They already do: The 3DS and the Wii U.
I suspect we shall not be seeing a Nintendo-approved Mario platformer on iOS or Android anytime soon. Seems like it would just undermine their hardware sales.
I suspect we shall not be seeing a Nintendo-approved Mario platformer on iOS or Android anytime soon. Seems like it would just undermine their hardware sales.
I don't understand the obsession people have with Nintendo releasing their games inside Apple's walled garden.
Nintendo already releases really great games, on good hardware specifically designed for playing those games. It's widely available, designed well for it's intended purpose and priced very competitively (32gb iPod Touch is $250, 32gb Wii U is $300 but also usually includes a ~$50 game).
They also sell a reasonable back-catalog of their older games. Their Wii U hardware is backwards compatible with nearly everything they've ever released (hardware-native compatible with Wii and GameCube, software-emulates N64, SNES, NES, GBA, DS, etc).
Nintendo isn't perfect by any means. But their setup right now is pretty competitive, and their hardware has been intelligently selected and priced.
Nintendo might gain a little bit of sales by jumping into iOS, but they'd loose a lot too -- way more than most people might realize.
All else being equal, I'd rather have Nintendo games on my iPhone than pay $1 for a 3DS or a Wii U, simply because I always have my iPhone.
The problem, of course, is that all else won't be equal. Business concerns aside, the games are unlikely to be very fun on a touchscreen. Every fast-paced touchscreen game I've played has been an exercise in frustration and I don't think Nintendo can overcome that.
But if a person hasn't figured that out, or thinks Nintendo can overcome it, then it's pretty reasonable to want their stuff on iOS (or their other mobile platform of choice).
It's reasonable to want it, I guess, but it's not reasonable to expect Nintendo to provide an inferior experience to players that also undermines their business.
Thing is, while an iOS Pokemon game would do gangbusters, would it be able to top the 10+ million copies at $40 a pop that Pokemon games (released almost every year these days, it seems) regularly clear, given that they'd have to cut the price considerably (or even make it "freemium") in order to sell to the typical iOS user? And even if it did sell better, would it be worth killing off what is arguably the main driver of 3DS sales and taking an additional corresponding hit on other, unrelated 3DS games?
Unless Nintendo goes totally bonkers, I think their iOS experiments are going to be limited to smaller puzzle titles and the like that fit into the existing "freemium" mold well, making a quick buck and advertising their bread-and-butter properties simultaneously.
I need to be able to feel the buttons as I'm pressing them.
- 3DS owners always have their 3DS, and don't usually own any Apple product, except rarely an iPod Touch. Why? Because they're Japanese schoolchildren, sitting around at recess battling one-another in Pokemon or somesuch. iOS doesn't fit anywhere into that picture.
- Likewise, the Wii U is still one of a long line of "famicom" (lit. "Family Computer") products. All the software written for it is written to encourage local multiplayer, with game balance choices made to cater to family members being those multiple players—thus why the "randomness" of items in Smash Bros, the rubber-banding in Mario Kart, etc. They're games that let younger and older siblings, or children and their parents, have a fun experience together even at disparate skill levels! Again, this isn't something that translates away from the "everyone sitting in the same room", so doesn't do well on mobile where everyone in the family would be expected to own their own iPod Touch or whatever else.
The closest functional analogue to a portable game console is not a smartphone, but a tablet. And while it's very fun to browse the web or watch videos on the couch with a tablet, even the best tablet games are no where near as engaging as the average portable console game.
Nintendo of Japan did a series of commercials to demonstrate this, showing Japanese celebrities relaxing at home, curled up on their couches, playing 3DS by themselves while thinking out loud to the audience. Another featuring the branding of a big pop star, and I'm sure there's many more that I never saw. AFAIK, Nintendo of America hasn't tried to market the 3DS to adults at all, and it's really not doing justice to the cross-generational appeal of many of their products.
To undermine your own brand like that by creating a shitty user experience and making the thing you have that is special into a cheap commodity makes no sense.
Nintendo's hardware right now isn't awesome (battery life on the Wii U GamePad is crap, etc.) but it is good enough to make the latest franchise games fun and playable for the family.
I would truly love to see Nintendo move towards a more open (in terms of platform) space... I don't know how much they make on hardware, but if they released a bluetooth controller that combined with software for iOS/Android could be a boon to their back catalog sales... though sharing 30% with Apple/Google is probably what keeps them away more than anything... not sure how open Google would be to a reduced sales rate given their size, I know Apple would be unlikely.