Sorry disagree with most of the comments here - Nintendo are not 'dead in the water' by any stretch of the imagination. I have an iPhone and iPod touch and whilst they are fun devices I have yet to find one single game with the depth and quality of design that games such as Animal Crossing, Super Mario and Pokemon Pearl enjoy. I know this because my kids will play with games on the iPhone until the novelty wears off but they always go back to the DS eventually.
I was contemplating purchasing an iPod Touch for each of them for Christmas but having thought about it I have decided to get them a new DSi each (they have had the DS devices for around 2 years now and they are getting a little battered). Yes it is an incremental improvement from Nintendo but they have actually doubled the speed of the Arm chip, added two cameras, redesigned the unit and OS, added extra functionality in the way of built in software, improved wireless capability, added SD card storage, AAC music ability amongst other improvements.
I am confident given the revisions above that my kids would prefer the DSi to an iPod touch at this time - this may change as they get older but right now amongst their peer groups it's the DSi that is the 'in' device - given my experience with the longevity of the DS units and games I am more than happy to invest my money on the Nintendo DSi.
not saying you made a bad choice, but is the cost/benefit really there vs. The iPod touch?
There are sooo many games available for the iPod touch with plenty of depth. And plenty that you play for 30 minutes and then never again. Unfortunately I can say the same for the DS. Yet all DS games go for $30. Every one. Not to mention the relative inconvenience of going to the store, storing/swapping game cartridges.
I'd rather hand my kids a $50 iTunes gift card, knowing that they can get anywhere from 5-50 games approximately, whenever they want them. Sounds like a great gift to me.
How many people already buying their kids an iPod will make the same conclusion? I suspect not as many who will decide to buy them an iPod touch.
As for depth of games, there is certainly nothing to preclude that. And there are certainly games on the iPhone/touch that you will never find on the DS. A game doesn't have to have elaborate depth to be fun. A developer can have an idea for a simple game and spend a month or two creating it for Apple's platform and sell it for 99 cents. Sell 20-50,000 and he's more than paid for his time, and he could sell a lot more than that if it's as fun as he thinks it'd be. The same game simply isn't feasible on the DS.
I don't disagree that there are some fun games for the iPod/iPhone but like you said many of these are very simplistic quick fix games (fun for 10 minutes or so at a time) - if I let them my kids would spend hours upon hours on the DS games such as Animal Crossing or Yoshi's Island - nothing comes even close to these on the iPhone, nothing.
In terms of competing then yes the iPhone is more advanced in most areas other than one - controls. Not having dedicated controls prevents the iPhone from being a true gaming device - anyone who says otherwise is, in my opinion, not a true gamer. For me games that employ the accelerometer for controlling the direction etc are poor substitutes for actual dedicated buttons - your opinion may be different but my experience is that onscreen controls are inaccurate, lack tactile feedback and have little consistency from one game to the next.
Apple need to sort this if they are to compete in the handheld console market.
Back, but only for a minute. I would like to make a sportmans bet that Apples next generation of pocket devices dwarf Nintendo's next generation of pocket devices (if they have the balls to make it).
Dont get me wrong, I love nintendo, possibly my second favorite company in the world. I'm sure they will continue to exist for some time. But I do believe Apple will put a significant dent in their market share.
Like when Apple announced they were entering the phone game, skeptics smudged their noses at them and laughed. People even laughed at the concept of an iPod playing games and competing with the likes of the PsP&DS. But guess what, time and again, Apple is showing these stagnated companies their business model needs to evolve into the 21st century and get out of the rut they've been in the past decade or so.
The other bit 'miss' is from those who insist that the big money to be made is from hard core gamers, and that the iPhone/touch misses that market.
The answer to that is, no, the big money is in selling to people with real lives who want to play for maybe 15 minutes at a time. Good games, but ones that you don't have to treat as a career.
I don't disagree that there are some fun games for the iPod/iPhone but like you said many of these are very simplistic quick fix games (fun for 10 minutes or so at a time) - if I let them my kids would spend hours upon hours on the DS games such as Animal Crossing or Yoshi's Island - nothing comes even close to these on the iPhone, nothing.
