skeptical that just because people like a F2P or $1 app that they'll be willing to pay $200-$300 for a seperate piece of hardware for those games. I don't think there's a ton of people buying Final Fantasy XV who started playing the games on iOS. 

These are seperate audiences, a lot of people who game heavily on mobile simply have no interest in a console or gaming handheld. Nintendo can now at least make money off them anyway. 


Yes, they did say it at the DeNA conference. And I never said that Nintendo doesn't intent to make money off of this. They do want to have multiple hits on the platform. But the purpose isn't "how can we make the most money off of this mobile hit," but "how can we most effectively built our brand and cement our platform through this mobile hit." The goals are completely different and are done with the primary motive of brand expension.

I would be skeptical of that too, but that's not what I described, at all. Like I said, the point isn't the games; it's the platform. An people didn't buy the iphone just because they had an ipod. They bought their iphones because they had thousands of songs connected to their Apple IDs that they didn't want to have to redownload and reorganize on a different, perhaps even better, platform. Every new app or game you purchase on your iphone is one less reason you'll be getting an Android phone. Your iOS FF example has nothing to do with that relationship.

These are separate audiences that have already proved that they could be swayed to invest in both consoles and gaming handhelds before. And if not for themsevles, for their family or friends. A mother with an NNID could be more easily swayed into buying a handheld for her child because she already has that base relationship with the brand. She's already a Nintendo constomer with an account. That's what matters. Nintendo are merely utilizing mobile games to achieve this, because simply launching a Nintendo app where all you do is check the eshop would appeal to no one but current Nintendo customers.


Can you find me a quote where they said profits from smartphones aren't important to them and this is purely a venture to advertise home/dedicated devices? I watched the presser live and read the statement from Nintendo and also read the Time Magazine interview. 

They never said that. They said they were hoping for synergy but they never said that was their sole purpose. 

What they did say back before this decision was they were trying to figure out how to use mobile in a way to advertise their platforms, but they were also saying then that would not make smartphone games full out, so obviously that whole plan went down the toilet at some point. 

I don't think there will be nearly as much overlap here, Nintendo is going into mobile for its own merits. If they get some cross over, so be it, it's icing on the cake, but again as I said it's not the cake itself. The cake itself is mobile revenue ... revenue which who knows very well could be Nintendo's no.1 money maker in a few years. 

Personally I think dedicated portables are going to decline no matter what Nintendo did, and consoles ... to be honest, the big mistake they made there was letting Microsoft ever come into the the industry and get a foothold. They needed to either head them out way back in the GCN era or have made an agreement/partnership with them before they decided to go full blown with the XBox brand. 

Once they allowed Sony to walk into the industry and then let Microsoft do it too ... their days as a big player in the home console biz were always numbered. People don't want three console brands, it's only worked with the Wii and that required a miracle controller fad to pull off, something Nintendo hasn't come close to ever replicating.