Comment by Tiktaalik | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Tiktaalik | Hacker News Reader

"Maybe it's the desire for official Nintendo games to come to iOS and Android that's coloring my opinions, but it seems like the writing is on the wall for some form of mobile gaming to eventually and completely push consoles to the side."

I understand where this "Nintendo must get into mobile" idea comes from. Folks look around on the subway and see that everyone is on their smart phones, and many are playing games. It's still very unclear to me however, to what extent smart phones are affecting Nintendo's business, and how Nintendo should adjust their business model in response.

Nintendo just announced[1] that Fire Emblem: Awakening for the 3DS smashed franchise sales records, selling 180k copies in the first month (a month plagued by shortages[2]) and selling more than a third of those units via their own digital distribution store. For perspective the lifetime sales of the previous Fire Emblem title was only 250k.

This game is selling out at $40 and 1/3 of the sales are online sales that they don't have to share with anyone else (still $40!). One of the main reasons why I don't think Nintendo should become a software only is company that I don't see how they can remain as profitable if they had to adjust their prices for the realities of the iOS market and had to share their profits with Apple. The most profitable games on mobile stores are free to play titles, and while I think Nintendo should experiment here and develop their own F2P games to test that market, I don't see why they couldn't do that on their own platform.

[1] http://venturebeat.com/2013/03/14/3dss-fire-emblem-awakening... [2]http://neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=511036&highligh...

Have you seen Square Enix's pricing in the app store? They charge 20-30 dollars a game. I think Nintendo could get away with a 30 dollar Mario game in the app store.

Nintendo currently sells Mario at $40. A move to $30 would be profitable if Nintendo makes 33% more sales (ignoring costs). Do you really think Mario would sell 33% better on Android than it does on the 3DS?

Mind you, the majority of Nintendo Fans have a 3DS already.

Another issue that is never addressed when discussing whether Nintendo should become a software only company and develop for mobile is whether their most successful products are even all that suitable for mobile devices. Would the user experience of playing Nintendo games actually improve on a touch screen smart phone?

Ironically, Advanced Wars and Fire Emblem, Nintendo's tactical RPG entires, can go on touchscreen just fine. A few others (such as Elite Beat Agents) would arguably do better on the Smartphone platform.

But this is definitely the minority of the games that Nintendo makes. The thought of playing something moderately fast-pace like "Mario Tennis" on a touch screen scares me. There isn't enough precision, and no touch screen is as responsive as a controller yet.

The major brands: Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Kid Icarus, Donkey Kong require speed and precision beyond that of the touchscreen. Let alone the issue of blocking the screen as you play the game.

I think if they were added on both Android and iOS, they would sell much better. I know many, many people that are fan enough to shell out money for these games, but not fan enough (anymore) to get a dedicated console, portable or otherwise, myself included.

Not the complete story either.

Fire Emblem: Awakening has paid DLC, that is very tempting to buy if you're a Fire Emblem fan. Lucina's full story is available in paid DLC, and the only way to experience it is to purchase those maps.

Anyone who has finished the game will know the importance of Lucina's character. (Spoiler alert btw: don't look her up if you haven't gotten to chapter 14 yet).

I bought Fire Emblem, and I'm having quite a bit of fun. If there wasn't a demo I'm not sure I would have.

It should be noted that there is a good reason 1/3 of people bought it online: supply was too low. I would have bought the physical game but it simply wasn't available.

Sooooooooo let me get this straight.

Nintendo is disappointing us because they're not leaving the TV set and going into mobile, and Apple is disappointing us daily because they're not leaving the mobile space and going into the living rooms with a TV set.

Sound about right?

> The most profitable games on mobile stores are free to play titles

Any evidence to support this? Generally curious.

There's what you can observe for yourself: on the iOS App Store, there are three "top" lists--Top Free and Top Paid (both of which measure downloads), and Top Grossing. Top Grossing is saturated with free-to-play.

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