Wait, wait, wait, didn't Nintendo come out and say that they were against taking their IPs to the mobile market?
"Just think of paying 99 cents just to get Mario to jump a little higher."
Please pour acid directly into our eye holes, but that was the quote this morning from Seth Fischer, of Oasis Management, a hedge fund that owns shares in Nintendo. The quote appeared in today's Wall Street Journal and has pretty shitty implications for not only Nintendo's flagship property, but for the mobile gaming market at large.
Microtransactions for upgradeable in-game purchases are nothing new. Want a stronger gun? Pony up. Extra gold/gems/coins? Pony up. But jumping? Jumping is a fundamental game mechanic, how can you charge someone for what should come standard?
Fischer, like most, can see the staggering sums of money being made in the mobile market and the cha-ching of extra zeroes isn't lost on him.
"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."
Everyone has an idea for how Nintendo can turn around their buisness model, but this is one of the basest attempts we've come across since...well...since that last time.
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[via Kotaku, The Wall Street Journal]
