Two pictures from Dragalia Lost. Screenshots: Nintendo/Cygames
Six years into the release of mobile games, Nintendo has had meager success at best, despite its proven expertise in game development.
Driving the news: Dragalia Lost, a mobile game jointly developed by Nintendo and Cygames, was shut down on Wednesday, making it unplayable.
- The game’s creators didn’t say why it was disabled, but had issued a detailed warning to players and thanked them for their support.
- Since 2018, Nintendo has shut down as many mobile games as it launched, three at a time.
Game Status: Nintendo’s mobile gaming revenue has been down all year and remains a tiny part of the business. From April to September, the company made $4.5 billion from Nintendo Switch games and hardware, but only $169 million from mobile games and other revenue related to its intellectual property, according to its latest financial report.
- With Dragalia Lost, Nintendo only has five active mobile games left: Super Mario Run (2016), Fire Emblem Heroes (2017), Animal Crossing Pocket Camp (2017), Mario Kart Tour (2019), and the Niantic-published Pikmin Bloom (2021).
- According to mobile tracking company data.ai, the company’s Nintendo Switch Online app has been downloaded more than all but two of these games this year: Mario Kart Tour and Super Mario Run.
- Nintendo itself reports more than 800 million unique downloads of its mobile games.
What you say: Nintendo is throwing out its mobile games as marketing.
- “While we recognize the importance of generating revenue and profit from our mobile business, our fundamental business strategy is to increase the number of people who have access to Nintendo [intellectual property]’ a company representative told Axios in a statement.
- The company says its mobile games are reaching people in countries where the Switch hasn’t launched yet, allowing people to “experience new entertainment from Nintendo and become familiar with its IP.”
- A game like Dragalia Lost, which was originally developed for mobile and which Switch didn’t spin off on, doesn’t fit into such a plan.
Flashback: Nintendo had approached the mobile market cautiously, resisting investor pressure and then bowing as its Wii U and 3DS platforms struggled in the post-Wii, pre-Switch era.
- Nintendo debuted as a disruptor on mobile in 2016. Its first major game, Super Mario Run, was offered with a promise to limit player spending on it, defying the conventional free-to-play mobile business model that constantly persuades players to spend more.
- But later Nintendo mobile versions embraced the microtransaction model.
- Along the way, its mobile games received solid reviews but nowhere near the glowing praise for the outstanding design of its main versions for its own gaming devices.
Yes but: Owned by Nintendo and managed by The Pokémon Company, the Pokémon series has thrived on mobile, most notably via Niantic’s still-healthy Pokémon Go.
- Pokémon is treated separately from Nintendo’s other businesses.
What’s next: Nintendo may have announced a lot of Switch games for the coming months, but it hasn’t announced a new mobile game since Pikmin Bloom was unveiled and launched in October 2021.
- “We are focused on delivering great experiences for our current mobile games through continuous updates and improvements while also considering new applications for the future,” the company said in a statement to Axios.
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