As you likely know by now, Nintendo announced plans yesterday to finally dip their toes into the smartphone gaming market. A lot of people have been saying this was long overdue. I say there was logic in keeping out of that market, no matter how “out of touch” the decision seemed.
It’s tempting to compare the current state of cellphone gaming to Atari‘s market right before the crash, but….I would actually say it’s worse than that. If 1983 thought it had a bad time with an overflooded market, phones have it far worse with literally hundreds of games being added per day, most of them garbage. In addition, you can’t even charge for them, because so many are “free” and the average consumer will pick a free game over a game with a set price no matter how low that price is. The iTunes and Android game market is, in summary, the opposite of everything Nintendo stands for — and they have made comments in the past suggesting this. Until now I figured Nintendo’s abstinence from smartphone gaming was simply their turning their noses up at the sight of it and saying snootily, “Humph! VE would NEVAIR!”
On smartphones, games are initially free and employ psychological tactics to force you to pay for them. Nintendo’s method is to give you a completed game and charge full price at the gate. If there’s DLC, it is made AFTER the original game is finished. This is a practice I appreciate, and I support with money, and so do most Nintendo fans who buy their products just to play their games. The smartphone market is full of the casual gamers Nintendo captured so many dollars from in 2007, but you’d think they would have learned from the sudden crash in Wii sales how fickle that audience is. They don’t care about quality or entertainment value. They just want something cheap to amuse them for two minutes before they move on to something else.
Nintendo’s traditional method of selling digital games isn’t exactly going to work on iTunes. This company charges $8 for a Super NES game. It doesn’t sound like they are bringing their classic titles to phones, though — just licensing their characters for games a mobile company is going to create. Mario is still a powerful brand, but this is a market where he has to compete with Kim Kardashian and could actually fail against her.
Up to this point, Big N has only competed in areas where they can control as much of their own product as possible (which is why ever “going third party” is unlikely). This is all-new, unfamiliar territory for them. For the first time since the mid-80’s, they will be a very small fish in a vicious, ravenous pond. They’ll need all the luck they can get.
