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[FoneBone]

That Nintendo has never made that mistake is a good thing.

Not quite: see - CDi and some of the various edutainment Mario games in the 90s

 

[BurntPork]

Total app store revenue in 2011: $3.6B - http://9to5mac.com/2011/07/07/apple...5b-downloads-425000-apps-nearly-3-6b-revenue/

Total Nintendo revenue in 2011: $12B - http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/41/41877.html

I will never understand why people want Nintendo to sacrifice their hardware business in an effort to gain market share in a smaller, more competitive market when the results of success are smaller and the result of failure is a complete loss of mind share and competitive advantage.

Because in like 3 years the app store will maybe probably reach like $24B in revenue and then they'll use that figure in their totally flawless logic without any flaws.

 

[Erethian]

Nintendo going third party has been a joke for a decade.

Now it's reality, analysts are actually arguing this.

Also if you take their argument to its logical conclusion then almost nobody would make anything for consoles or handhelds, because there are a lot of gaming companies doing a lot worse than Nintendo are.

Uncharted? Make it for iOS/Android. Halo? iOS/Android. Battlefield? iOS/Android.

 

[ColtraineGF]

Well, it's not like they had a choice with the CD-I titles -- Philips was legally able to use them after the addon deal between them and Nintendo fell through. And use them they did...

Edutainment market is probably different though. Don't know enough to comment on that.

 

[Mutanthands]

Just another example of the stupidity of the investor-driven need for quarterly profits and constant growth versus long term viability. Any legitimate questions about the current strategy are negated by the insistence on putting Nintendo games on iOS devices. Sure it would boost profits for a quarter, but it would destroy Nintendo in the long term.

People want short term profits now, otherwise you're worthless. Nintendo will keep doing what they need to do, know-nothing analysts be damned.

 

[StevieP]

Also if you take their argument to its logical conclusion then almost nobody would make anything for consoles or handhelds, because there are a lot of gaming companies doing a lot worse than Nintendo are.

Uncharted? Make it for iOS/Android. Halo? iOS/Android. Battlefield? iOS/Android.

Uncharted: GA would actually be an extremely easy port to newer smartphone/tablet hardware (in comparison to the other examples you cited). I don't see constant articles calling for it to be ported to the new ipad, though.

 

[TheNatural]

Yes you are. And Im not going to let you drag this off topic any more than that. If you want to have this discussion, and you are not walking away from it, you need to go back several posts in our exchange and directly respond to the points I put forth that you dodged half a page ago.

Just in case you have forgotten.


This is wrong. Its not my opinion that its possible making this move could harm them or their brand in some way, its a literal fact that its a possibility.

There is a risk involved in doing this, it would help if you could provide some solid reasoning using real world data as to why this risk is worth it. Something other than "I think that" would be a really good start. You tried to slither out of this one by saying that there was no risk, and that it was merely my opinion that there was a risk.

Its not. Its just the truth.

Second:



What you are supposed to say to that is anything that would solidify, rectify and perhaps support your statement that:



You see, in this statement here, you stated that the reason doing this isnt a bad move is solely because these games no longer hold any value at all on Nintendos own hardware.

This is factually false as proved by this 25th anniversary game selling millions worldwide. These old game do still hold value, and LOTS of it, specifically for Nintendos own hardware, the only place where this game could be played.




And this part of your post was handled properly by Ion



Then of course, if your up for it. Theres always this to address:

You're making jumps as to the reason why things are true and false here, so I'm not going to argue with you any longer. You're making jumps and connections and presenting them as true when there are other factors at play.

The way you're talking about risk is the same as opportunity cost, so let it put it to you simply here since you ignored what I said about cartridges. Staying the same path the way you are talking about risk IS that in itself. If you don't adapt your core business or try to expand into other areas you're putting your business at risk. Nintendo did that with the N64 and unwisely stuck with that they knew and it hurt them. Another good example is AOL - they never adapted from the internet boom and oncoming wave of broadband connections to adapt and they're now a shell of the giant they once were. What you said is flat out untrue about what you think about risk as the way you presented it.

I'm going to make it simple for you here, because this is going to be my last post on the matter. You keep trying to make this personal about my opinion when I've given you plenty of reasons to support my opinion.

Just because you present yours as "fact" and say mine do not count doesn't make it true.

