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Nintendo grabs iPhone top grossing #1 and #2 in the UK

Does this bode well for the future of Switch though?

why bother with a dedicated console to play nintendo games if you can play a flavour of them on your phone / tablet?

no this is not a nintendo is doomed post, more a 'what direction should nintendo go'?

I think it is good for Nintendo as a whole, it gives them a secondary revenue output that will probably earn them more money than most of their main business. It will be a good supplement for them.

I guess the trick is, not to over saturate the mobile market, otherwise that balance may switch (no pun intended :) ). Surprised Fire Emblem and Animal Crossing are coming so soon, if they're not delayed. I would say one game a year would be good, but perhaps a march/novemeber release strategy could work too.
 
Anecdotal, but everyone I know with an iPhone downloaded this. This is people who don't really game either, they just wanted to see what Mario was like on their phone.

Not sure how many bought the game after the demo ends, but I do know everyone was loving what they played of the first world.
The Top Grossing chart doesn't include non-purchases. It's literally counting upgrades to the complete app.
 

M3d10n

Member
The true question is how frontloaded the sales are going to be or if the game will manage to become evergreen. The initial exposure has been massive. Nintendo even emailed their users with NNIDs about the game's launch, which exposes a bunch of consumers who already spend money in game purchases to it.
 
The true question is how frontloaded the sales are going to be or if the game will manage to become evergreen. The initial exposure has been massive. Nintendo even emailed their users with NNIDs about the game's launch, which exposes a bunch of consumers who already spend money in game purchases to it.

Yup. I can at least see sales getting a pick-up on the 25th as people open their new presents of iPads/iPhones or whatever.
 

gogogow

Member
I think you underestimate the mobile market. 10 dollars is a lot when theres so many free alternatives, especially runner type games.

Eeeeh...SMR is way different (and better) than those gazillion endless runners which play all the same. Maybe next time Nintendo needs to make a f2p game with tons of microtransactions.
 

JoeM86

Member
The true question is how frontloaded the sales are going to be or if the game will manage to become evergreen. The initial exposure has been massive. Nintendo even emailed their users with NNIDs about the game's launch, which exposes a bunch of consumers who already spend money in game purchases to it.

If they periodically add content to it, it could be evergreen but if this is it, it won't have GO style legs
 

M3d10n

Member
About the Android version, I read that Nintendo is terrified of piracy (that's why the game is always online) and that they are still unsure if it's possible to "secure" the game on Android.
 

Lutherian

Member
I think you underestimate the mobile market. 10 dollars is a lot when theres so many free alternatives, especially runner type games.

They can but they were "trained" to not want to. Why spend $10 on a time waster when you can get something similar for free that will serve the same purpose?

You're both right, I was being a little sarcastic. Dare I say "Why spend $10 on a time waster when you can get something similar for free but with tons of microtransactions?"
 

M3d10n

Member
If they periodically add content to it, it could be evergreen but if this is it, it won't have GO style legs
Adding more paid level packs would only monetize users who already purchased the game. It would increase average user spending, but it does little to convert non-paying customers.

Adding more levels to the existing pack could have a more positive effect, since it increases value. They could also add more free levels alongside it to bring back users who didn't purchase the game yet to give it another try (but that only works if they didn't uninstall the game.)
 

WaterAstro

Member
Yes, Nintendo did a great job at grabbing #2 with Pokemon GO without even developing the game.

How did you think up of that thread title knowing that fact?
 

gogogow

Member
Seems like being 3rd party isn't so bad. Shocking.

Expected coming from someone like you. How much did Nintendo make in a day? How long will this be no.1 in the charts. This is just ONE game. We don't know how other games without Mario will do. How will a f2p Nintendo mobile game with microtransactions do etc. We barely know anything, but Nintendo needs to go third party!!!!! Because it isn't so bad!!
 

yurinka

Member
If they want good reviews in the game, they must have the demo and the full game in separate products. The demo would get bad reviews (from normal mobile players) and the full game would get good reviews (from Nintendo fans).

Regarding connection issues, it's normal considering that they may be experiencing scalability issues due to the huge amount of users that Apple is throwing at their servers. In a level that the dev team didn't handle before. They'll need some time to adress these issues.

