Kimishima talks Fire Emblem Heroes, Animal Crossing mobile delay
This information comes from Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima…
I will now talk about the third smart-device application, following Miitomo and Super Mario Run, that Nintendo will release, Fire Emblem Heroes. Distribution for both the iOS and Android versions of Fire Emblem Heroes will begin tomorrow, February 2, in 39 countries worldwide.
The Fire Emblem series is a franchise that is supported enthusiastically by fans in their 20s and 30s in particular. The series has become especially popular overseas since the titles on the Nintendo 3DS.
Though Fire Emblem Heroes changes many aspects of the Fire Emblem series to better suit play on a smart device — such as smaller maps that fit on a smartphone screen and the ability to attack enemies by dragging an allied character over an enemy — it inherits a deep battle system and the joy of training your characters, which are aspects typical of the Fire Emblem series. We developed Fire Emblem Heroes to be a quality title that fans of the series will appreciate and play thoroughly.
At the same time, we hope to provide a chance for consumers who have never played Fire Emblem before to experience the appeal of the series.
This title uses the free-to-start business model, in which users can download the game and start playing for free.
As the word “Heroes” in the title implies, users can acquire various heroes who have appeared throughout the history of the Fire Emblem series. Heroes are obtained by expending items called orbs. The focus of the game is to train your characters, form a team to take into battle by picking heroes from those and progress through the story. Characters are acquired randomly. Users can acquire orbs, which are required to get characters, by progressing in the game’s story, but they can also purchase additional orbs in the shop. Distribution for Fire Emblem Heroes will begin
tomorrow.As stated yesterday, we have revised the release timeframe for our Animal Crossing smart-device title. While we had previously said that we planned to launch the title by the end of March 2017, because the Android version of Super Mario Run will now be launching in March, we are changing the distribution period to next fiscal year so we can
prepare all the content we wish to include and properly support the distribution of this application. I apologize to all the consumers who are anticipating this title. We will provide more details about the specific release period at a later date. This revision will have minimal impact on the earnings forecast.
