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Nintendo promises more games now that the Wii U developers have finally “reached the next stage”

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Nintendo held its regular investor question and answer session following last week’s earnings report. President Satoru Iwata, director Genyo Takeda, and creative lead Shigeru Miyamoto addressed questions about the Wii U’s perceived power in comparison to other game consoles and the progress of its internal development teams. With expectations for total Wii U sales lowered to 4 million before the end of the fiscal year in March—down from the previously expected 5 million consoles—Nintendo needs new games to push the system.

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There are many new Wii U games in development including new entries in best-selling series like Mario Kart. Those games are far from release though, and investors are curious as to what’s taking Nintendo’s teams so long to produce product. The answer, according to Iwata, is that Nintendo’s teams are only now getting a firm grip on the Wii U hardware.

“[Each] game console has its own unique qualities, and developers must go through a trial and error phase to acquire the knack of taking full advantage of them,” said Iwata, “This time does not come until a final version of the hardware and development tools for the version have been made available and then a base for software development has been established. For Wii U, such a time finally came in the latter half of last year. In this sense, we could not avoid the trial and error stage to create games which take full advantage of the hardware.

“We believe that our in-house development teams have almost reached the next stage. It is not true that we are deadlocked with a lot of trouble in our development. Otherwise, we could not aim for 100 billion yen (around $1 billion) or more in operating profit for the next fiscal year.”

As of now, Nintendo is expecting profits of just $154 million for the fiscal year that ends in March. That’s an improvement over the $530 million loss Nintendo recorded in the last fiscal year but still far from the proposed $1 billion it hopes to earn by the end of next year.

Nintendo will have to rely heavily on the quality of its internally developed titles for those profits as third party developers like Electronic Arts are turning their attention to the next consoles from Sony and Microsoft. During EA’s own earnings report on Jan. 30, CEO John Riccietiello said that the publisher is increasing investment in “what’s coming in consumer electronics” and turning away from current technology. Nintendo’s investors have to hope that Iwata is not exaggerating his developers’ progress.

Anthony John Agnello
Anthony John Agnello is a writer living in New York. He works as the Community Manager of Joystiq.com and his writing has…
Nintendo’s mobile games are more influential than you might think
Alear and Marth open a door in Fire Emblem Engage.

Nintendo’s mobile games don’t get enough credit. While Nintendo had some undeniable hits like Pokémon Go and Fire Emblem Heroes, many consider the rest of its mobile efforts fairly underwhelming and even somewhat disappointing for a video game company of Nintendo’s stature. While nothing ever quite reached the high bar Pokémon Go set in 2016, Nintendo’s mobile games are a bit more influential than they get credit for.
Over the past few years, games like Pokémon: Let’s Go! Pikachu and Eevee, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe have built upon their mobile counterparts. Then, during the September 13 Nintendo Direct, Fire Emblem Engage’s announcement and main gimmick cemented that Nintendo isn’t just viewing mobile games as a mostly failed side experiment. While they might not be the most successful games out there, their DNA is creeping into the Nintendo Switch’s bestselling titles.
Mediocre mobile returns
Nintendo’s mobile gaming efforts kicked off in the mid-2010s. Niantic created the AR game Pokemon Go, which quickly became a smashing success in 2016. In the six years since, the game has generated around 678 million installs and $6 billion in player spending, according to data from Sensor Tower.
While working with Niantic proved fruitful for The Pokemon Company, Nintendo partnered with DeNA for most of its initial mobile games. Unfortunately, none of these quite reached the heights analysts and Nintendo expected. Super Mario Run was a smash hit at launch but failed to sustain much interest and consistent revenue, so it’s considered a disappointment by Nintendo.
Meanwhile, other games like Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp, Mario Kart Tour, Dr. Mario World, and Dragalia Lost launched, and while they’ve still made lots of money for Nintendo, most haven't matched the success of the most popular mobile titles. The biggest exception to this is Fire Emblem Heroes, a gacha game where players can summon classic Fire Emblem characters. It’s had over $1 billion in player spending alone as of June 2022 and is Nintendo’s “flagship title on the [mobile} platform,” according to Sensor Tower.
More recently, Nintendo tried to recapture the success of Pokemon Go with Niantic’s Pikmin Bloom, although that game has reportedly disappointed as well. Overall, it’s understandable why some people are surprised to see only a couple of surefire mobile hits from a company with the pedigree of Nintendo and consider it a side venture that never realized its full potential. If you look closely at the console games in these series that Nintendo put out since, though, it isn’t ignoring everything learned while making mobile games.
Mobile's monumental impact
Nintendo has the masterful ability to find the strongest elements of an idea, draw those out, and then expand upon them to create something uniquely memorable. We’ve seen it do this time and time again with subsequent entries of its flagship series, but it’s a mindset it has applied to its mobile games upon closer inspection.
As far back as 2018, Pokemon: Let’s Go! Pikachu and Eevee recognized the charm of not needing to battle a Pokemon to capture it, and incorporated that into a traditional RPG experience. More recently, items and mechanics like gardening and cooking from Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp made their way into Animal Crossing: New Horizons and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was able to revive its live service offerings by repurposing the best tracks and assets from Mario Kart Tour.
Fire Emblem Engage – Announcement Trailer - Nintendo Switch
The legacy of Nintendo’s mobile games could also be felt in the September 13 Nintendo Direct. The showcase’s first announcement was Fire Emblem Engage, which is turn-based strategy game where the main gimmick is being able to summon classic Fire Emblem characters with a ring. While it doesn’t look like Fire Emblem Engage goes full gacha, it’s clear that Nintendo recognized how people liked collecting and using classic Fire Emblem characters in a new adventure, so the developers drew and expanded upon that idea for Fire Emblem Engage.
Before the announcement of Pikmin 4, Shigeru Miyamoto also took a lot of time to highlight Pikmin Bloom. While we don’t know much about Pikmin 4’s gameplay, Nintendo could find some aspects of that game’s exploratory experience, weekly challenges, or something I’m not even thinking of to freshen up the next mainline game. The same could even happen with Super Mario Run the next time Nintendo decides to make a 2D Mario game.
While watching Fire Emblem Engage’s reveal during the latest Nintendo Direct, it became clear that Nintendo’s mobile games have quietly become influential forces in the company's console games. Nintendo has slowly plucked the best ideas out of them and brought them into Switch games without extra monetization. While the future is cloudy for Nintendo's seemingly stalled mobile push, I hope the company can still find a place for its games on mobile, using the platform as a space to experiment with its beloved series.

