Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, Mobile, News, Switch | 32 Comments

More tidbits have been translated from Nikkei’s interview with Nintendo president and CEO Tatsumi Kimishima.

We already heard Kimishima’s mention that Nintendo has interest in bringing its mobile apps to over 100 countries (with eight supported languages). We also heard him mention that he believes Nintendo could exceed profits from the Wii and DS days.

In terms of what’s new, here’s what Kimishima said when asked when the localization of Nintendo’s mobile apps will take place:

“I want to do it as soon as possible. This is because our goal is to increase the number of My Nintendo members. It would be good if we reached one hundred or two hundred million members.”

Kimishima was also asked if Nintendo will lose money on Miitomo. He replied with the following:

“If you want to dress your Mii in certain outfits, it’ll be so that you can select and purchase them. Also, it will have game elements.”

Finally, Kimishima did briefly touch on NX. Of course, Nintendo won’t be talking about it until next year, but it “offers a totally new experience.” He also wants it to be adopted quicker than the 3DS and the Wii U.

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 15 Comments

Tatsumi Kimishima recently spoke with Japanese outlet Nikkei. According to the new Nintendo CEO, the company’s mobile applications will be localized into 8 languages, and will be available in over 100 countries. He also mentioned that Nintendo’s profits will have the potential to exceed the Wii/DS era in three years time.

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 12 Comments

Nintendo introduced its first mobile app, Miitomo, during a financial results briefing earlier today. For the full overview from today’s presentation, read on below.

The main character of Miitomo is you. First, you create your own Mii.

The Mii asks you a variety of questions and communicates your answers with your Friends’ Mii.

The people you will be able to communicate with are limited to your friends whom you have registered as Friends. We are designing this communication application to enable Friends to share information comfortably and securely.

In this way, instead of the users proactively sending their own messages, Miitomo has a unique characteristic that can be called “friendly communication starters” as your Mii will automatically dispatch the answers you gave to certain questions to your friends.

These “friendly communication starters” have an advantage that even the people who are less willing to send messages can easily participate. Another unique characteristic of Miitomo is that you may be able to find out unknown aspects about your friends or unexpected commonalities you share with your friend because Miitomo may pick up the topics that you usually do not discuss but would be willing to answer if asked.

What we would like to realize is, through such communication, you will be able to deepen friendly relationships and have more people with whom you can play games.

Both My Nintendo and Miitomo will be available in March 2016.

For reference, more than 200 million Mii characters have been created on our platforms, which means that many people around the world understand the appeal of Mii.

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 78 Comments

It didn’t seem like we’d be hearing about Nintendo’s first mobile game after news dropped that it had been delayed to March 2016, but information was revealed after all. Here’s what we know thus far about “Miitomo” courtesy of the Wall Street Journal:

The new smartphone game will be “Miitomo”. It will be free to play, with attractive add-ons that people can pay for, Mr. Kimishima says. Others will be pay-to-download, he says.

Looks like Miis go ahead and communicate with other Miis without your knowledge. This will help people who are hesitant to talk about themselves to communicate with others, and reveal a side of your friends you never knew, Mr. Kimishima says.

In the new Miitomo game, users will design their own avatars, or “Miis,” to communicate with other users. Executive Shinya Takahashi says that Nintendo will find ways to encourage people who are hesitant to talk to share things about themselves.

Senior Managing Director Shigeru Miyamoto says DeNA will help operate the smartphone games, while Nintendo will focus on ways to guide users to its hardware.

The five smartphone apps won’t soon comprise half of sales, Mr. Kimishima says. Nintendo’s goal is to use smart devices to increase the value of its IP, which will help sales of both software and hardware, he says.

On the reason for the delay of the smartphone app, Mr. Kimishima says, is the need for more lead time to fully promote and explain Miitomo. The company is busy promoting other titles in the pipeline right now, he says. It will start promoting Miitomo after the year-end holiday season. Says this will have little impact on earnings.

Curious about how the DeNA and Nintendo partnership is going. Senior Managing Director Shigeru Miyamoto says DeNA will focus on operation of the games. Which suggests game design is all Nintendo.

On second thought, not clear whether Miitomo should be called a game. It looks more like a communications app with Mii avatars that can be ported to games on Nintendo hardware.

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 8 Comments

Update: We ended up receiving first details about Miitomo shortly after this post. Information here.

Nintendo and DeNA first announced plans to collaborate on mobile titles in March. We were expecting to hear about their debut title today, but that unfortunately did not materialize.

Nintendo did touch on its mobile plans during its financial results briefing today. However, president Tatsumi Kimishima revealed that the launch of these games has been delayed to March 2016 as opposed to the end of this year. The Wall Street Journal reports that “Nintendo eyes global launch, depending on the game.”

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, Mobile, News | 110 Comments

Nintendo is just about to kick off its Second Quarter Financial Results Briefing (and Corporate Management Policy Briefing). The event should begin at roughly 9 PM ET / 6 PM PT – 30 minutes from now.

We’ll be relaying information collected by the Wall Street Journal as well as any other sources that pop up. You can keep track of the updates below.