1) A collection of Mario games selling on a Nintendo system has no correlation with its value possibly decreasing if another version of one of the games on that collection were on a mobile platform. Saying "well it sold X amount" - Mario itself has value and Mario sells, I've never disputed that. My point of "value" is that Super Mario Bros solely as an exclusive ran out long ago, because it's commonplace and been available years and years. It feels almost like a public domain property at this point, so arguing the sacredness of it's exclusivity makes no sense to me. Saying the Mario Collection sold means no more than "Mario sells" - it does not present any facts with regard to *if* a mobile version of one of the games existed it would have effected the sales of this certain game in any way.

2) You list app store revenue as "cold hard fact" - of what? I've never argued anything with regards to Nintendo moving to a platform in any way taking their games off their own system. What does that have to do with anything I'm saying?

I'm not really sure why you've drug this out so long, and why you have such a hang up with what I thought was a pretty basic opinion and response to a thread that wasn't meant to be taken at anything more than face value. But since you're basically doing, and continuing to do some thinly veiled personal attacking and labeling (sidestepping, slithering, going into a "shell" when I'm just responding to you), for whatever reason.

Believe it or not, people have different opinions in this world, and agreeing to disagree is fine. Apparently you have a hang up on this point and can't do that, and want to claim everything you say is fact, with things that don't correlate to anything, and then claim I'm not giving reason to anything.

You said to me, "They are taking action, just not the one you would like." I've never said anything about the action they're taking, I think Nintendo is doing a great job, and it's just a suggestion and opinion about what a good move might be. I'm not offended by it, I have no idea why you have such a hang up over my personal opinion here like I'm grilling Nintendo or said anything bad about it, but maybe you need to take a break and learn the phrase "live and let live." I'll make it easy on you, I'm done with this topic and I'll do myself a favor and put you on ignore and probably avoid the weird mentality on the videogame side for a while.

Try not to take everything so seriously, sometimes people just disagree and it doesn't have to turn into some shit throwing fest trying to make someone else seem like they don't have a right to think what they think.

 

[frankie_baby]

Because in like 3 years the app store will maybe probably reach like $24B in revenue and then they'll use that figure in their totally flawless logic without any flaws.

Though by then though several new companies will have produced and milked a game on it been proclaimed the next big thing and subsequently gone bankrupt

 

[BorkBork]

Just another example of the stupidity of the investor-driven need for quarterly profits and constant growth versus long term viability. Any legitimate questions about the current strategy are negated by the insistence on putting Nintendo games on iOS devices. Sure it would boost profits for a quarter, but it would destroy Nintendo in the long term.

People want short term profits now, otherwise you're worthless. Nintendo will keep doing what they need to do, know-nothing analysts be damned.

I know nothing about the feasibility of this, but is there a possibility for Nintendo to go private? Since they march to their own drum, I could see this being a better way for them to move forward. But it's probably not realistic at all.

 

[boiled goose]

An interesting idea is that the mobile market actually 'lacks' a real competitive environment.
The market is huge, but is is also very new.

The fact that Angry birds has become a cultural phenomenon is testament to this.

The games, while fun, don't really have anything special. It is an old simple game with a cute exterior. Yet, it became the game to get. This tells me that there is a lack of competition.

Maybe Nintendo is not the best suited to take advantage of this situation, but probably speaks to why so many developers are moving into the mobile space.

 

[frankie_baby]

I know nothing about the feasibility of this, but is there a possibility for Nintendo to go private? Since they march to their own drum, I could see this being a better way for them to move forward. But it's probably not realistic at all.

Unless zombie yamauchi fancies forking out for the rest of the company it aint gonna happen

 

[salpa]

iPhones make up 8% of the total mobile phone market.

They make up I think 26% of the total smartphone market, the rest being dominated by Android and the few left by Blackberry.

It's bad enough to sit there and say Nintendo should sacrifice billions of dollars in profit to develop for a pathetic ecosystem when it comes to video games, but come on... People really need to lay off the Apple-juice. It pisses me off that people think their phones consist of 100% of the market and are the best thing to ever happen to the world.

I cannot go a day in my life without hearing about the "incredible" revolutionaries over at Apple HQ. Makes me want to puke.