In terms of competing then yes the iPhone is more advanced in most areas other than one - controls. Not having dedicated controls prevents the iPhone from being a true gaming device - anyone who says otherwise is, in my opinion, not a true gamer. For me games that employ the accelerometer for controlling the direction etc are poor substitutes for actual dedicated buttons - your opinion may be different but my experience is that onscreen controls are inaccurate, lack tactile feedback and have little consistency from one game to the next.
Apple need to sort this if they are to compete in the handheld console market.
it depends on the game. Some are perfect for a touch interface (enigmo, chess, checkers, air hockey, card games, etc.) while others are perfect for the accelerometer (like racing games). For those kinds of games, a digital touch pad is a poor substitute.
And games don't have to have Yoshi's Island depth to be fun for hours, and as I said before, there is nothing at all to preclude that kind of depth in iPhone games. They do take longer to create, so I expect that more and more games with depth will come out over time.
I don't disagree that there are some fun games for the iPod/iPhone but like you said many of these are very simplistic quick fix games (fun for 10 minutes or so at a time) - if I let them my kids would spend hours upon hours on the DS games such as Animal Crossing or Yoshi's Island - nothing comes even close to these on the iPhone, nothing.
In terms of competing then yes the iPhone is more advanced in most areas other than one - controls. Not having dedicated controls prevents the iPhone from being a true gaming device - anyone who says otherwise is, in my opinion, not a true gamer. For me games that employ the accelerometer for controlling the direction etc are poor substitutes for actual dedicated buttons - your opinion may be different but my experience is that onscreen controls are inaccurate, lack tactile feedback and have little consistency from one game to the next.
Apple need to sort this if they are to compete in the handheld console market.
and another point that needs adding is that one of the benefits of the DS market is the market for used games - this is huge - just look on Ebay. You can't do this with the DRM controlled download only marketplace on the iPhone - in my opinion Sony have made a big mistake with the new PSP going download only.
My kids borrow games from friends, are able to play games without the actual game cartridge using download from device to device and when they have eventually finished with a game they sell it on ebay.
and another point that needs adding is that one of the benefits of the DS market is the market for used games - this is huge - just look on Ebay. You can't do this with the DRM controlled download only marketplace on the iPhone - in my opinion Sony have made a big mistake with the new PSP going download only.
My kids borrow games from friends, are able to play games without the actual game cartridge using download from device to device and when they have eventually finished with a game they sell it on ebay.
How is buying a game for $30 and selling it later for $15 better then buying the same game for $10?
"There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance," said Ballmer. "It's a $500 subsidized item. They may make a lot of money. But if you actually take a look at the 1.3 billion phones that get sold, I'd prefer to have our software in 60% or 70% or 80% of them, than I would to have 2% or 3%, which is what Apple might get."
Is WinMo even ON the charts anymore? Last month it was somewhere at Palm's level, if not lower. From dominant share two years ago to swirling in the bowl today. A decade of MS mobile work utterly demolished by Apple almost overnight. And it was done to MICROSOFT. Most resources, biggest R&D budget, corporate penetration.
I believe the point I was trying to make in my last post is we don't want Nintendo to fail, for that matter we don't even want Sony to fail in this arena. I actually think Sony is in far worse shape then Nintendo. The PS3 needed about a 60% price cut to even start selling and the PSP hasn't had a decent game in forever, not to mention the PSP Go is extremely overpriced for what you get.
The fact that Apple is doing well in this market is no surprise to those of us that have been gamers for a long time because the handheld market has been poor for a very long time due to no real competition and the same players making the same old hardware selling new versions of the same old games.
I am hoping the Apple tablet will be geared far more towards games then an e-reader. A 10ch in handheld that you can game on that would pretty much steal the market away. Then Niintendo and Sony would be in serious trouble.
The reason the iPhone/ iPod Touch are doing well in gaming has to do with the price of games.
Yes... and no. It's also a small matter of having your phone with you at all times, whereas one must make a conscious decision to ALSO carry a DS, games, charger, etc..
As photographers often say, the best camera is the one that you always have with you.
As photographers often say, the best camera is the one that you always have with you.
Really? On the other side of that coin I often heard, "Gee, I wish I had my better camera on me to get take that shot!" - especially at nightime- the one with the F*L*A*S*H*!