Live blog

– Beginning now (9:04 PM ET)
– Kimishima, Miyamoto, and more are there
– Kimishima beginning his presentation

– CEO Tatsumi Kimishima says there are more titles–unannounced–coming this year to promote both Wii U and 3DS during the year-end holiday season

– 70% of “Animal Crossing” fans in Japan are women
– Nintendo will be pushing more games to win more women users this Christmas
– “Super Mario Maker” hit 1 million sales in just three weeks
– Mr. Kimishima notes that like “Splatoon”, a single hit game can change the course of hardware sales

– 400,000 Yarn Yoshi amiibo sold
– amiibo shipments worldwide hit 21.1 million at end-September
– This is up from 14.7 million at end-June

– Nintendo can’t keep up with demand for “Animal Crossing” amiibo cards
– Kimishima apologizes, says will start sales of a new round of shipments today
– 8.6 million amiibo cards sold

– Nintendo’s new membership service will be called “Nintendo Account”
– This will connect hardware users, as well as PC and smart device users
– Nintendo to use a cloud-based data service to transfer game data between mobile games and console games
– Launch date of Nintendo’s smartphone games has been delayed
– Launch will be March 2016, not year-end
– Nintendo eyes global launch, depending on the game
– The new smartphone game will be “Miitomo”
– Free-to-play
– Attractive add-ons that people can pay for
– Other games will be pay-to-download
– Miitomo is the first of five smartphone apps that Nintendo plans to release by March 2017
– In the new Miitomo game, users will design their own avatars, or “Miis,” to communicate with other users
– Executive Shinya Takahashi says that Nintendo will find ways to encourage people who are hesitant to talk to share things about themselves
– Senior Managing Director Shigeru Miyamoto says DeNA will help operate the smartphone games, while Nintendo will focus on ways to guide users to its hardware
– The five smartphone apps won’t soon comprise half of sales
– Nintendo’s goal is to use smart devices to increase the value of its IP, which will help sales of both software and hardware
– On the reason for the delay of the smartphone app, Mr. Kimishima says, is the need for more lead time to fully promote and explain Miitomo
– The company is busy promoting other titles in the pipeline right now,
– It will start promoting Miitomo after the year-end holiday season
– Says this will have little impact on earnings
– Curious about how the DeNA and Nintendo partnership is going. Senior Managing Director Shigeru Miyamoto says DeNA will focus on operation of the games
– Which suggests game design is all Nintendo
– Mr. Miyamoto chimes in on NX
– “We are going to be far more aggressive in using our IP, and not just stop with licensing, as in the past. The first example is Amiibo. We want our IP to better reach more children, and smart devices is just one vehicle.”
– Coy on NX
– Mr. Kimishima: How can we make a completely different kind of game that nobody has ever thought of? It’s the same issue we have always faced.

END

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 18 Comments

We’ve all been waiting a very long time for the first details about Nintendo and DeNA’s debut mobile title. In just a matter of hours, the wait will be over.

Nintendo has confirmed that it will be sharing news about its project in Japan during its latest financial results briefing on Thursday.

“We will provide updates on our project with DeNA tomorrow,” Nintendo president and CEO executive Tatsumi Kimishima said today.

For those of us in North America, we should be hearing something later tonight. That will be in the very early morning over in Europe.

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, Mobile, News | 0 comments

Niantic is the main developer behind Pokemon Go. Additionally, Nintendo and The Pokemon Company are heavily involved with the project.

Niantic CEO John Hanke recently spoke with TechCrunch and talked about what it’s like working with the Big N. He said:

“Terrific. It’s an honor to have the support and insights of a company that has brought decades of joy to people through their IP, game design, technology innovation. They share our same values of using innovation and play to bring people together. We have so much respect for Nintendo, as well as The Pokémon Company and of course Google. We couldn’t ask for a better group of companies.”

A couple of days ago, it was announced that Nintendo, The Pokemon Company, and Google are investing $20 million in Niantic. This will allow the developer to continue work on Pokemon Go and expand the company overall.

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, Mobile, News | 3 Comments

Pokemon Go developer Niatic announced today that it has raised its Series A financing round from The Pokemon Company Group, Google and Nintendo. As mentioned in today’s announcement, “The companies are investing up to $30 million in Niantic, Inc., which includes an initial $20 million upfront and an additional $10 million conditioned upon achieving certain milestones.” Through the funding, Niatic intends to continue developing Pokemon Go, support the global Ingress community, scale its platform, and release new games.

Niantic CEO John Hank said of today’s news:

“The Pokémon Company, Google and Nintendo are incredible investors and strategic partners to help build the next chapter for Niantic. We will be using this capital to continue the development of Pokémon GO, to evolve and grow Ingress and its thriving global community, and to build out our real-world gaming platform.”

Tsunekazu Ishihara, president and CEO of The Pokémon Company, also stated:

“Pokémon’s strategic investment in Niantic paves the way for a social mobile experience the world has never seen before. The Pokémon Company is committed to partnering with companies like Niantic that share the same spirit of community and innovation.”

Finally, some words from Google’s VP of corporate development, Don Harrison:

“Niantic has shown the great potential of mixing geolocation technology, dynamic storytelling and innovative game design, and we’re excited to continue supporting the team on their journey.”

Source: Pokemon PR

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Posted on 8 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in Mobile, News | 17 Comments

We’ve all been waiting quite awhile for the announcement of Nintendo’s debut mobile game. The company said it was “making announcement plans” in August, and an insider recently indicated that news would be coming soon.

There’s still no date yet when it comes to the reveal of the mobile title. Still, DeNA West chief executive officer Shintaro Asako officially went on record at GamesBeat 2015 today and said, “Soon, we should be able to announce the game.”

Asako also reiterated previous statements. As mentioned before, five Nintendo and DeNA games are coming between now and March 2017.

Asako added:

“I can’t say too much about the Nintendo deal. But it’s a really exciting initiative. It’s a really long-term initiative.”

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