What's with the 3 star rating?
  • $10 paywall
  • Little free content
  • Always online
  • Frequent connection drops
  • Stability issues in some devices
  • And probably more
How much did Nintendo make in a day? How long will this be no.1 in the charts.
In exchange for having a Mario game in mobile devices, and with a temporal exclusive, Apple with give them the best featuring and for an extended period of time, longer than usual.

This alone means a huge amount of revenue since featuring is maybe the main free source of new users and revenue in mobile.
 
Cool. I hope this signifies a return of the ability to release good 'pricey' games that sell, and reverse the race to the bottom attitude. Doubt it though.
 
Cool. I hope this signifies a return of the ability to release good 'pricey' games that sell, and reverse the race to the bottom attitude. Doubt it though.

Yeah that won't happen. Nintendo can barely get away with it just because it's Mario and Apple is helping them. No other game from Nintendo will carry that price point.

If anything this proves that it won't happen any time soon.
 

gogogow

Member
In exchange for having a Mario game in mobile devices, and with a temporal exclusive, Apple with give them the best featuring and for an extended period of time, longer than usual.

This alone means a huge amount of revenue since featuring is maybe the main free source of new users and revenue in mobile.

Huge amount of revenue, IF millions of people are willing to spend $10 to unlock the full game. The majority of the people/casual crowd who game exclusivly on phones are NOT used to spending money like that. Those people don't understand that with microtransactions they would spend WAY more than 10 bucks.
 

big_erk

Member
Didnt nintendo literally set up the TPC? Like forget shares for a minute, they straight up made TPC with their own two hands. They own them in them most basic sense

Nintendo also owns all of the Pokemon characters, and likenesses, ALL OF THEM. So, basically, they own Pokemon.
 
If people can afford a friggin' iPhone, sure they can spend 10$ on a game.

You'd think that, but free software is what adds value to the hardware purchase:

Good read on the problem: Why doesn’t Apple enable sustainable businesses on the app store?

Here's a choice quote. The author is an infuriatingly good writer on these topics:

Ben Thompson said:
Apple’s business model devalues developers

Apple makes money on hardware. It’s in their interest that said hardware be sold for as much of a premium as the market will bear. However, it’s equally in their interest that the complements to that hardware are sold as cheaply as possible, and are preferably free.

That is why, for example, iOS updates are free, and OS X updates nearly so. Both cost hundreds of millions of dollars to develop, but they only exist to sell more hardware, not to make money in and of themselves.

This is standard strategy, especially in technology. Look at Google: the vast majority of their services are free because they want to drive usage in order to capture signals and serve ads. Microsoft, which has felt the pain of Google commoditizing services and Apple commoditizing OS updates, did the same thing to hardware makers: Windows supported everything under the sun because the increased competition would drive down the cost of hardware, leaving all of the profit to Microsoft.

In the case of apps, the current app store, full of a wide variety of inexpensive apps, is perfect from Apple’s perspective. It’s a reason to buy Apple hardware, and that’s all that matters. Anything that on the surface makes the store less desirable for hardware buyers – such as more expensive apps – is not in Apple’s interest.

Emphasis of course mine. Now, the piece was written in 2013 but little has changed since then until very recently. iPad Pro would live or die by its productivity software, so Apple has started enabling developers to charge subscriptions for software and do free trials (in ways which make sense for that kind of software). Furthermore, there's a theory that Mario Run is an effort by Nintendo and Apple to upend the mobile games market.
 

Ashodin

Member
I'm more surprised that Pokemon Go remains that high in the UK. Mario Run being a big success was to be expected.

Surprise, Pokemon Go is still a game. It's not an all-encompassing phenomenon, but Niantic have been killing it with the updates lately.
 

Alienfan

Member
If the game had $10 worth of content or was at least upfront about the price, I don't think people would be complaining as much
 

cw_sasuke

If all DLC came tied to $13 figurines, I'd consider all DLC to be free
now hurry and release Fire Emblem gacha so I can go bankrupt and die

Im worried for my wallet...im non-iap but i have a feeling that they will design FE so that even non-iAP are happy to spend lol.

