Nintendo might abandon consoles in the future
Company president Shuntaro Furukawa spills the beans
Nintendo is well known for its innovative consoles, from the GameCube (perfect) to the Wii U (meh) and now the Switch (also perfect) - but what if it just... stopped making them and focusing all its development efforts on them?
It's a future that company president Shuntaro Furukawa is considering. In an interview with Nikkei (translated by Nintendo Everything), Furukawa-san has stated that the company is staying flexible when it comes to its next steps in the games industry.
"We aren't really fixated on our consoles. At the moment we're offering the uniquely developed Nintendo Switch and its software – and that's what we’re basing how we deliver the 'Nintendo experience' on," he said.
"That being said, technology changes. We'll continue to think flexibly about how to deliver that experience as time goes on."
Furukawa goes on to say that "In the long-term, perhaps our focus as a business could shift away from home consoles – flexibility is just as important as ingenuity."
And what exactly does this future look like? "I'd like to increase the (amount of) games on smartphones that have a continuous stream of revenue," said Furukawa.
"We're also dabbling in theme parks and movies – different ways to have our characters be a part of everyday life."
Now, does this mean Nintendo will actually start moving away from its consoles? Probably not. For one thing, it's the one market where it would control all its own revenues - everywhere else, it's splitting money with store holders like Apple and Google.
What Furukawa is (probably) saying is that Nintendo will be diverifying quite a bit in the long-run - hence the desire for more mobile games and the move into films and amusement parks. But that stuff has already been in the works for a while, so none of this is particularly new.
Still, it's nice to see that the head of Nintendo is taking mobile gaming even more seriously now. Maybe we'll finally get Mario Kart Tour soon? Eh? Nintendo? Please? Or at least Dragalia Lost in Europe, come on.
