Nintendo games on iOS?

Nintendo Is “Experimenting” With Bringing Games To IOS

Nintendo has been finding themselves between a rock and a hard place in recent years when it comes to handheld gaming versus mobile gaming, as is Sony with their PS Vita.

While the DS, 2DS and 3DS are great devices and are enjoying great sales, it could always be better. Smartphones and tablets have been taking potential profits away from their portable consoles little by little over the past few years.

The belief by many is simple, who wants to carry an additional device dedicated to gaming when our phones have everything we need already? Well I guess it really depends on the type of consumer/gamer you are and where you are going. If it’s a quick commute, maybe a quick round of Angry Birds, Candy Crush or my favorite Nimble Quest is enough but most gamers do not consider these types of games as true deep playing games along the lines of, lets say a Zelda or Mario Kart for 3DS on the go are.

To remedy (somewhat) this problem, Nintendo is looking at various experimental ways they can add their brand on mobile devices but, and here is the tricky part..not take sales away from their own devices. A catch 22.

In a recent interview, Reginald “Reggie” Fils-Aime, president/chief operating officer of Nintendo of America, suggested a shift in Nintendo’s current strategy. Fils-Aime explained that while the ultimate goal will be to draw gamers to Nintendo hardware, the company is aware of the need for expansion. “We recognize that there are a lot of smartphones and tablets out there, and so what we’re doing is we’re being very smart in how we use these devices as marketing tools for our content.” He went on to say, “We’re also doing a lot of experimentation of what I would call the little experiences you can have on your smartphone and tablet that will drive you back to your Nintendo hardware.”

Fils-Aime was also quick to point out “We believe our games are best played and best enjoyed on our devices,” so it’s unlikely that Donkey Kong 3D and Mario Kart 8 will be available in full mode on a future iOS.

Many consumers and analysts are suggesting that Nintendo get out all together from the console market and focus on the great games they make just as Sega has done. But as John Brownlee a writer for Cult of Mac suggests and I tend to agree:

“Many people will wonder why Nintendo doesn’t just give-up, and just start releasing games for iOS, but that’s too cynical. Nintendo is, in many ways, Japan’s Apple, tightly integrating hardware and software to create a magical experience. Telling them to just give up on hardware is like telling Apple to start licensing iOS to competitors and stop making iPhones. But Nintendo does need to be smarter about what a gaming console even looks like in a world saturated with smartphones, and it looks like they have finally started.”

Wii U still misunderstood by consumers, retailers – Analyst

IHS analyst says Nintendo’s messaging troubles persist, people don’t understand how it differs from Wii.

As the Wii U closes in on its one-year anniversary, the system is still hampered by some of the same problems it faced at launch. Speaking with Benzinga, IHS senior games analyst Christine Arrington said people still don’t understand that there’s a difference between the Wii U and its seven-year-old predecessor, the Wii.

“I think one of the things that was a real indicator of that was just, anecdotally, if you went into a retailer and you talked to somebody in the games department, they didn’t even understand what it was,” Arrington said. “I did the secret shopper kind of thing, and they would say, ‘Well, there’s no difference between the Wii and Wii U.'”

Arrington said she was told the same thing multiple times in her secret shopping efforts. As for why the console was so poorly understood, Arrington lamented the lack of a Wii Sports-like launch title, a game that would let everyone understand at a glance why the Wii U GamePad would allow for different experiences from the Wii.

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata acknowledged both the lack of consumer understanding and the absence of a Wii Sports-like title for the Wii U earlier this year. However, he blamed the misunderstanding on Nintendo’s “relaxed” marketing efforts for the system.

 

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Japanese Sales Charts: PlayStation Games Dominate the Top 10, Wind Waker HD Disappoints

Ignoring the fact that Monster Hunter 4 on the 3DS finished in first yet again, it was a pretty good week for PlayStation games with 7 titles in the top 10, including two for the PlayStation Vita. On the hardware side of things, the PS3 and PS Vita were up a bit at 11,382 and 6,031, respectively, while the PlayStation Portable dropped to 4,805.

Outside of PlayStation, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD disappointed with a debut of just over 30,000 and Armored Core: Verdict Day gave the Xbox 360 a rare game in the charts as it sold 5,088 copies.

