Nintendo Reveals New Business Model

[calmwaters]

Some of you will say, "It's about time." And yet others of you will bash Nintendo for not doing it sooner. At any rate, they have decided to change.

http://www.nintendo.co.jp/ir/en/library/events/140130/index.html
This PowerPoint was uploaded to Nintendo's website January 30th and reveals their business results for their third quarter. The third page is the one that is referenced by Kotaku because it reveals how Nintendo will be releasing an application for smartphones. (Remember when people said this would be a good business move for them? Well...)
Article on Kotaku

If you're impatient to read five pages of a presentation, then you can also read this article from Siliconera that says how Nintendo will be dedicating a team of people to work with smartphones:
Article on Siliconera

I am tickled pink that Nintendo is doing this: it appears that Nintendo is a slow learner, but they somehow always pull through. I really hope this smartphone venture succeeds. I'm sure some of you hope the same thing because we all love Nintendo and don't want them to fail. Now we can hope for the removal of the region lock on their consoles. And lastly, I read a comment (which I think was in the Kotaku article) where it was said that Nintendo was celebrating its 125th anniversary as a business. If this is true, then it should be apparent that Nintendo can evolve with the times. I think President Iwata mentioned this too, but I can't remember: like I said, I'm really happy.

One more thing: I think I remember reading a comment on this site within the past few days about how Nintendo should release a smartphone application to do whatnot.

 

[BORTZ]

While I am surprised this hasnt happened sooner, Im glad they are finally doing it now. I am hopeful.

 

[chavosaur]

Haven't we already seen all this just broken Up into multiple threads..? There's the character IP's, the Mobile thing, The prospect of the future and all that.
This is all stuff we've already seen just in one thread.

 

[tbgtbg]

Now we can hope for the removal of the region lock on their consoles.

Not going to happen, get over it.

 

[Black-Ice]

I'm still amazed at how interested everyone has suddenly become in Nintendo's business and economic situation.

 

[Deleted_171835]

I'm still amazed at how interested everyone has suddenly become in Nintendo's business and economic situation.

GBAtemp is full of investors and business analysts, don't you know?

 

[calmwaters]

Haven't we already seen all this just broken Up into multiple threads..? There's the character IP's, the Mobile thing, The prospect of the future and all that.
This is all stuff we've already seen just in one thread.

So basically I condensed all the stuff from multiple threads into one thread?

I'm still amazed at how interested everyone has suddenly become in Nintendo's business and economic situation.

Maybe people care about Nintendo in more ways than just their gaming consoles? Nintendo has been suffering for a while anyway; concern has probably been mounting for some time now.

 

[MichiS97]

No backward compatibility in the future? Fuck this.

 

[Snailface]

I'm still amazed at how interested everyone has suddenly become in Nintendo's business and economic situation.

Games cost a lot of money to make. If a company's business model is failing it will eventually affect what you, the end consumer, will receive from said company.

This is why, even though game business threads are fodder for fanboy mischief, they are pertinent to people who care about the games they will be able to purchase in the future, if at all.

 

[Maxternal]

No backward compatibility in the future? Fuck this.

Wait, WUT
I, too, like my backwards compatibility.

Edit : found it in the presentation but reading more carefully it seems like backwards compatibility was part of a larger idea of trying to keep customers when crossing console generation gaps ... which is a goal they still have so they MIGHT not ditch this after all.

 

[Taleweaver]

Haven't we already seen all this just broken Up into multiple threads..? There's the character IP's, the Mobile thing, The prospect of the future and all that.
This is all stuff we've already seen just in one thread.

...and with an official powerpoint presentation and link. This isn't secondary guessing or speculating but Iwata holding a speech.

And honestly...the fact that nintendo's changing their business plan is far more important than "doing stuff" on a smartphone. It may be one step closer to having nintendo's IP's on mobile devices (erm...legally, that is), but I feel they're more going to focus on "other" sorts of games. Fitness, cooking, learning...that's where they'll be aiming. And on the long run, that's going to change far more than these short term projects. It may very well be that the wiiu will be their last console.



(oh, and a small personal joy: faster startup of games on the wiiu. Haven't heard that either! ).

 

[Maxternal]

(oh, and a small personal joy: faster startup of games on the wiiu. Haven't heard that either! ).

Actually, yeah. This is getting back to the good old days when you just put in the game, turned it on and played without having to worry about the whole silly menu booting process. If I wanted that I'd game more on a PC

 

[osirisjem]

No backward compatibility in the future?

Wait, WUT
I, too, like my backwards compatibility.

