Don’t hold your breath waiting for Mario to arrive on the iPhone any time soon. At a recent post-press conference interview with Nikkei, Nintendo President and CEO Satoru Iwata denied rumors that Nintendo would begin making games for other platforms.
According to Iwata, “This is absolutely not under consideration. If we did this, Nintendo would cease to be Nintendo. Having a hardware development team in-house is a major strength. It’s the duty of management to make use of those strengths.”
Recently, Nintendo’s stock rose sharply with rumors that the company would soon begin developing software for third party devices such as the iPhone. But their stock soon plunged back down when it was discovered that the rumors were unfounded.
Nintendo’s latest handheld gaming system, the 3DS, has been something of a failure for the company. The system has been out for less than six months and Nintendo has already slashed the price from $249 to $169.99. Shareholders, fearing more losses, have urged Iwata to start developing games for other platforms.
Nintendo could take the same route that Sega did back in 2001 when Sega of America officially announced that they would become a third-party software publisher. With stiff competition from the likes of Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft, Sega chose to throw in the towel and just sell software. Nintendo may have to take the same route that Sega did over a decade ago.
Nintendo will continue to have financial difficulties unless they can come up with a strategy to deal with the likes of Apple. Many gamers are unwilling to spend $30 -$40 on a single game when they can easily get 30 to 40 games at the App Store for the same price, and that’s not including free titles. Hopefully, Nintendo will find a way to continue to sell innovative hardware and to release a few titles for the iPhone along the way. I’m not the only one who would love to play Super Mario Bros. on my iPhone.
Source: TechCrunch
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