Here’s the top 20 selling games in Japan between September 23rd – 29th, according to Media Create:

1. Monster Hunter 4 (3DS) – 213,278
2. The Legend of Heroes: Sen no Kiseki (PSV) – 81,622
3. Warriors Orochi 3: Ultimate (PS3) – 80,398
4. The Legends of Heroes: Sen no Kiseki (PS3) – 67,718
5. Armored Core: Verdict Day (PS3) – 59,184
6. My Little Sister Can’t be This Cute: Happy End (PS3) – 31,054
7. The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD (Wii U) – 30,264
8. Warriors Orochi 3: Ultimate (PSV) – 25,483
9. Friend Collection: New Life (3DS) – 9,269
10. Arcadias no Ikusahime (PS3) – 9,252
11. Youkai Watch (3DS) – 8,578
12. Disney Magic Castle: My Happy Life (3DS) – 7,575
13. Animal Crossing: New Leaf (3DS) – 7,431
14. Mario & Luigi: Dream Team (3DS) – 7,361
15. Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn (PS3) – 6,866
16. Starry Sky: After Winter Portable (PSP) – 6,074
17. Meiji Toukyou Renka (PSP) – 5,963
18. Epic Mickey: Power of Illusion (3DS0 – 5,569
19. Armored Core: Verdict Day (Xbox 360) – 5,088
20. Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon (3DS) – 5,007

 

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Bethesda: “The time for convincing publishers to support Wii U has long past”

Pete Hines highlights flaws in Nintendo’s third-party strategy.

Bethesda’s Pete Hines had some choice words regarding Nintendo’s third-party strategy, suggesting that the time for getting better software support for the Wii U may have already passed.

In an interview with Game Trailers‘ Bonus Round, Bethesda’s vice president of PR and marketing underlined the company’s commitment to making its games available on every platform – as long as those platforms don’t require compromise on the original vision.

As far as Bethesda’s games are concerned, that has led to their absence on Nintendo hardware despite their huge popularity. And Hines intimated that the situation is representative of Nintendo’s approach to third-party developers as a whole.

“The time for convincing publishers and developers to support Wii U has long past. The box is out,” Hine said, while sitting on a panel that also included Borderlands 2 lead writer Anthony Burch.

Hines pointed to Sony and Microsoft’s diligent and long-running efforts to communicate with third parties during the hardware design process as a better strategy for most developers.

“It’s not that every time we met with them we got all the answers we wanted, but they involved us very early on, and talking to folks like Bethesda and Gearbox, they say ‘here’s what we’re doing, here’s what we’re planning, here’s how we think it’s going to work’ to hear what we thought – from our tech guys and from an experience standpoint.

“You have to spend an unbelievable amount of time upfront doing that. If you’re just going, ‘we’re going to make a box and this is how it works and you should make games for it.’ Well, no. No is my answer. I’m going to focus on other ones that better support what it is we’re trying to do.”

This adds colour to comments Hines made in an earlier interview, where he stated that the Wii U was, “not on [Bethesda’s] radar.” Nintendo is now attempting to address the Wii U’s less than admirable position by cutting $50 off its price.

 

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Nintendo preps free-to-play title

Wii U maker tells analysts it will explore new business model with non-Mario, non-Pokemon game by end of fiscal year

Nintendo may be resisting bringing its brands to smartphones and tablets, but it’s still interested in the business models that have driven the mobile boom. As spotted by Polygon, analyst David Gibson attended a Nintendo briefing event at E3 today and tweeted about the company’s intention to explore free-to-play.

“Nintendo free-to-play game will be released this [fiscal year] but will not be Mario or Pokemon game as already have good relationship in those brands,” Gibson said. (Nintendo’s fiscal year ends in March of 2014.)

While the platform of that game wasn’t specified, Gibson said Nintendo president Satoru Iwata made the remark in a section of the briefing dedicated to the Wii U. Iwata also said that the 3DS’ success in Japan is proof that dedicated handheld platforms can thrive despite the competition from smartphones.

Nintendo has already indicated that it would welcome free-to-play business models on the Wii U. One of the earliest games announced for the system was Ubisoft’s free-to-play Ghost Recon Online. However, that project never actually launched on the system.

 

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