Nintendo, a Japanese home and handheld video game console manufacturer and game developer, has traditionally focused on games that utilize unique elements of its consoles. However, in the early 2010s, the company saw several successive fiscal quarters where they were running at an operating loss. This financial turmoil prompted a shift in strategy to enter the mobile gaming market with the aid of mobile platform development partner DeNA, using mobile titles as a marketing tool to entice that audience into purchasing Nintendo's dedicated video game hardware.
Nintendo's mobile game initiative largely lasted from 2015 to 2020, during which Nintendo internally developed a number of mobile games, as well as collaborated with studios outside of the initial DeNA partnership. Several of these titles would enter the top-downloaded games list on the iOS App Store and Google Play stores, earning over US$1 billion in revenue in total by 2020.[1] However, Nintendo's dedicated hardware and software business seeing a major resurgence following the release of the Nintendo Switch, coupled with dwindling numbers for its mobile games during the COVID-19 pandemic, prompted Nintendo to exit the market outside of projects spearheaded by The Pokémon Company.
- ^ Williams, Katie (January 2020). "Nintendo Mobile Games Reach $1 Billion in Lifetime Player Spending". Sensor Tower. Retrieved August 22, 2024.