 

[AtomicShroom]

A Mario game driven entirely by touch controls would be absolutely atrocious. That's all that need to be said to this iOS nonsense.

 

[Version 3.0]

When the media reports in this complete head-up-its-ass, ignorant manner on a topic I'm so familiar with - whether it's video games or another of my interests, or something related to my work - it just scares me to think how far from the truth the rest of the news may be, on topics a lot more important than whether Nintendo had a (well-deserved) bad year.

 

[mclem]

A Mario game driven entirely by touch controls would be absolutely atrocious. That's all that need to be said to this iOS nonsense.

To be fair, a *Kirby* game driven entirely by touch controls was absolutely awesome.

But, yeah, your point stands.

 

[axisofweevils]

Total app store revenue in 2011: $3.6B - http://9to5mac.com/2011/07/07/apple...5b-downloads-425000-apps-nearly-3-6b-revenue/

Total Nintendo revenue in 2011: $12B - http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/41/41877.html

I will never understand why people want Nintendo to sacrifice their hardware business in an effort to gain market share in a smaller, more competitive market when the results of success are smaller and the result of failure is a complete loss of mind share and competitive advantage.

Good point. And remember this in 2011, where Nintendo released hardly any games for the Wii and had to price drop the 3DS. - Yet their revenue was still 4x that of the app store.

 

[axisofweevils]

A Mario game driven entirely by touch controls would be absolutely atrocious. That's all that need to be said to this iOS nonsense.

Stylus touch controls > finger touch controls.
I couldn't imagine playing a kirby game like that with my finger.

 

[the androgyne]

When i see an article like this on a subject i know, i can't help but think how many OTHER topics (that i know nothing of) they're reporting on are filled with bullshit inaccuracies and piss poor reporting like this.

They make it sound like Iwata is going it alone against the board or something if he's supposedly gonna get ousted in a few years, when in reality Nintendo is pretty much 100% united on their cause.

 

[CoconutTank]

OBJECTION. A NEW ARGUMENT APPROACHES!

Let's talk *just* about iOS. There are approximately 400 million iOS devices out in the wild, right? Including 30 million+ iPhone's and like 11 million+ iPads sold in the last 3 months, right?

Now. Let's make the genuinely fair assumption that many people who have bought games for their iOS devices would be damn interested in buying a Mario game. Further, while we know many iOS games are like $0.99 (therein lying your point), we also know that some can be priced higher if they deliver a better experience...so lets say that Nintendo offers one up for $15-$20 and offers that caliber of experience. Mario is a brand name that everyone knows and if they make a full-fledged Mario game lots and lots of people will buy it. I for damn sure would. It'd be the new standard for gaming on the OS, hands down. It would be sitting at the top of the paid apps chart for a long, long time.

If just 10% of that iOS audience buys in (and they would, since Mario is that kind of name and iOS really does need full-featured games...which will come sooner or later) do you really think Nintendo would make "very little money" off of the investment? I mean, that's 40 million copies sold, and all they had to do was build it and put it on the iTunes store. No shipping, no boxes, no carts, no discs, etc.

Even if only 5% of that audience bought the game at that price, 20 million copies would be sold. What was the last console game that sold 20 million copies? That wasn't bundled with a console at some point? That's rare air indeed.

Think about it. If anyone can make an experience-defining game designed to take advantage of a touch screen in ways that make a game impossible on traditional controllers and desirable to all...Nintendo is that company.

Nintendo hardware is usually designed to fit the software, not the other way around. Maybe it's just me, but I don't think they'll be able to recreate the experience of Mario games on touch only interfaces all that reliably. If they could, surely they would've tried by now? And if they have to compromise the gameplay to make it work better with the interface, well...

 

[Boss Doggie]

I wonder if the investors would believe in this report.

 

[HK-47]

To be fair, a *Kirby* game driven entirely by touch controls was absolutely awesome.

But, yeah, your point stands.

Do you use you finger?

 

[Cosmo Clock 21]

I wonder if the investors would believe in this report.

During one of the Iwata apology investment meetings last year one of the investors asked asked him what he had to say for himself given that he didn't even play videogames and in fact hated them; he just bought Nintendo stock cause it was a solid investment at the time.

 

[GDGF]

When i see an article like this on a subject i know, i can't help but think how many OTHER topics (that i know nothing of) they're reporting on are filled with bullshit inaccuracies and piss poor reporting like this.