Really, care to dispute some of my points then, or are they all spot on?
Lets take a look:
Quote:
Originally Posted by ifail
1. The big N's numbers dropped because the Wii sales have fallen off TREMENDOUSLY,
True. Mostly it was the Wii sales that caused the nosedive in Nintendo profits. On the other hand the DS platform isn't doing all that great either.
Quote:
2. Market Share and Distribution. We have to count the iphone with touch sales otherwise the platform is well behind Nintendo's 117 million DS sold as of October 09. Also where said pieces sold are a key piece. Japan is a huge player in the video game market, if you dont have this market support you will not be king simple as that (MS knows this, and they try hard as hell to appeal to the japanese market by creating content they want, and every gaming console/platform from overseas has a 100% rejection rate thus far, because japanese and western/european tastes are much different)
If you can't win the Japanese market why bother trying that hard? Answer: Don't. Apple has some presence in Japan but traditionally it has sucked hard in Japan and not been too bothered by it.
No, you don't need to win Japan to do well at gaming and Japan didn't do great last year. 2007: ¥687.95 billion, 2008 ¥582.61 billion. UK was almost as big as Japan in 2008.
So, doing well in Japan is important but not critical. The iPhone's success was not dependent on doing well in Japan as a phone and neither will it depend on Japan as a game platform if it does well in the EU and US.
False.
Quote:
3. Content. Funny AI decided to bring Madden and Metal Gear into the picture. Metal Gear for the touch and metal gear: peacewalker arent even remotely in the same category when it comes to quality (google search it, you can see first hand). As it stands, you get what you pay for 10 bucks vs 40 bucks is a huge leap, I mean this is the saying amongst Apple users no?
False. These are titles from major franchises from major studios/publishers. Plus Apple has a lot of indy content that the DS will never have and the only game platform with any real indie focus is the 360 with XNA.
Quote:
4. Pricing. Like i said earlier the quality from 10 bucks vs 40 is a huge one. You wont see major full scale mobile games like on the DS or PSP until there is a market there to support it (blast me all you want, but people are all about the 99c apps, some may pay 4.99 for a GOOD one...this pricing disparity is a huge negative)
True. Pricing is an issue but given that the navigation apps are in the $50+ range there's room for a high end title.
Quote:
5. Split. You think a publisher is gonna cut Apple 30% of sales? You must be delusional, no console gets those kinds of royalty rates, none have and none will.
False. 30% for both royalty and retail cut is good. Publishers see what? $15-$18 ppu for a $50 title? That's a lot less than 70%. I think those numbers are for consoles but I doubt that retailers and Nintendo are taking a smaller cut for DS games.
Quote:
6. Sales. Apple is good at touting the number of games it has, but whats the best selling game? Whats the revenue/profits of these games? There is no doubt some will dabble in ipod/phone gaming...plenty of companies have well before the iphone/ipod since the cell gaming market is big, especially in japan. The way they sell these games as well is interesting, iTunes is unquestionably a success. How is Apple going to handle millions of downloads well over 1+ GB (assuming the game is decent content, not some shoddy homebrew you see a lot of currently) if they do happen to have a huge leap into the game industry? They struggle constantly all the time when a new iphone launches because their servers cant handle it...Also what about those who are old enough to buy games but dont have a credit/debit card and you have to be 18 to have an iTunes account iirc. Being able to physically purchase games is a huge advantage (well a plus), for the iphone this doesnt matter since you can get games on the go anywhere, but for the touch your nailed down to wifi to buy a game.
I read some iPhone game dev revenue numbers somewhere but have to look it up. However there's no issue with downloading a 1GB game given that iTunes does it all the time for movies, navigation packages, etc. iTunes > Steam.
False.
Quote:
7. Hardware. Apple doesnt have physical buttons...they need to add a peripheral for this, you can only do so much with an accelerometer and on screen controls. I have sonic on my girls iphone, its a decent game (would hope so for how old it is) the on screen controls work but i want ALL THE SCREEN to view the game.
True.
