Fund manager wants Nintendo

[HalcyonDaze00]

to start making mobile games:

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/hedge- ... _news_stmp

I know Nintendo have said this won't happen but the eye watering numbers will surely mean it's only a matter of time?.........

[dste]

I was just looking for a relevant thread to post this in.

The key points for me were:

"Just think of paying 99 cents just to get Mario to jump a little higher.

"The same people who spent hours playing Super Mario, Donkey Kong, and Legend of Zelda as children are now a demographic whose engagement on the smartphone is valued by the market at well over $100bn," he added.

How about no and f**k off.

[HalcyonDaze00]

Just think of paying 99 cents just to get Mario to jump a little higher

yeah, lots of people have jumped on this, but with the $$ signs that major investors are seeing, nintendo are going to come under a huge amount of pressure to make this happen, especially with the wii u doing so poorly.

[killbot]

I'm not against it in priciple but it needs to be properly thought out and not just a knee-jerk response. It's all well and good sticking SMB on a smartphone and waiting for the dollars to roll in but would SMB be any GOOD on a phone? Part of the appeal of the game is the perfectly weighted control, how well would that actually work with touchscreen controls?

Nintendo might make a fortune and become the toast of the stock exchange again, or they might squander their good name in the pursuit of a quick buck.

One thing I can't see them doing is going anywhere near the in-app purchases thing. Their popularity may have waxed and waned over the years but I think even their biggest detractors would point to the company as one who generally treat their audience with respect (by, for example, not releasing half-finished games and patching them later - Nintendo games always ship finished and very rarely feature any major bugs or errors). Taking advantage of this reputation for quality by attempting to cynically milk their fans wallets dry would destroy this carefully built reputation at a stroke.

[sirpigmeat]

Yeah, hedge fund managers, thats whose hands I want the future of gaming to be in...

I think Iwatas perfectly sensible to be hesitant about mobile phones, its not proven stable territory, nobody knows if its going to last or go anywhere... And if gaming does head down that path, Nintendo can just make the move at a later date... They are sitting on a huge pile of franchises, those franchises aren't going anywhere and they can exploit them once they know its nesacary... Of course hedge fund managers don't give a censored about nintendos long term well being, they'd rather rip them apart for their resources til their a dried up husk and then move on to the next sucker.

[retrosofer]

Although there are plenty of proper and decent games on Android and iOS, its also got tons of crap on there and these market places are not yet well known for great family friendly gaming experiences. I dont know whether this will ever happen, but the mobile market would need a real shake up first imo as its abit of a joke with all the crap that goes on there.

[psj3809]

I'm not against it in priciple but it needs to be properly thought out and not just a knee-jerk response. It's all well and good sticking SMB on a smartphone and waiting for the dollars to roll in but would SMB be any GOOD on a phone? Part of the appeal of the game is the perfectly weighted control, how well would that actually work with touchscreen controls?

Of course it would work well. Doesnt have to be the latest Mario it could be a collection of old gameboy classics. The funny thing is there are tons of clones out there anyway on iOS/Android, and many people have emulators running these old Gameboy games anyway. So yes of course the game will work well, platformers on iOS/Android are very popular as they work well.

On Android you can download an emulator for free, on iOS you may have to be jailbroken or manage to download one of the apps which gets through for a few days. But theres also a free Gameboy emulator out there on iOS now anyway (GBA4iOS). So its funny Nintendo dont want users playing their games on these smartphones when a huge majority are anyway.

[sirpigmeat]

None of the platformers respond anywhere near as well as something on dedicated hardware, the emulators are ok for advance wars/fire emblem turn based stuff, but pretty useless for anything else... Also you have a problem with different phones responding in different ways, games working fine on one phone and being buggy and dreadful on another... with specific platform in mind, games can be really optimised.

[psj3809]

Of course its not the same as dedicated hardware but it still works very well.

Problem is some people arent keen on mobile gaming so they'll come out with the controls argument. I'm currently 80% through Batman on the Gameboy (on my iphone). Its easy to control, one thing mobile gaming is good for is platformers as theyre so easy, just left/right/jump mostly.

