Nintendo Reveals First Smartphone Game - "Miitomo"

[Steven Bogos]

Nintendo Reveals First Smartphone Game - "Miitomo"

Miitomo will be a free-to-play smartphone game with in-app purchases.

At a strategy briefing for investors in Tokyo today, Nintendo has unveiled its first-ever smartphone game: a social interaction-type game called "Miitomo", that will be free-to-play and come with in-app purchases. The Wall Street Journal [http://blogs.wsj.com/japanrealtime/2015/10/29/nintendo-unveils-first-smartphone-game-live-blog/] is currently live blogging the event, in which various Nintendo executives are laying out the company's plans for its entry into the smartphone market.

In Miitomo (a portmanteau of Mii and "Tomodachi", the Japanese word for friend) as you may have guessed, users will design their own Miis to communicate with other users. The Miis will communicate with each other even while you're not actively using your device, in a similar fashion to how the 3DS's StreetPass functionality currently works. In fact, this whole thing sounds a whole lot like StreetPass's Mii Plaza but for phones...

[gallery=4940]

Miitomo will be the first of five smartphone apps that Nintendo plans to release by March 2017. Also, while Miitomo will be free-to-play, other Nintendo smartphone games will be pay-to-download.

Both Miitomo and the other smartphone games will tie in to current Nintendo hardware in some way, and will use cloud-based saves to transfer data between your smartphone and your Nintendo device.

Miitomo has a tentative launch date of March, 2016

Source: Wall Street Journal [http://blogs.wsj.com/japanrealtime/2015/10/29/nintendo-unveils-first-smartphone-game-live-blog/]

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[xaszatm]

What's funny is that this was stated to be one of Nintendo's mobile endeavors for a very long time:

http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/02/12/nintendo-president-satoru-iwata-teases-mii-smartphone-app

"For example, some Nintendo game consoles incorporate Mii, which creates a digital avatar to represent players," Iwata said. "It would be fun for players to use their Mii characters as icons on social media. We are currently developing an application that will allow users to do that. The app will be announced around the time our full-year results are released."

This isn't the first time Iwata has discussed creating smartphone apps to promote Nintendo's brand. Last year at this time, he talked about extending Nintendo Network ID to smart devices. And in 2013, Iwata explained how he wants Nintendo to take advantage of smart devices.

All this investor meeting do is show both the Mii App (now named Miitomo) and the new Nintendo Account system. Then again, going off on how other certain hardcore sites reacted, I guess people were for some reason expecting Mario Galaxy 3. Here's to another month of Nintendo bashing on certain other gaming sites...(Escapist usually is too apathetic to Nintendo to really care)

 

[InsanityRequiem]

Snip.

Yeah, it?s pretty sad. Hilariously so. We?ve had multiple years of Nintendo publicizing their investor meetings (Where even one investor went on about how he doesn?t know anything about games), where the Big N?s laid out barebones ground work of their plans. Nothing to really speculate on.

And then many gaming sites go crazy about what was/was not said, as if the Investor meetings were something super important.

 

[gigastar]

For once, gamers arent the only ones underwhelmed by a smartphone thing.

 

[xaszatm]

For once, gamers arent the only ones underwhelmed by a smartphone thing.

You mean what has happened to every Nintendo investor's meeting since even when the Wii was a success? Because Nintendo's stock dropping then going back up (which it is doing right now) is old hat by now. Nice try though.

 

[gigastar]

...Nice try though.

You might be reading a bit too much into my shitposting.

Or you might just be sensitive to any suggestion that Nintendo is never going to be as good as it was when Miyamoto Iwata was running the show.

At a glance, im suspecting its the latter.

 

[xaszatm]

...Nice try though.

You might be reading a bit too much into my shitposting.

Or you might just be sensitive to any suggestion that Nintendo is never going to be as good as it was when Miyamoto was running the show.

At a glance, im suspecting its the latter.

Well, one Miyamoto is still part of the show, you're thinking about Iwata.