An official d-pad would be nice. But then again, you could argue that the Wii sucks because it doesn't have the cutting edge graphics required for hardcore titles. If all Apple wants is causal gaming and if it can take that away from the DS then it's DS vs PSP for hardcore gaming market. PSP wins IMHO.
Quote:
8. ...
For Apple to be successful they need to hit a wide range for their audience, so mom/dad will buy one for their kid, (and it needs to be priced accordingly...199 for a Wii/360 or a iPod Touch?)They have the image to work for older gamers so this is a huge plus for Apple, since they wont be embarrassed to be seen playing a game on their Touch/Phone.
The iPod touch is not shooting for kids but teens. There's a large teen demographic that plays casual games. Pricing for the teen demographic can be higher.
False.
So more false than trues in my opinion. I don't think you've made a compelling case that the iPhone/iPod Touch can't do well in the game market against the DS and Nintendo.
Nintendo really needs to get off it's ass and release a real replacement for the DS. It does have a large pile of money to do so. It could even be a phone/pmp.
They give up more now for sales that are harder for people to make. For a DS game, the fee to Nintendo is just part of the expense, there are also manufacturing and distribution expenses and then the customer has to go to the store to buy it. The game company makes well less than 70% of each sale. On this point they come out ahead.
And is it not troubling that EA can sell Maddon 2010 for the iPhone/touch for $9.99, but didn't even bother making a version for the DS despite their being able to sell that for $29.99? Do you consider that more people can buy a $9.99 game than can buy a $29.99 game?
And the problem Nintendo faces isn't selling to people who are willing to carry both an iPhone and a DS around, it's selling to the people who won't do that. The associated problem is keeping game developers on their platform.
If they did, it would do just as poorly as the ipod touch version does. If people want madden, they will pony up for a 360/PS3 and play it, thats why the console versions always have incredibly high sales.
Nintendos royalty fee isnt near 30% they dropped it quite a few years ago because they wanted to entice developers to their console (back when they were getting spanked hard) the total cost of a game (sans advertising) still wouldnt nail you that hard considering packaging costs and buying the cartridges (which you save in bundle dont forget). 30% is still too high when you can get it for less and make more money. Nintendo even waves royalty fees to high profile devs since content sells systems.
And the issue everyone likes to bring up, if you have an iphone/ipod thats cool you dont want to carry two devices, your most likely an adult who MOST LIKELY owns a console of some kind in your own home. Portable gamings market segment is younger users, when i see 7-8 year olds running around with touchs/phones playing the latest pokemon or whatever then it will be something worth mentioning.
What they can do, though, is reinvent themselves and bring their Nintendo software line to the iPhone. They would sell a ton of an iPhone version of MarioCart.
No they wouldn't. It has been proven that iPhone users won't buy expensive apps, and if someone like Nintendo developed games for the iPhone, they would be the same price as the NDS versions, or be very cut down
5. Not so, that split is too high. Take Nintendogs, 22 Million copies times 29.99 (about 660 million) 30% of that to Apple is an absurd amount. Small house devs wont see numbers this high so it doesnt bother them, but big publishers will see this as unacceptable. When it comes to that bottom line it matters.
snip)
does that mean that big publishers only sell direct? no distributors/wholesalers/retailers are getting a cut of the $29.99? i would be surprised if the publisher even gets 50% of that. So a 30% cut to apple that includes the entire distribution shouldn't be the issue.
the question is if the $30 price is too high for the ipod/iphone crowd (and of course if the interface works well for the game).
Comments
Mario, Zelda, Metroid.
Those are the only things they've ever needed to sell hardware.
Sorry disagree with most of the comments here - Nintendo are not 'dead in the water' by any stretch of the imagination. I have an iPhone and iPod touch and whilst they are fun devices I have yet to find one single game with the depth and quality of design that games such as Animal Crossing, Super Mario and Pokemon Pearl enjoy. I know this because my kids will play with games on the iPhone until the novelty wears off but they always go back to the DS eventually.
I was contemplating purchasing an iPod Touch for each of them for Christmas but having thought about it I have decided to get them a new DSi each (they have had the DS devices for around 2 years now and they are getting a little battered). Yes it is an incremental improvement from Nintendo but they have actually doubled the speed of the Arm chip, added two cameras, redesigned the unit and OS, added extra functionality in the way of built in software, improved wireless capability, added SD card storage, AAC music ability amongst other improvements.