We are done.
 

gogogow

Member
If the game had $10 worth of content or was at least upfront about the price, I don't think people would be complaining as much

NO, people would complain just as much. The casual crowd wants everything for free. They don't like the idea to buy a game, they do like microtransactions though....
 
Cool. I hope this signifies a return of the ability to release good 'pricey' games that sell, and reverse the race to the bottom attitude. Doubt it though.
I think the stores are very crowded so anything paid is easy to get overlooked. That is unless you are a traditional developer with a well recognized brand name in which case that give you a spotlight and also makes a potential customer go something like "Oh Bully? Rockstar; the GTA guys, they make good stuff".

Also this is launch day which you would expect to be the biggest day of sales so you will have to see what the long term effect is. My expectation is successful enough to continue doing but not so successful as to shelve any future plans for NSMB Switch.
 

Genio88

Member
How many of those download actually payed 10$ to unlock the full experience remains to be seen though, i don't think Nintendo earn a thing from just people downloading the game without then paying the full price for it, since it shouldn't have any ad
 

Javier

Member
#1 in Chilean App Store as well (Free and Top Grossing). Deserved, it's a very well designed game.

Fire Emblem Mobile is going to be the death of me. Hope they announce it soon.
 

LordKano

Member
How many of those download actually payed 10$ to unlock the full experience remains to be seen though, i don't think Nintendo earn a thing from just people downloading the game without then paying the full price for it, since it shouldn't have any ad

It's the top grossing, it only counts the amount of money spent.
 

Genio88

Member
Let's be honest, i love Mario, i love Nintendo, but even i would just download that game to play those free 3 levels just to try it, without never play the game, to me that experience is not worth it 10$, especially with the always online DRM, i can play better version of Mario everywhere on my 3DS without needing to be always connected and have my phone battery go down fast, and from March it'll be even better with Switch
 

Genio88

Member
It's the top grossing, it only counts the amount of money spent.

Oh didn't noticed that, well that's a pretty good result for Nintendo then, it remain to be seen if it'll keep this pace, the game just launched and had a heavy marketing campaign, so a good start was likely
 
Let's be honest, i love Mario, i love Nintendo, but even i would just download that game to play those free 3 levels just to try it, without never play the game, to me that experience is not worth it 10$, especially with the always online DRM, i can play better version of Mario everywhere on my 3DS without needing to be always connected and have my phone battery go down fast, and from March it'll be even better with Switch

I love mario games, ive downloaded the free part.

The always online doesn't bother me, but I have Nsmb Wii/U and Mario Maker, this is just a poor mans version of that. If I didn't have those, then tbh I probably would pay for it.
 

oti

Banned
Let's be honest, i love Mario, i love Nintendo, but even i would just download that game to play those free 3 levels just to try it, without never play the game, to me that experience is not worth it 10$, especially with the always online DRM, i can play better version of Mario everywhere on my 3DS without needing to be always connected and have my phone battery go down fast, and from March it'll be even better with Switch
Well yeah, you're a Switch avatar on NeoGAF. You don't care too much about it since you're ok with spending $300+ on video games. The people who give the game 1 star most likely aren't.

I don't think those people are idiots or have "wrong" opinions. That's just how they grew up. That's what they were taught by the App Store. $10 for an app is A LOT of money.
 

Alienfan

Member
NO, people would complain just as much. The casual crowd wants everything for free. They don't like the idea to buy a game, they do like microtransactions though....

There are people who are willing to spend money and others who aren't. That's perfectly fine. By making the game free, Nintendo are attracting those players who don't spend a penny on the app store. When they find out the it's a demo of four 1min levels, the reception obviously won't be positive.

As it stands, Mario Run isn't even as good as most FREE runners on the app store, plus the always online, and performance issues that aren't exactly helping the review score. As someone who has no problem paying for games, I don't think it's worth $10 for what it comes with. Especially when the other premium runner games out there, like Rayman, are playable offline, come with hours of content and are a quarter of the price. There are a lot of lessons Nintendo will hopefully learn from this game, and casual players not wanting to pay $10 is only one of the many lessons.
 
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