They make it sound like Iwata is going it alone against the board or something if he's supposedly gonna get ousted in a few years, when in reality Nintendo is pretty much 100% united on their cause.

You have no idea how much I miss your GIFs.

Hope you're ready for E3!

[/offtopic]

 

[rezuth]

An interesting idea is that the mobile market actually 'lacks' a real competitive environment.
The market is huge, but is is also very new.

The fact that Angry birds has become a cultural phenomenon is testament to this.

The games, while fun, don't really have anything special. It is an old simple game with a cute exterior. Yet, it became the game to get. This tells me that there is a lack of competition.

Maybe Nintendo is not the best suited to take advantage of this situation, but probably speaks to why so many developers are moving into the mobile space.

“There aren’t many games that I’ve played recently that have been truly convincing to me. But that said, I have very much enjoyed Angry Birds, especially the way in which it combines traditional and new game elements in exciting ways. Angry Birds is a very simple idea but it’s one of those games that I immediately appreciated when I first started playing, before wishing that I had been the one to come up with the idea first.” - Shigeru Miyamoto

 

[CoconutTank]

To be fair, a *Kirby* game driven entirely by touch controls was absolutely awesome.

But, yeah, your point stands.

As much as I thought Kirby Mass Attack was neat, the game ended up not being super fun for me, at least not fun enough to compel me to finish it.

1. Enemies and traps were very very telegraphed. Like sometimes there was flashing and one would have up to 3 seconds to deal with whatever. I don't know if any other Kirby games were that obvious, I'm pretty sure Return to Dreamland was not though. This probably has more to do with one having to manage 10 liabilities at once rather than touch controls, but I get the feeling that touch controls are less discrete than Control Pad + ABXY (which results in greater chance for inaccuracy (which means compensation)).

2. For the situations in which I had to actually react fast or put on pressure, flicking a bunch was not fun. For the situations in which I had to be accurate and methodical... I could sometimes tolerate.

3. I really dislike the Dedede Resort world. The worst one was the surfing level. Sliding up the ramps to get high was a right pain in the ass for the most part.

And I am probably being unfair here, but I think after my experience with Kirby Mass Attack, I am going to be warily enthusiastic for the next touch control platformer that I get my hands on.

Wrong all-touch Kirby. There's another one on DS. But Mass Attack was still very good.

?

...

Oh you guys are talking about Canvas Curse. Whoooooooooops. I haven't played that, but I hear it's awesome (and it doesn't really sound like a normal platformer)!

 

[Pyrokai]

As much as I thought Kirby Mass Attack was neat, the game ended up not being super fun for me, at least not fun enough to compel me to finish it.

1. Enemies and traps were very very telegraphed. Like sometimes there was flashing and one would have up to 3 seconds to deal with whatever. I don't know if any other Kirby games were that obvious, I'm pretty sure Return to Dreamland was not though. This probably has more to do with one having to manage 10 liabilities at once rather than touch controls.

2. For the situations in which I had to actually react fast or put on pressure, flicking a bunch was not fun. For the situations in which I had to be accurate and methodical... I could sometimes tolerate.

3. I really dislike the Dedede Resort world. The worst one was the surfing level. Sliding up the ramps to get high was a right pain in the ass for the most part.

And I am probably being unfair here, but I think after my experience with Kirby Mass Attack, I am probably going to be warily enthusiastic for the next touch control platformer that I get my hands on.

Wrong all-touch Kirby. There's another one on DS. But Mass Attack was still very good.

 

[AzaK]

Total app store revenue in 2011: $3.6B - http://9to5mac.com/2011/07/07/apple...5b-downloads-425000-apps-nearly-3-6b-revenue/

Total Nintendo revenue in 2011: $12B - http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/41/41877.html

I will never understand why people want Nintendo to sacrifice their hardware business in an effort to gain market share in a smaller, more competitive market when the results of success are smaller and the result of failure is a complete loss of mind share and competitive advantage.

I agree with the point you're trying to make but remember revenue is not profit. Nintendo make what, $20 on a $60 game = 33% App store devs make 70% of what Apple make. So the numbers Re closer when it comes to what the developers get from a sale.

