DeNA West CEO on the Nintendo partnership, thinks titles could “change the way people play mobile games”
During Pocket Gamer Connects San Francisco 2015, DeNA West CEO Shintaro Asako further commented on DeNA’s partnership with Nintendo.
He said:
“The Nintendo deal is a huge, huge deal. Nintendo has the best IP, and IP that’s perfect matched to smartphones”.
Asako also spoke about how talks with Nintendo began years ago. Originally, DeNA hoped that Nintendo would be interested in releasing games on Mobage.
“It took us 5 or 6 years to convince them. We wanted to convince them to release games on Mobage [DeNA’s browser platform]. They didn’t like it. Five years later, the industry has changed. The market has changed. Nintendo wanted to attract a lot of people who they don’t reach today, including China and emerging countries.”
Asako later made a bold statement about what the Nintendo and DeNA partnership could bring to the game, and also brought up the importance of discoverability.
“I think our games might change the way people play mobile games.”
“Successful mobile games needs to be discoverable. I’m convinced there will be hundreds of millions of people who will want to play free-to-start Nintendo games.”
Finally, Asako added that few games are able to obtain success in the west, in China and in Japan, which are worth roughly $5 billion.
