“Just think of paying
99 cents just to get Mario to jump a little higher.” No. Let’s not think
of that. Ever.
The quote above, in today’s Wall Street Journal, comes from Seth Fischer, manager of Oasis Management, a
hedge fund that owns shares in Nintendo. The Journal got a look at a letter
from Fischer to Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, where he makes the case for
Nintendo getting into mobile gaming and, more specifically, the business of in-app
purchases:
“We
believe Nintendo can create very profitable games based on in-game revenue
models with the right development team.”
Nintendo has said that
they’re not bringing Mario to smart devices. And they’re not too keen on free-to-play either. But Fischer—dollar signs dancing
in his eyeballs—desperately wants Nintendo games on smartphones, tablets and
wherever else they can make a buck:
https://kotaku.com/how-nintendo-plans-on-tackling-its-toughest-year-1512339954
“The
same people who spent hours playing Super Mario, Donkey Kong, and Legend of
Zelda as children are now a demographic whose engagement on the smartphone is
valued by the market at well over $100 billion.”
This
kind of talk isn’t new. Fischer, like lots of other people obsessed with the company’s current problems, dreams of the money that the embattled game
company could make by spreading out their franchise into other ecosystems. But
there have been very
good rebuttals to that line of thinking. For now, Satoru Iwata and the powers-that-be in the House of
Mario believe that their iconic plumber’s best possible home is on hardware
that Nintendo makes. Let’s be grateful for that.
And, if Mr. Fischer wants
to a character that jumps higher, maybe he should play as Mario’s brother, who
already jumps higher. It is the Year of Luigi, after all.
[via The Wall Street Journal]
Top image originally via Ayay, dollar signs added by Kotaku’s Chris Person.