 

[LOCK]

I wouldn't be surprised if they break even this year. Just saying.

 

[starmud]

when has wall street or general finance guys ever understood vidya gamez as a business?

after seeing these people speak/write, most barley understand how angry birds and farmville are a business. they see the end total of DAU's or total downloads and think of paper being printed because of mass zero's and digits. if thats completely true or not, who the hell knows.

they only see numbers. large numbers. apple has that. they understand apple and the ecosystem forming on it. many of these guys have never understood consoles and their ecosystem. if your not participating in the only visible growth parade (visors on), you fail and face extinction.

zealous financiers and their groupies aside, video games do need to change to the technology coming, and it will. we haven't even really had a generation of consoles to embrace many of these new ideas about monetization, service and distribution. wiiu/3ds will start that change for nintendo. i can't imagine live and (even) psn wont evolve next go around to meet the need as well.

 

[Ulairi]

I agree with the point you're trying to make but remember revenue is not profit. Nintendo make what, $20 on a $60 game = 33% App store devs make 70% of what Apple make. So the numbers Re closer when it comes to what the developers get from a sale.

Nintendo sells their games for $50 and they get closer to $30. And, unlike a lot of other publishers Nintendo keeps their games at $50 for a long ass time. Anyone that thinks Nintendo leaving their platforms for iOS is flat out delusional. If I were an iOS game developer I would be terrified of having to compete with Nintendo. People think that it is hard to compete with Nintendo on their own platform, it will be just as hard to compete with them on iOS.

 

[Cheebo]

Why is Nintendos total revenue being compared to app store revenue? App Store is just software revenue. The vast majority of Nintendo's revenue comes from hardware.

Oh and what the hell? That 2011 total link for the App Store is from July. No wonder it was so off. Know how much the app store made in just the last quarter alone (Jan through March 2011)? 2 billion.
http://www.appolicious.com/finance/...asses-600k-apps-1-9-billion-in-revenue-for-q2

The App store is now averaging about 8 billion a year in revenue currently. Posting out of date data to mask your point. What a surprise.

So the App stores revenue nearly matches Nintendos ENTIRE revenue on a per year basis, and Nintendos revenue is dominated by hardware! Comparing the app store revenue to nintendo revenue is a losing argument for Nintendo. If you know you use facts and actual up to date data.

 

[Ulairi]

Why is Nintendos total revenue being compared to app store revenue? App Store is just software revenue. The vast majority of Nintendo's revenue comes from hardware.

Because the cult want Nintendo to stop producing their own hardware and make iOS games.

 

[shinra-bansho]

I agree with the point you're trying to make but remember revenue is not profit. Nintendo make what, $20 on a $60 game = 33% App store devs make 70% of what Apple make. So the numbers Re closer when it comes to what the developers get from a sale.

I thought Nintendo games retailed generally for around $50?

As the platform holder and the distributor they would I assume take a margin closer to 60%+ of the retail price, than 30% though.

Hmm.

Nintendo makes a Mario game for Wii/3DS; sells a conservative 10M units at $50. Makes $25 a piece. Grosses $250M.

Nintendo makes a Mario game for iOS; sells a not conservative 100M units at 99c. Makes 70c a piece. Grosses $70M. (I don't think any iOS game has sold that many copies.)

Of course relative cost of development for the latter would be a pittance I imagine.

Why is Nintendos total revenue being compared to app store revenue? App Store is just software revenue. The vast majority of Nintendo's revenue comes from hardware.

Does it?

They're currently operating on a negative margin for the 3DS.

I thought the bulk of all three's profit came from software, both royalties from third party, and first party sales.

EDIT: Oh revenue, I was thinking profit.

 

[Mariah Carey]

so who is paying for this agenda you guys are talking about? I mean I can see the bias but not sure who is leading this?

Is it just pro-USA company vs a Japanese company?

I've been suspecting for quite a while now that there are third parties that are doing anything they can to get Nintendo out of the hardware business, as it means their strongest competitor pulls all the strings, and I don't think they're above trying to manipulate investors.

 

[Christine]

Nintendo make what, $20 on a $60 game = 33%

Probably quite a bit more than that. Assuming that you're ballparking this based on something similar to this article, ~30% goes to the publisher. However, as Nintendo is usually also the developer, console manufacturer and marketer, they're taking closer to 4/5 than 1/3 of the retail revenue for the majority of their software unit sales.