I am confident given the revisions above that my kids would prefer the DSi to an iPod touch at this time - this may change as they get older but right now amongst their peer groups it's the DSi that is the 'in' device - given my experience with the longevity of the DS units and games I am more than happy to invest my money on the Nintendo DSi.
not saying you made a bad choice, but is the cost/benefit really there vs. The iPod touch?
There are sooo many games available for the iPod touch with plenty of depth. And plenty that you play for 30 minutes and then never again. Unfortunately I can say the same for the DS. Yet all DS games go for $30. Every one. Not to mention the relative inconvenience of going to the store, storing/swapping game cartridges.
I'd rather hand my kids a $50 iTunes gift card, knowing that they can get anywhere from 5-50 games approximately, whenever they want them. Sounds like a great gift to me.
How many people already buying their kids an iPod will make the same conclusion? I suspect not as many who will decide to buy them an iPod touch.
As for depth of games, there is certainly nothing to preclude that. And there are certainly games on the iPhone/touch that you will never find on the DS. A game doesn't have to have elaborate depth to be fun. A developer can have an idea for a simple game and spend a month or two creating it for Apple's platform and sell it for 99 cents. Sell 20-50,000 and he's more than paid for his time, and he could sell a lot more than that if it's as fun as he thinks it'd be. The same game simply isn't feasible on the DS.
I don't disagree that there are some fun games for the iPod/iPhone but like you said many of these are very simplistic quick fix games (fun for 10 minutes or so at a time) - if I let them my kids would spend hours upon hours on the DS games such as Animal Crossing or Yoshi's Island - nothing comes even close to these on the iPhone, nothing.
In terms of competing then yes the iPhone is more advanced in most areas other than one - controls. Not having dedicated controls prevents the iPhone from being a true gaming device - anyone who says otherwise is, in my opinion, not a true gamer. For me games that employ the accelerometer for controlling the direction etc are poor substitutes for actual dedicated buttons - your opinion may be different but my experience is that onscreen controls are inaccurate, lack tactile feedback and have little consistency from one game to the next.
Apple need to sort this if they are to compete in the handheld console market.
1
8. see ya when you got back
Back, but only for a minute. I would like to make a sportmans bet that Apples next generation of pocket devices dwarf Nintendo's next generation of pocket devices (if they have the balls to make it).
Dont get me wrong, I love nintendo, possibly my second favorite company in the world. I'm sure they will continue to exist for some time. But I do believe Apple will put a significant dent in their market share.
Like when Apple announced they were entering the phone game, skeptics smudged their noses at them and laughed. People even laughed at the concept of an iPod playing games and competing with the likes of the PsP&DS. But guess what, time and again, Apple is showing these stagnated companies their business model needs to evolve into the 21st century and get out of the rut they've been in the past decade or so.
The other bit 'miss' is from those who insist that the big money to be made is from hard core gamers, and that the iPhone/touch misses that market.
The answer to that is, no, the big money is in selling to people with real lives who want to play for maybe 15 minutes at a time. Good games, but ones that you don't have to treat as a career.
I don't disagree that there are some fun games for the iPod/iPhone but like you said many of these are very simplistic quick fix games (fun for 10 minutes or so at a time) - if I let them my kids would spend hours upon hours on the DS games such as Animal Crossing or Yoshi's Island - nothing comes even close to these on the iPhone, nothing.
In terms of competing then yes the iPhone is more advanced in most areas other than one - controls. Not having dedicated controls prevents the iPhone from being a true gaming device - anyone who says otherwise is, in my opinion, not a true gamer. For me games that employ the accelerometer for controlling the direction etc are poor substitutes for actual dedicated buttons - your opinion may be different but my experience is that onscreen controls are inaccurate, lack tactile feedback and have little consistency from one game to the next.
Apple need to sort this if they are to compete in the handheld console market.
it depends on the game. Some are perfect for a touch interface (enigmo, chess, checkers, air hockey, card games, etc.) while others are perfect for the accelerometer (like racing games). For those kinds of games, a digital touch pad is a poor substitute.