And two...look, I'm antsy over other video game sites that are way more anti-Nintendo (to the point where they're trying to say that the Wii was a failure financially) and over-reacted. I'm sorry. Still, the stock droppping and rising (as it's doing now) has been happening with every Nintendo Investor's Meeting even when the Meeting was positive for investors. It's a short term investor's strategy and shouldn't be really considered "proof" of anything.

 

[Sleepy Sol]

Sounds fine to me. Just have to wait and see how it turns out.

Not like Nintendo's in a spot where it's actually going away any time soon. And it's also not like this was an event really aimed at creating any excitement in a more "core" gaming audience. That said, I may even have a passing interest in this direction from Nintendo already considering I have succumbed to the plague of phone games several times recently.

 

[gigastar]

...Nice try though.

You might be reading a bit too much into my shitposting.

Or you might just be sensitive to any suggestion that Nintendo is never going to be as good as it was when Miyamoto was running the show.

At a glance, im suspecting its the latter.

Well, one Miyamoto is still part of the show, you're thinking about Iwata.

Yeah, ive never been brilliant with names.

And two...look, I'm antsy over other video game sites that are way more anti-Nintendo (to the point where they're trying to say that the Wii was a failure financially) and over-reacted. I'm sorry. Still, the stock droppping and rising (as it's doing now) has been happening with every Nintendo Investor's Meeting even when the Meeting was positive for investors. It's a short term investor's strategy and shouldn't be really considered "proof" of anything.

Ok, with that in mind ill monitor the situation for a few days.

But seriously though, what does Nint think theyre going to get done with a smartphone social app?

 

[xaszatm]

But seriously though, what does Nint think theyre going to get done with a smartphone social app?

Probably the Japanese Audience. Stuff like that is wildly popular over there. It's other purpose it probably related to the Nintendo Account thing which also releases on the same date. It's probably a way to "personalize" your Nintendo account by associating it with your Mii while also getting people to connect their mobile systems to Nintendo's accounting system.

 

[Queen Michael]

And thus, an era ends. *sigh*

 

[Hairless Mammoth]

Excellent, now trolls can share Miis with facial features resembling those of historical tyrants' and genitalia without having to be at home or carry their 3DS around. /jk

This actually sounds like a decent implementation of mobile devices. I guess streetpass stuff would be easier for someone who can't bring their 3DS everywhere. Definitely better than Nintendo's version of All the Bravest.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

This game is almost too exciting.

 

[CaitSeith]

For once, gamers arent the only ones underwhelmed by a smartphone thing.

For once? First bring the graph for every other smartphone thing, then we'll talk.

 

[Fox12]

And thus, an era ends. *sigh*

Honestly, I think that era ended a while ago.

 

[InsanityRequiem]

And thus, an era ends. *sigh*

Explain what you mean by that. I can?t count how many times I?ve seen people, both here on the Escapist and elsewhere, stating Nintendo should go third party/make mobile games/apps. Am I happy Nintendo?s doing this? Not really. But that?s because I?m a consumer. If I were one of the investors/top tiered employees of Nintendo, I?d probably think differently. Sadly, all this will do is show that mobile is not a good game market. Particularly for games with any depth. There?s a reason the successful games are stuff like Fruit Ninja, Flappy Bird, Clash of Clans, Candy Crush, etc. And all the games that come from AAA places do not do so well.

 

[Queen Michael]

And thus, an era ends. *sigh*

Explain what you mean by that. I can?t count how many times I?ve seen people, both here on the Escapist and elsewhere, stating Nintendo should go third party/make mobile games/apps. Am I happy Nintendo?s doing this? Not really. But that?s because I?m a consumer. If I were one of the investors/top tiered employees of Nintendo, I?d probably think differently. Sadly, all this will do is show that mobile is not a good game market. Particularly for games with any depth. There?s a reason the successful games are stuff like Fruit Ninja, Flappy Bird, Clash of Clans, Candy Crush, etc. And all the games that come from AAA places do not do so well.

What I mean is that it's the end of Nintendo doing their own thing, and not having a boss. As a Swede, I'd compare this to when Volvo was bought by a Chinese company.