 

[Ulairi]

We need to nip in the bud this myth that development for iOS is so much less expensive than for the other platforms. It's simply not true. Does anyone think that a full scale Mario game would somehow cost less money just because it's on the iPhone? The majority of the costs for high end console games would still be there if they produced a game of the same quality for iOS. The amount of prototyping, art assets, etc that goes into Mario wouldn't disappear on iOS. The simple fact is that iOS has not shown itself able to support AAA game development. It hasn't. The reason iOS games cost less to make is because they are making simpler games that require fewer resources to produce because outside of a very few games the revenue isn't there. I don't see any major publisher or any developer right now willing to take a risk to spend fifty million dollars for an iOS game.

 

[Cheebo]

Because the cult want Nintendo to stop producing their own hardware and make iOS games.

Except Nintendo is currently losing money on hardware. Software is where they do well.

And the App Store is literally exploding. That initial link from July 2011 is way off to how much it has grown since just then, it's now doing 2 billion a quarter. It's constant rise in revenue is off the chart. It will probably be pulling in over 20 billion revenue a year in just a year or two.

 

[Ulairi]

Except Nintendo is currently losing money on hardware. Software is where they do well.

And the App Store is literally exploding. That initial link from July 2011 is way off to how much it has grown since just then, it's now doing 2 billion a quarter. It's constant rise in revenue is off the chart. It will probably be pulling in over 20 billion revenue a year in just a year or two.

Do you know how much money the app store could make if Apple released it for Android? DO you?!?!?!

Nintendo likes to control their experience. They like to control what the hardware is. They develop their experiences from the interface, to the box powering the games, to the games. They don't want to have to rely on what Apple thinks makes for the best games.

 

[Cheebo]

Do you know how much money the app store could make if Apple released it for Android? DO you?!?!?!

Actually basically nothing. Android users don't pay for apps. The vast majority of android phones being sold on the market are the cheap low-end ones. Those users aren't buying apps. It has been shown time and time again that iOS users are far more likely to spend money on apps than Android users.

It is why iOS is always the lead platform for mobile games.

Also, I am not saying Nintendo should go iOS, I am saying the logic to try to downplay how big the App Store in this thread is just incredibly wrong and in the numbers shown previously just plain extremely out-dated.

 

[shinra-bansho]

Except Nintendo is currently losing money on hardware. Software is where they do well.

And the App Store is literally exploding. That initial link from July 2011 is way off to how much it has grown since just then, it's now doing 2 billion a quarter. It's constant rise in revenue is off the chart. It will probably be pulling in over 20 billion revenue a year in just a year or two.

They traditionally make money on both software and hardware.

They also make money on software royalties once the platform is established, rather than just their own software releases.

In FY2010 (as 2011 has yet to be released) Nintendo took in revenues of ~400B yen; roughly ~US$5B on software. (This will be down this year.)

Even should the AppStore grow to $20B in revenues the likelihood of Nintendo generating similar revenues through iOS that they currently do on their own hardware doesn't seem high. Unless the suggestion is that Nintendo as a company would account for a quarter of all iOS app revenue.

 

[Ulairi]

Actually basically nothing. Android users don't pay for apps. The vast majority of android phones being sold on the market are the cheap low-end ones. Those users aren't buying apps. It has been shown time and time again that iOS users are far more likely to spend money on apps than Android users.

It is why iOS is always the lead platform for mobile games.

Also, I am not saying Nintendo should go iOS, I am saying the logic to try to downplay how big the App Store in this thread is just incredibly wrong and in the numbers shown previously just plain extremely out-dated.

People are not trying to downplay the app store. They are trying to put into perspective what Nintendo does when we get these half-wit analysts that do not understand the games industry. They've never actually had to create a product and sell that product to an actual consumer. You get these finance guys that think they can do everything by manipulating the financials and have no experience trying to sell anything or make anything and they are clueless.

 

[Cheebo]

People are not trying to downplay the app store. They are trying to put into perspective what Nintendo does when we get these half-wit analysts that do not understand the games industry. They've never actually had to create a product and sell that product to an actual consumer. You get these finance guys that think they can do everything by manipulating the financials and have no experience trying to sell anything or make anything and they are clueless.

