Nintendo reportedly wants to expand the Wii U’s library by actively helping smartphone developers to adapt their apps for the system. According to “company sources” at The Japan Times, Nintendo “has offered professional-use conversion software” to app devs in the hope smartphone software will help boost the Wii U’s underwhelming sales figures.
The report tallies with Nintendo’s increased affinity for the downloadable games market; the company’s digital sales figures for the last fiscal year more than doubled the previous year’s. In a recent Q & A session, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said the new strategy isn’t limited to selling packaged games digitally.
“We will not simply change our existing packaged software distribution channel,” Iwata said. “Rather, we might have many other types of business models in addition to packaged software. For example, we might see more games that are similar to free-to-play games, games that cost much less or games that require a monthly subscription fee.
“Digitalization allows for greater flexibility, whereby having more ways to make payments, both software developers and consumers have more options. And Nintendo 3DS and Wii U have flexible systems to handle such trends, so it is now a question of putting these ideas into action. I can definitely say that Nintendo will make new offers that go well beyond simply replacing packaged software with digital software.”