We're talking very basic Mario Land games, phones will be fine. Use an old phone and of course it may struggle.

But again if you think emulators are okay for just advance wars/fire emblem and nothing else, i think that shows you dont play many games on mobile phones then. I've got GBA, GB, NES, SNES, PC Engine, i've played many of those games on my iphone and they all work fine.

Its funny, it seems the Nintendo fans are the only ones going on about how bad it'll work on a smartphone. The rest of us who play these types of games on smartphones know it'll be fine.

[retrojc]

Nintendo games (The 2D variety) could easily make it onto mobile platforms, the latest stuff/3D stuff not a chance. The platforms won't be able to handle it not without lots of dev anyway.

However I'm against Nintendo porting/developing for any other platforms than their own. There is no longevity in that, none at all, it's a quick buck not a long term plan. This investor clearly wants a quick return so he/she can bail the censored out.

[stvd]

some people arent keen on mobile gaming so they'll come out with the controls argument.

Not true. I'd love to be able to play classic games on a mobile device but, IMO, touch screens aren't up to it. It may be that I need to persevere and get better at it but it doesn't seem worth the effort. Holding direction+run+jump on Super Mario on a touch screen is terrible. Maybe certain platformers are suited to it but some of my favourites (chuckie egg, manic miner, donkey kong) are virtually impossible. Anything that needs any sort of precision movement/jumping doesn't work. For me at least.

[Matt_B]

I just don't see it myself. As soon as you can buy Nintendo games on other platforms, they're pretty much writing off their hardware business. That might be something they'd consider if the struggling Wii U was all they had, but with the 3DS still selling like hot cakes they'd be mad to.

[killbot]

some people arent keen on mobile gaming so they'll come out with the controls argument.

Not true. I'd love to be able to play classic games on a mobile device but, IMO, touch screens aren't up to it. It may be that I need to persevere and get better at it but it doesn't seem worth the effort. Holding direction+run+jump on Super Mario on a touch screen is terrible. Maybe certain platformers are suited to it but some of my favourites (chuckie egg, manic miner, donkey kong) are virtually impossible. Anything that needs any sort of precision movement/jumping doesn't work. For me at least.

For me, the finger-dexterity required to play Super Mario Brothers well demands a physical d-pad and buttons. It would be incredibly hard without them. I might be in a minority on that, but there it is.

[HalcyonDaze00]

it's very clear that a huge swathe of the core market (girls, young children, housewives) for Nintendo have jumped from the wii onto the mobile gaming platforms, they certainly aren't buying into the wii u, so you can see why the big investors in Nintendo want them to chase this "lost" revenue stream.

[sirpigmeat]

Of course its not the same as dedicated hardware but it still works very well.

Problem is some people arent keen on mobile gaming so they'll come out with the controls argument. I'm currently 80% through Batman on the Gameboy (on my iphone). Its easy to control, one thing mobile gaming is good for is platformers as theyre so easy, just left/right/jump mostly.

We're talking very basic Mario Land games, phones will be fine. Use an old phone and of course it may struggle.

But again if you think emulators are okay for just advance wars/fire emblem and nothing else, i think that shows you dont play many games on mobile phones then. I've got GBA, GB, NES, SNES, PC Engine, i've played many of those games on my iphone and they all work fine.

Its funny, it seems the Nintendo fans are the only ones going on about how bad it'll work on a smartphone. The rest of us who play these types of games on smartphones know it'll be fine.

I play quite a bit on the phones i've had, I don't take my 3ds out of the house except to pick up streetpass hits... so its my main way of entertaining myself when i'm stuck on the train... rpgs and turn based strategy, puzzle games are all fine enough.

But i've tried to get on with a few platformers and they just don't cut the mustard control wise...

Ok that said all my phones are cheapies, i don't have an Iphone or a top of the line Android, maybe on these phones the games play fine... but this is part of the argument Nintendo are making, these inconsisties, were a game plays great on one device and stinks on another and people don't blame the hardware, they blame the game... can really screw you up if your dedicated to creating a quality product...