Well if Nintendo's investors want them to go iOS in masse then Nintendo has to convince them like hell otherwise. The shareholders could very well demand for the high ups at Nintendo such as Iwata and co. be fired and be replaced by far more pro-smartphone/tablet types.

Even if it would be wrong it is still a strong possibility. Shareholders have made terrible choices in the past. Many many many many times.

I really don't think a lot here comprehend just how real the possibility is the shareholders could demand Iwata's head if they are as angry with the poor numbers as they could be, especially if it happens for multiple fiscal reports in a row.

It may not be the "right" choice, but thats not how the corporate world works always. Iwata could possibly be a few fiscal reports from being the next Howard Stringer. Things happen fast and shareholders tend to lack patience.

 

[Ulairi]

Well if Nintendo's investors want them to go iOS in masse then Nintendo has to convince them otherwise. The shareholders could very well demand for the high ups at Nintendo such as Iwata and co. be fired and be replaced by far more pro-smartphone/tablet types.

Even if it would be wrong it is still a strong possibility. Shareholders have made terrible choices in the past. Many many many many times.

“A lot of times, people don’t know what they want until you show it to them.” Steve Jobs

Shareholders, like customers, don't know what they want. Shareholders are not creative. Also, the shareholders do not want them to go to iOS. If they did, they could vote in people who do but they don't have the ability to do that.

 

[saichi]

Then we fundamentally disagree on the nature and potential of the market.

You think there is only a small market for expensive games because there are no expensive games (or, because almost all other games have been cheap and short games). I think a sizable market exists that hasn't been tapped because there have been no games made that are expansive and deep enough to justify a $15-$20 price. I believe that they most certainly can be made...and that if they come, so will the money. That's why I like the Republique project so much. It's pushing forward into the Undiscovered Country.

Again, if 5% bought in...20 million copies+ get sold. You can make a lot of fair arguments, but not one that suggests that 5% of the iOS market would NOT buy a high-quality Mario game at a $15-$20 price. I don't accept the notion. If you do, then we can agree to disagree.

We can agree to disagree but until your point in bold can be proven instead of what you believe in, there is no incentive for Nintendo to take that risk.

On Nintendo hardware - Nintendo can release a Mario game for $40 and guarantee to sell 10 million copies (which is the very low end of Mario game sales)

On iOS - Nintendo can release a Mario game for $15-$20 and there is a chance in theory that it will sell 20 millions copies.

Also, as the others pointed out, the 400 million devices don't mean 400 million potential buyers since it is common for someone to have multiple iOS devices. In addition, there are a bunch of old devices that can't even run the latest iOS which also reduces the number of potential buyers.

 

[CharminUltra]

Do you know how much money the app store could make if Apple released it for Android? DO you?!?!?!

Probably not enough to bother. It's a well documented fact that Android users don't like paying for apps, and that Android developers are probably undernourished

 

[SatelliteOfLove]

"Nintendo has to deal with the change and let Mario games be played on non-Nintendo devices," said Imazu. "I think it will take at least couple of years to see that."

"Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!"

"Has it worked yet?"

"Naw, 3DS sales are still white hot."

"Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!" "Echo Chamber!"

 

[Cheebo]

One thing is for sure if shareholders are angry enough and do get Iwata fired GAF will have one of its biggest meltdowns ever. Regardless if the implication has anythig to do with iOS or not.

 

[Ulairi]

One thing is for sure if shareholders are angry enough and do get Iwata fired GAF will have one of its biggest meltdowns ever. Regardless if the implication has anythig to do with iOS or not.

You don't know very much about stock and share classes, do you? Iwata is in no danger of getting fired.

 

[shinra-bansho]

One thing is for sure if shareholders are angry enough and do get Iwata fired GAF will have one of its biggest meltdowns ever. Regardless if the implication has anythig to do with iOS or not.

What makes you think Iwata is at any risk of getting fired?

Between 2008 and 2010 Nintendo's market cap declined roughly 60% and he's still there; you think they'll move to can him now out of the blue because of some desire to make iMario? :/

 

[Cipherr]

You don't know very much about stock and share classes, do you? Iwata is in no danger of getting fired.

He really doesn't, Im surprised he doubled down on that view like that. The irony is just glorious considering the condescending tone he took.