And games don't have to have Yoshi's Island depth to be fun for hours, and as I said before, there is nothing at all to preclude that kind of depth in iPhone games. They do take longer to create, so I expect that more and more games with depth will come out over time.
I don't disagree that there are some fun games for the iPod/iPhone but like you said many of these are very simplistic quick fix games (fun for 10 minutes or so at a time) - if I let them my kids would spend hours upon hours on the DS games such as Animal Crossing or Yoshi's Island - nothing comes even close to these on the iPhone, nothing.
In terms of competing then yes the iPhone is more advanced in most areas other than one - controls. Not having dedicated controls prevents the iPhone from being a true gaming device - anyone who says otherwise is, in my opinion, not a true gamer. For me games that employ the accelerometer for controlling the direction etc are poor substitutes for actual dedicated buttons - your opinion may be different but my experience is that onscreen controls are inaccurate, lack tactile feedback and have little consistency from one game to the next.
Apple need to sort this if they are to compete in the handheld console market.
and another point that needs adding is that one of the benefits of the DS market is the market for used games - this is huge - just look on Ebay. You can't do this with the DRM controlled download only marketplace on the iPhone - in my opinion Sony have made a big mistake with the new PSP going download only.
My kids borrow games from friends, are able to play games without the actual game cartridge using download from device to device and when they have eventually finished with a game they sell it on ebay.
and another point that needs adding is that one of the benefits of the DS market is the market for used games - this is huge - just look on Ebay. You can't do this with the DRM controlled download only marketplace on the iPhone - in my opinion Sony have made a big mistake with the new PSP going download only.
My kids borrow games from friends, are able to play games without the actual game cartridge using download from device to device and when they have eventually finished with a game they sell it on ebay.
How is buying a game for $30 and selling it later for $15 better then buying the same game for $10?
and another point that needs adding is that one of the benefits of the DS market is the market for used games - this is huge - just look on Ebay.
The creators and publishers of games hate the used game market.
It takes money away from new game purchases - and channels it into video-game stores.
Nintendo don't make any money from used game sales.
So as a game-maker. The iPhone is a more attractive platform.
Not only can you sell a game, and make more money, with a lower retail price.
But that game cannot be resold. Everyone who wants one, has to buy one.
C.
I'm sure Nintendo will try. What that entails remains to be seen.
The "doing" part, however, doesn't always work out as planned, especially if you're "doing" against Apple.
Do you honestly think a company like Microsoft is just going to roll over? You're dreaming.
http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/18/s...t-expensive-i/
"There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance," said Ballmer. "It's a $500 subsidized item. They may make a lot of money. But if you actually take a look at the 1.3 billion phones that get sold, I'd prefer to have our software in 60% or 70% or 80% of them, than I would to have 2% or 3%, which is what Apple might get."
And now:
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2009/10...martphone_biz/
Is WinMo even ON the charts anymore? Last month it was somewhere at Palm's level, if not lower. From dominant share two years ago to swirling in the bowl today. A decade of MS mobile work utterly demolished by Apple almost overnight. And it was done to MICROSOFT. Most resources, biggest R&D budget, corporate penetration.
I believe the point I was trying to make in my last post is we don't want Nintendo to fail, for that matter we don't even want Sony to fail in this arena. I actually think Sony is in far worse shape then Nintendo. The PS3 needed about a 60% price cut to even start selling and the PSP hasn't had a decent game in forever, not to mention the PSP Go is extremely overpriced for what you get.
The fact that Apple is doing well in this market is no surprise to those of us that have been gamers for a long time because the handheld market has been poor for a very long time due to no real competition and the same players making the same old hardware selling new versions of the same old games.
I am hoping the Apple tablet will be geared far more towards games then an e-reader. A 10ch in handheld that you can game on that would pretty much steal the market away. Then Niintendo and Sony would be in serious trouble.
The reason the iPhone/ iPod Touch are doing well in gaming has to do with the price of games.
Yes... and no. It's also a small matter of having your phone with you at all times, whereas one must make a conscious decision to ALSO carry a DS, games, charger, etc..
As photographers often say, the best camera is the one that you always have with you.
The creators and publishers of games hate the used game market.
It takes money away from new game purchases - and channels it into video-game stores.
