Big Announcements from Nintendo

Today, Nintendo made some rather huge (to put it lightly) announcements at a press conference.

First of which, is that they’re teaming up with mobile gaming bigwig DeNA in extending their game development to the mobile market.

Nintendo intends to make use of their existing IPs to create games specifically for both smartphones and tablets. In a press release by DeNA, they revealed further information and details/intentions of this joint venture:

“The alliance is intended to complement Nintendo’s dedicated video game systems business and extend Nintendo’s reach into the vast market of smart device users worldwide. Under the alliance, DeNA will also be able to strengthen its gaming business at a global scale by leveraging Nintendo’s IP. To ensure the quality of game experience that consumers expect from this alliance of Nintendo and DeNA, only new original games optimized for smart device functionality will be created, rather than porting games created specifically for the Wii U home console or the Nintendo 3DS portable system.

Nintendo and DeNA expect to develop a new core system compatible with a variety of devices including PCs, smartphones and tablets as well as Nintendo’s dedicated video game systems, and are to jointly develop a membership service utilizing this system, with a launch targeted for the fall of 2015. The companies expect to further enhance their customer relationships through the membership service.”

If this bit of news worries you about Nintendo’s future, don’t despair. In the second announcement made by Nintendo they shed some rather interesting information about the company’s future: In response to the announcement of Nintendo going mobile, CEO Satoru Iwata shed a SLIGHT bit of information on the company’s next console. Iwata gave the following comments in regards to Nintendo’s future and the new hardware they’re currently working on:

“Nintendo has decided to deploy its video game business on smart devices, but it is not because we have lost our passion or vision for the business of dedicated video game systems. On the contrary, because now we have decided on how we will make use of smart devices, we have come to hold an even stronger passion and vision for the dedicated video game system business than before. As proof that Nintendo maintains strong enthusiasm for the dedicated game system business, let me confirm that Nintendo is currently developing a dedicated game platform with a brand new concept under the development codename ‘NX’.”

So there you have it, Nintendo is going into the mobile division but is still fully dedicated to console gaming. Iwata says that more information about project “NX” will be revealed next year.

My take-away from this is that Nintendo is just seeking to increase their already massive influence on gaming by getting into mobile games. This isn’t a bad thing considering how big the mobile market is in Japan. Moreover, they are still going to cater to their fans by releasing a new console in the near future. I just hope this “NX” isn’t Nintendo’s replacement for the WiiU as I still love the WiiU, and hope it recovers sales-wise.