Edit : found it in the presentation but reading more carefully it seems like backwards compatibility was part of a larger idea of trying to keep customers when crossing console generation gaps ... which is a goal they still have so they MIGHT not ditch this after all.

Nintendo won't need to worry about migrating Wii U owners to Wii 3, because it'll be such a small number of people.

 

[the_randomizer]

Wow, sweet article, heartening news too!

 

[Wisenheimer]

I think Nintendo needs to do a few things:

1) Do more to reward loyal customers. A lot of game publishers, especially ones like EA, have a bad reputation. Nintendo has one of the best reputations in the industry and is one of the biggest brand values in the world. That is one of the reasons it can charge so much money, even for older games, because you know you are getting quality. That being said, there are competitors like Steam which really focus on customer satisfaction. My suggestions are:

A) Integrated, unified accounts: This should be a no-brainer. You should have individual accounts and family accounts. Games you pay for should be available on a reasonable number of devices and all devices should support an entire family. You should be able to deactivate a game from one device and transfer it to another. Once you buy a game, you should get it on all devices, including ports (like Donkey Kong Country Returns) by Nintendo. Basically, if a game was first released on a Nintendo console and you purchased it at full price digitally, you should get a free copy of it on all future consoles that support it. Not having to pay for a game twice makes customers feel that their purchases are valuable.​

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B) Achievements linked to rewards for playing games. This is a no-brainer. Nintendo needs a unified achievement system, and it needs to have some valuable rewards.​

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C) An "adult library card" for online play and communication. Nintendo could do something where a user can verify he is an adult and make an adult account that would give him access to the "open" online community, which would still be family friendly but have no restrictions such as only playing with friends. He could then authorize "adult library cards" for other family member accounts. For authorized "adults", there needs to be an online service similar to the competition.​

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D) Nintendo MMO. Sony has their own version of this. It is pretty silly. I think Nintendo could be a lot more creative with their Miiverse. It should be free with all Nintendo devices and incorporate things like Street Pass.​

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E) DLC in the form of achievements in other games. This would promote the purchase of Nintendo products while avoiding the pitfalls of knickle and diming customers. You want to unlock some more characters in Super Smash Bros or Mario Kart? You have to unlock certain achievements in other games, which means either that you have to borrow a friend's disk (which promotes living room multiplayer, which is Nintendo's strongest multiplayer niche) or buy a copy of your own.​

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[the_randomizer]

With the quick boot option, won't that be a problem with off-TV play and HDMI cable hookups? Last I checked, the Wii U refuses to boot at least, into Wii Mode, without it being on the right input if using an HDMI cable due to how it communicates with the console and TV in question.

 

[calmwaters]

With the quick boot option, won't that be a problem with off-TV play and HDMI cable hookups? Last I checked, the Wii U refuses to boot at least, into Wii Mode, without it being on the right input if using an HDMI cable due to how it communicates with the console and TV in question.

Maybe? It's hard to believe the quick boot would work when it's connected to the TV, but won't work when it isn't connected. Then again, it is Nintendo... maybe they'll discover this problem and fix it. Or maybe you'll just have to quick boot and then disconnect it from the TV when times require it.

 

[the_randomizer]

Maybe? It's hard to believe the quick boot would work when it's connected to the TV, but won't work when it isn't connected. Then again, it is Nintendo... maybe they'll discover this problem and fix it. Or maybe you'll just have to quick boot and then disconnect it from the TV when times require it.

Hard to say for sure, to disconnect HDMI each time would be counterproductive IMHO. Oh well. But getting back to things, it's starting to look pretty good for the Wii U

 

[calmwaters]

Hard to say for sure, to disconnect HDMI each time would be counterproductive IMHO. Oh well. But getting back to things, it's starting to look pretty good for the Wii U

Uh huh; I guess I'm not too fond of having 4 different things to hook up to my television. I've gotten used to it, but still. Maybe they'll have a "switch input" option when doing this so the boot will work the same I hope this is the year that the Nintendo does pick up steam (not the computer company)

 

[Maxternal]

With the quick boot option, won't that be a problem with off-TV play and HDMI cable hookups? Last I checked, the Wii U refuses to boot at least, into Wii Mode, without it being on the right input if using an HDMI cable due to how it communicates with the console and TV in question.

The way I understood it that restriction only applied to Wii mode (to which you already have a quick start option by holding the B button) because it needed to get some TV-specific information over HDMI in order to set the TV resolution that could not be done once in Wii mode. I'm pretty sure I've heard of lots of people using their Wii U without the TV connected (like taking it in the car with them)

Even if it is a problem depending on what settings you have or something, maybe they could use the TV remote function on the gamepad to remember and set the right TV input.