Nintendo don't make any money from used game sales.
So as a game-maker. The iPhone is a more attractive platform.
Not only can you sell a game, and make more money, with a lower retail price.
But that game cannot be resold. Everyone who wants one, has to buy one.
C.
Tell me why the consumer should support that model then ?
As photographers often say, the best camera is the one that you always have with you.
Really? On the other side of that coin I often heard, "Gee, I wish I had my better camera on me to get take that shot!" - especially at nightime- the one with the F*L*A*S*H*!
Really, care to dispute some of my points then, or are they all spot on?
Lets take a look:
1. The big N's numbers dropped because the Wii sales have fallen off TREMENDOUSLY,
True. Mostly it was the Wii sales that caused the nosedive in Nintendo profits. On the other hand the DS platform isn't doing all that great either.
2. Market Share and Distribution. We have to count the iphone with touch sales otherwise the platform is well behind Nintendo's 117 million DS sold as of October 09. Also where said pieces sold are a key piece. Japan is a huge player in the video game market, if you dont have this market support you will not be king simple as that (MS knows this, and they try hard as hell to appeal to the japanese market by creating content they want, and every gaming console/platform from overseas has a 100% rejection rate thus far, because japanese and western/european tastes are much different)
If you can't win the Japanese market why bother trying that hard? Answer: Don't. Apple has some presence in Japan but traditionally it has sucked hard in Japan and not been too bothered by it.
No, you don't need to win Japan to do well at gaming and Japan didn't do great last year. 2007: ¥687.95 billion, 2008 ¥582.61 billion. UK was almost as big as Japan in 2008.
http://kotaku.com/5123288/last-year-...nced-shrinkage
http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/new...hp?story=21760
So, doing well in Japan is important but not critical. The iPhone's success was not dependent on doing well in Japan as a phone and neither will it depend on Japan as a game platform if it does well in the EU and US.
False.
3. Content. Funny AI decided to bring Madden and Metal Gear into the picture. Metal Gear for the touch and metal gear: peacewalker arent even remotely in the same category when it comes to quality (google search it, you can see first hand). As it stands, you get what you pay for 10 bucks vs 40 bucks is a huge leap, I mean this is the saying amongst Apple users no?
False. These are titles from major franchises from major studios/publishers. Plus Apple has a lot of indy content that the DS will never have and the only game platform with any real indie focus is the 360 with XNA.
4. Pricing. Like i said earlier the quality from 10 bucks vs 40 is a huge one. You wont see major full scale mobile games like on the DS or PSP until there is a market there to support it (blast me all you want, but people are all about the 99c apps, some may pay 4.99 for a GOOD one...this pricing disparity is a huge negative)
True. Pricing is an issue but given that the navigation apps are in the $50+ range there's room for a high end title.
5. Split. You think a publisher is gonna cut Apple 30% of sales? You must be delusional, no console gets those kinds of royalty rates, none have and none will.
False. 30% for both royalty and retail cut is good. Publishers see what? $15-$18 ppu for a $50 title? That's a lot less than 70%. I think those numbers are for consoles but I doubt that retailers and Nintendo are taking a smaller cut for DS games.
6. Sales. Apple is good at touting the number of games it has, but whats the best selling game? Whats the revenue/profits of these games? There is no doubt some will dabble in ipod/phone gaming...plenty of companies have well before the iphone/ipod since the cell gaming market is big, especially in japan. The way they sell these games as well is interesting, iTunes is unquestionably a success. How is Apple going to handle millions of downloads well over 1+ GB (assuming the game is decent content, not some shoddy homebrew you see a lot of currently) if they do happen to have a huge leap into the game industry? They struggle constantly all the time when a new iphone launches because their servers cant handle it...Also what about those who are old enough to buy games but dont have a credit/debit card and you have to be 18 to have an iTunes account iirc. Being able to physically purchase games is a huge advantage (well a plus), for the iphone this doesnt matter since you can get games on the go anywhere, but for the touch your nailed down to wifi to buy a game.
I read some iPhone game dev revenue numbers somewhere but have to look it up. However there's no issue with downloading a 1GB game given that iTunes does it all the time for movies, navigation packages, etc. iTunes > Steam.
