On Thursday, Nintendo President Satoru Iwata spoke with Japanese news site Nikkei to state that Nintendo isn’t considering developing new games for smartphones or tablets. In addition, the company isn’t interested in developing iPhone or iPad versions of it’s massive library of already released titles. Iwata believes that developing titles for the iOS platform is a short term strategy that may result in higher profits, but doesn’t line up with the long term goals of the gaming company. Nintendo would face a pricing problem if they release new games for the iOS platform as most iPhone or iPod Touch games are between 99 cents up to $9.99.
Nintendo’s stock has fallen over 44 percent this year due to investor disappointment in weak 3DS sales. While Nintendo recently announced a new Circle Pad adapter for the handheld device as well as a smattering of new titles, analysts still view the platform as weak in comparison to the smartphone platform for gaming. Sales initially started strong with over 3.6 million units sold through the end of March, but plummeted by 80 percent over the next three months. Analysts are betting that Nintendo will have difficulty reaching 10 million units sold by the end of the next fiscal year. By comparison, over 100 million iPhones were sold by March of this year and the next revision of the hardware is likely to sell just as well.
Besides competition from smartphones and tablets, Nintendo faces a bigger problem with Sony’s PlayStation Vita upcoming December launch in Japan. However, the release of Super Mario 3DLand and Mario Kart for the 3D platform should help sell systems. Nintendo’s lack of AAA first party titles at the launch of the 3DS is often the main complaint from people considering the system. Third party publishers are also paying the price for supporting the 3DS as Capcom’s stock fell by 8 percent this week after announcing the next version of Monster Hunter was headed to Nintendo’s new handheld.