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Nintendo is ending Wii U and 3DS eShop service
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Nintendo has announced the end of its eShop service for the Wii U console and 3DS handheld. The eShop will stay live on those devices until late March 2023, after which players will no longer be able to purchase games or download eShop apps and services for those devices.

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The player throws a bowling ball in Nintendo Switch Sports.

If 2021 was the year of the Game Boy Advance renaissance, then 2022 is the year of the Wii. At this point, the Nintendo Switch has outsold the Wii, but it still doesn’t feel like the Switch is as ubiquitous with casual gamers as the Wii was. Meanwhile, the Wii is getting just old enough that it’s starting to feel nostalgic and retro.
If Nintendo wants to continue to grow the Switch’s userbase, these yearnful Wii fans need to be its next target. Perhaps that’s why the latest Nintendo Direct felt like a love letter to the Wii era by featuring games like Nintendo Switch Sports, Mario Strikers: Battle League, and Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. 
Nintendo Direct - 2.9.2022
Let’s go bowling
At this point, most hardcore gaming fans who want a Nintendo Switch likely already own one. While those 100+ million players will continue to buy new video games, Nintendo still wants to sell 23 million more units this year alone. If it’s going to accomplish that, it needs to entice people who might not usually play video games or spend hundreds of dollars on a new system. 
Nintendo was the most successful at doing this during the Wii era but moved away from this casual focus after the Wii U flopped. Focusing on its hardcore fans is what made the Nintendo Switch a runaway success right at launch, but we’re now almost five years in, and Nintendo is looking to maintain a growing audience. 
Making the Nintendo Switch even more appealing to casuals and non-gamers seems to be the company’s next goal. Nintendo Switch Sports recapturing some of that Wii magic is the spearhead of this strategy.
Its predecessor Wii Sports is one of the most successful games of all time. Even people who’ve never played a video game might remember the game from the Wii’s heyday. Nintendo wants a Switch in every nursing home, school, or daycare if it isn’t all ready, and first-party titles like Nintendo Switch Sports make that a possibility.
If the game catches on with casual gamers and Nintendo makes it a bundled Switch game, there’s a chance that this could be the Switch’s next Mario Kart 8 Deluxe or Animal Crossing: New Horizons from a sales perspective.

Wii Remember
Believe it or not, the Wii is over 15 years old. Young kids who played games on the Wii with their parents are now adults and likely have nostalgia for those experiences. Some may even consider it to be a retro console at this point. As such, it’s not surprising that Nintendo and other companies would dip back into the well of Wii-era IPs. It started with the Skyward Sword remaster last year, but several Wii-related announcements were in this Nintendo Direct too, which made it a real trip for those of us that grew up with these games on Wii.
Mario Strikers’ last great outing was on the Wii, and the sports spin-off series has been dormant for just long enough to where Nintendo fans are delighted that it’s making a grand return. Even Nintendo Switch Sports will trigger nostalgia for the millions of people who enjoyed it over 15 years ago.
Third parties are even taking notice. Aspyr decided to specifically remaster the Wii version of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, which is an odd choice considering that a more polished version of the game existed for Xbox 360 and PS3. Still, the Switch is the only console capable of preserving that Wii experience, and Aspyr ensures that the Wii port doesn’t get lost to time. For players who enjoyed the Wii but don’t want to dig out their system, sensor bar, and some Wii Remotes, releases like this will allow them to satiate their nostalgia. While games like Xenoblade Chronicles 3 indicate that Nintendo isn’t abandoning its hardcore audience, it’s clear that the casual market is the Switch’s next great frontier. Many of the games featured in the February 9 Direct capitalize on a new wave of nostalgia for the Wii. Embracing that market and those causal players with these games might be the key to the Nintendo Switch’s continued success. 

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