False.
7. Hardware. Apple doesnt have physical buttons...they need to add a peripheral for this, you can only do so much with an accelerometer and on screen controls. I have sonic on my girls iphone, its a decent game (would hope so for how old it is) the on screen controls work but i want ALL THE SCREEN to view the game.
True.
An official d-pad would be nice. But then again, you could argue that the Wii sucks because it doesn't have the cutting edge graphics required for hardcore titles. If all Apple wants is causal gaming and if it can take that away from the DS then it's DS vs PSP for hardcore gaming market. PSP wins IMHO.
8. ...
For Apple to be successful they need to hit a wide range for their audience, so mom/dad will buy one for their kid, (and it needs to be priced accordingly...199 for a Wii/360 or a iPod Touch?)They have the image to work for older gamers so this is a huge plus for Apple, since they wont be embarrassed to be seen playing a game on their Touch/Phone.
The iPod touch is not shooting for kids but teens. There's a large teen demographic that plays casual games. Pricing for the teen demographic can be higher.
False.
So more false than trues in my opinion. I don't think you've made a compelling case that the iPhone/iPod Touch can't do well in the game market against the DS and Nintendo.
Nintendo really needs to get off it's ass and release a real replacement for the DS. It does have a large pile of money to do so. It could even be a phone/pmp.
They give up more now for sales that are harder for people to make. For a DS game, the fee to Nintendo is just part of the expense, there are also manufacturing and distribution expenses and then the customer has to go to the store to buy it. The game company makes well less than 70% of each sale. On this point they come out ahead.
And is it not troubling that EA can sell Maddon 2010 for the iPhone/touch for $9.99, but didn't even bother making a version for the DS despite their being able to sell that for $29.99? Do you consider that more people can buy a $9.99 game than can buy a $29.99 game?
And the problem Nintendo faces isn't selling to people who are willing to carry both an iPhone and a DS around, it's selling to the people who won't do that. The associated problem is keeping game developers on their platform.
If they did, it would do just as poorly as the ipod touch version does. If people want madden, they will pony up for a 360/PS3 and play it, thats why the console versions always have incredibly high sales.
Nintendos royalty fee isnt near 30% they dropped it quite a few years ago because they wanted to entice developers to their console (back when they were getting spanked hard) the total cost of a game (sans advertising) still wouldnt nail you that hard considering packaging costs and buying the cartridges (which you save in bundle dont forget). 30% is still too high when you can get it for less and make more money. Nintendo even waves royalty fees to high profile devs since content sells systems.
And the issue everyone likes to bring up, if you have an iphone/ipod thats cool you dont want to carry two devices, your most likely an adult who MOST LIKELY owns a console of some kind in your own home. Portable gamings market segment is younger users, when i see 7-8 year olds running around with touchs/phones playing the latest pokemon or whatever then it will be something worth mentioning.
Yet proved correct every time, it really defies the laws of logic!
All gaming platforms should be worried, just watch...
I saw images of assassin's creed 2 off an iPhone, and off a PSP, the iPhone images were nothing to be worried about
What they can do, though, is reinvent themselves and bring their Nintendo software line to the iPhone. They would sell a ton of an iPhone version of MarioCart.
No they wouldn't. It has been proven that iPhone users won't buy expensive apps, and if someone like Nintendo developed games for the iPhone, they would be the same price as the NDS versions, or be very cut down
1. not sure what your asking for number one lol
snip
5. Not so, that split is too high. Take Nintendogs, 22 Million copies times 29.99 (about 660 million) 30% of that to Apple is an absurd amount. Small house devs wont see numbers this high so it doesnt bother them, but big publishers will see this as unacceptable. When it comes to that bottom line it matters.
snip)
does that mean that big publishers only sell direct? no distributors/wholesalers/retailers are getting a cut of the $29.99? i would be surprised if the publisher even gets 50% of that. So a 30% cut to apple that includes the entire distribution shouldn't be the issue.
the question is if the $30 price is too high for the ipod/iphone crowd (and of course if the interface works well for the game).
Nintendo don't make any money from used game sales.
What about the hardware that was purchased to play that second hand game, Nintendo makes money from that.