Sad that I had hoped some exec at Nintendo would veto this approach as "Not Nintendo" rather than choosing to tarnish the brand and take the money, like Apple did.
They did, originally. They released a $10, no microtransactions Mario game (Super Mario Run) in 2016. The general consensus is that the game did not live up to Nintendo's commercial expectations[1], and I think that's true. Nintendo entirely switched to the more standard App Store game model for its later mobile titles, and they print money.
As for "tarnishing the brand," Nintendo still hasn't really put a "full title" on mobile, with the maybe possible exception of Mario Kart. It feels like they are still keeping their distance, but who knows what would have happened if the Switch sales were more like the Wii U than the Wii.
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[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Mario_Run#Commercial
They let their extreme love for DRM and proprietariness completely overwhelm the user experience. But instead of asking themselves if that's why it didn't sell well, they of course conclude that they weren't making money because they weren't being scummy enough.
I bought Mario Run and even with the absurd restrictions I enjoyed it and probably would have bought more of their games if they'd continued. Quite the disapointment.
At what point is Nintendo's ability to manipulate us with their corporate mascots/IP a type of mental illness or cause for public concern?
None of this is new information, but a precursor to this point: Nintendo, strategically, couldn't afford (or at least wasn't willing to risk) to develop mobile content on par with the quality of their proprietary hw platforms. Super Mario Run had to be a sub-par experience compared to what was obtainable on their own platform to avoid this risk. Yet they still released a sub-par experience at what, for mobile, was a high premium price of $10. It was doomed to fail from the outset.
They might have maximized the popularity of Mario Run by coming out with a $2-$3 price tag and marketing campaign that essentially gave the message of "Hey this is just a fun little thing we made, hope you enjoy" but that price tag would risk anchoring consumer expectations of the cost of actual premium Nintendo content to a lower benchmark: "Why is Nintendo charging me $40 for New Super Mario Bros. 2 when a similar game (in visual aesthetics only, but still) only costs $3? Ripoff!"
Or at least that might have been their fear at the time. Mario Run appear a in the year prior to the Switch and after the mediocre reception of the Wii U.
The confusing thing to me is that, even after the Switch's success demonstrated the mobile App Store platforms didn't need to be an existential threat, they still went ahead with a freemium lootbox game, or really any freemium game. It's like their still fighting the previous war. Now the emerging mobile war surrounds gaming services that can provide a full console or PC experience on just about any mobile device. I'll lump the Steam Deck in there as part of that war since Steam has demonstrated that really avid gamers are willing to pay to 1) have access to their existing deep library of games and 2) not have to deal with the downsides of streaming. A more casual gamer can get a decent experience streaming w/ Game Pass for $15/month on their phone and/or tablet, a more dedicated gamer might still do that for convenience but can also go for the Deck (or potential competitors) at a price near that of traditional consoles, etc.
There's lots of dust still in the air here that has yet to settle, but Nintendo has yet to show their strategy for this next era of gaming while their current hardware is aging and their gaming service is not only restricted to that hardware but also limited mostly to older games from previous gen consoles.
I'm guessing it happened to a point. King with their Candy Crush saga had higher revenue and profits than Blizzard [1] for a while now. The amount of money mobile gaming pulls is insane. It's hard to leave that on the table.
Luckily this didn't spread beyond their mobile apps, unlike other game developers that push to replicate the model on desktop and consoles.
[1] https://www.tweaktown.com/news/84423/king-has-made-more-mone...
That said, I've wondered why game companies haven't transitioned back to a socialized model where high profit games are used to subsidize the high-intellect games. I'm talking something like 2014 Blizzard where Hearthstone dwarfed the money every other IP was making but which still attracted a higher-end audience with SC2 and WoW.
[0]https://www.sportskeeda.com/esports/news-genshin-impact-amon...
They do have a concept of filling up your store credit and then spending it on purchases, so the future microtransaction flow could just grab a few credits that you already have on your account.
Let's hope that never happens.
Or they're just greedy. They make tons of money running their own walled gardens.
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/09/10/apple-vs-epic-70percent-of-a...
https://daringfireball.net/linked/2023/05/05/apple-arcade-ne...
I am familiar with the Epic debacle. And while I find the Apple Arcade business model a much better one, I am not sure if it works at the scale of an entire app store. We'll have to see if SetApp ever takes off (same business model, but for apps).
But yeah, the (monetization) design of Nintendo’s mobile games is quite disappointing.
The App Store and exploitative the models it's design perpetuates.