Nintendo mobile games

Driven by novel hardware concepts such as the dual-screen nature of the DS line and the motion Wii Remote, both systems had become Nintendo's best-selling handheld and home consoles by the end of 2009.

[4] In an interview with The Wall Street Journal during E3 2013, Nintendo global president Satoru Iwata addressed the allure of developing for the mobile market, saying he had opted to not take Nintendo in that direction, focusing instead on providing compelling games that would drive their hardware sales, retaining their unique approach.

Iwata believed that while they could easily obtain short-term gains by addressing the mobile market, "20 years down the line, we may look back at the decision not to supply Nintendo games to smartphones and think that is the reason why the company is still here.

[7] These sentiments were later echoed by Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aimé saying "When the consumer wants to play Mario, Zelda, and Pokémon, they have to purchase our hardware to do so.

"[8] In January 2014, when issuing a lowering of its financial forecast for the fiscal year due to continued underperformance, Iwata expressed a more open attitude towards the mobile market, saying "Given the expansion of smart devices, we are naturally studying how smart devices can be used to grow the game-player business," but that "It's not as simple as enabling Mario to move on a smartphone.

[15] When elaborating on the partnership, Iwata said that Nintendo had found a way with DeNA to bring its franchises to mobile devices that took advantage of unique control methods offered by these devices, and stated their belief that their mobile effort will "become an opportunity for the great number of people around the world who own smart devices—but do not have interest in dedicated video game hardware—to be interested in Nintendo IP and eventually to become fans of our dedicated game systems.

"[13] To prevent speculation that the company would be ceasing hardware development, Nintendo also announced an upcoming console under the codename "NX" during the conference.

[16] At the time of announcement, Nintendo had not committed to whether their mobile games would be free-to-play or require a single up-front cost, but Iwata did assure that they would stay to payment schemes that parents would be comfortable with for letting their children play.

The company's first two mobile titles as part of the DeNA partnership would release in 2016, being Miitomo and Super Mario Run, followed by Fire Emblem Heroes in 2017.

In statements to investors made in November 2017, Kimishima acknowledged Nintendo was still adapting to mobile, pointing to missed expectations with Super Mario Run, which utilized an up-front cost as opposed to free-to-play model, stating: Nintendo has a large stock of valuable IP characters and has developed many games.

Among the various ideas, a primary concern is enabling our consumers to play on not only smart devices, but also our dedicated video game systems.

Bloomberg attributed to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which caused players to move away from Nintendo's mobile games to other games and failing to reach the projected revenue targets estimated in 2018; Sensor Tower reported double-digit drops in player counts in games like Super Mario Run and Fire Emblem Heroes, while the company's console titles such as Animal Crossing: New Horizons saw massive sales which helped drive Nintendo's profits to a twelve-year high.

[26] Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp would end service in 2024, being replaced with a paid offline version with no microtransactions.

While the game was downloaded more than 200 million times, topping app store charts, Nintendo affirmed that they had not reached a 10% target conversion rate worldwide, but were still exploring this approach for future titles.

Analytics firm Sensor Tower estimated that Super Mario Run had about $56 million in revenue in its first year.

It uses the same tactical role-playing game elements from the Fire Emblem series, in which players control a party of heroes to battle foes.

Like Fire Emblem Heroes, Nintendo used a free-to-play mechanism, allowing players to purchase in-game items that reduce activity cooldown timers.

[33] On August 21, 2024, it was announced that the game will reach end of service on November 29 and be replaced with a paid version without microtransactions.

[39] The game was initially released on July 9, 2019, in 59 territories,[40][41] and follows the approach set by Candy Crush Saga.

Monetization is also similar to Candy Crush Saga - the player earns coins in-game and can spend real-world money on diamonds, both which then can be used to purchase special power-ups, or new doctor characters such as Dr. Peach, Dr. Yoshi, and Dr. Toad each with their own unique skill.

[44][45] Nintendo announced in April 2019 that they would be holding a closed beta for the game, exclusively for Android users, which took place from late May to early June.

The game was available as a free-to-play download, using in-app purchases to buy Poké Balls for capturing Pokémon and other in-game boosts.

Pokémon Quest is an action role-playing game spin-off of the series, available for the Nintendo Switch in May 2018 and for mobile devices the month after.

The game is described as "free to start" in that there are no costs to download the title, but can require monetary purchases to speed up certain actions.

Developed by Genius Sonority, the puzzle game Pokémon Café Mix was announced in June 2020 and launched on the same month.

In June 2021, it was announced that the game is set to release for Nintendo Switch in July 2021, and for mobile devices in September 2021.

Consequently, Tencent embedded additional widgets, or "mini programs", to their WeChat mobile app to give Chinese Nintendo Switch users an alternative method for support functionality such as remote parental controls and eShop pay support, as well as game-specific functions, such as the ability to track play statistics for Ring Fit Adventure.

Following the release of Pokémon Go, Nintendo's value rose by over US$17 billion, emphasizing the importance of the mobile gaming sector to the company.

[62][63] Kimishimma said of these 2017 fiscal year numbers that "we have not reached a satisfactory profit point yet, so our goal is to further expand the scale of this business to develop it into one of the pillars of revenue".

[65] By August 2023, Appmagic estimated that the total revenue from all of Nintendo's mobile games had reached US$1.5 billion, with the most having come from Fire Emblem Heroes with US$810 million.