Will mobile gaming kill handhelds?

Not really because you cant play the likes of Mario or Zelda on a mobile! It may well stop older people from buying handhelds, but as handheld gaming is primarily for kids anyway, so there wont be too much damage done.

I am confused. Are handhelds not mobile gaming? But misleading head line aside, Yes, I'd say it's safe to say cell phones will kill handheld systems.

"We don't have a mobile gaming industry anymore. We have a mobile scamming industry."

So said Thomas Baekdal in a column last week, swinging for the head of a nail with a strike so true that I found myself letting out an involuntary splutter of agreement.

The proliferation of games like Dungeon Keeper suggests it's too late for a lot of mobile developers, but the good work being done on PC points to another possible future. If I were busy building free-to-play ideas into a PlayStation 4 or Xbox One game, I know which side of the line I'd prefer to end up on. Reject the ways of the scammers. Be a game developer.

Whenever you write about this phenomenon, the common complaint from people making the games in question is that not all of them are bad. As Thomas Baekdal realised though, the problem is definition. When your free-to-play game is all economy mechanics rather than game mechanics, when your game is all business design rather than game design, you're not actually making a game - you're constructing a scam, whether you realise it or not. If you're doing it knowingly, you're just a high-tech gangster.

http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2014-02-08-console-developers-need-to-look-at-dungeon-keeper-and-learn

I can't stand playing games on my phone, never do. Vita or nothing for me.

i hope not. mobile gaming, quality wise, is just awful imho. the only mobile game i go back to every now and then is robot unicorn attack. when robot unicorn attack is a highlight of a platforms library then something has gone horribly wrong.

in saying that i would like a gaming device that has some phone features. i would like to be able to carry my 3DS or vita type device around and also be able to watch netflix, send texts, read email and make/take calls. it wouldnt need to be a full blown smartphone (i have one and only use a few apps. cant find much that interests me). the ngage idea but with far better execution basically. a gaming device first with some phone features rather than a phone that just so happens to play games.

No, not necessarily. I think both industries will get bigger in both respects.

But I can't stand handhelds -- though my DS wasn't bad, but still -- I always prefer a console.

On the go, I totally don't mind using a smartphone/tablet for games. Laptops are best for portable games!

Mr. Z~kun

I don't know if it'll outright kill it but it's certainly impacting it.

I think the potential's there, yes.

Dedicated handhelds just aren't practical. Why should I haul around a huge piece of plastic, along with cartridges (which cost $40+ each, without an account system for digital) when I can have so many great games right on my phone, many of those game for half the price and less, with an account system? Sure, the dedicated handhelds have pads and buttons, but there are Bluetooth phone controllers out there as well, that also act as a battery recharger.

FFVI just came out on iOS, and as much as people will disregard it simply due to being mobile, it is easilythe best version of the game so far released. It's just too bad many will never know this due to their inherent bias against mobile as a viable gaming platform, but it's the truth. If I can somehow find a way to play it on a (non-Apple) TV and also carry a controller add-on for my phone, what is the point of carrying a dedicated anymore? I have FFVI, KoToR, X-Com EU, Chrono Trigger, all on my phone. And I take my iPhone EVERYWHERE......I'm never away from it. It's a tool of all trades and IS good for gaming, and not just MT-laden exploitative garbage like Dungeon Keeper is available for it. There are good mobile games available regardless of what many claim.

Sure, the library needs to expand, controller support needs to become universal, and being able to play on a TV needs to happen, but once those things are done, there is NO reason for me to look at my 3DS aside from Nintendo's exclusives. However, if Nintendo got its head out of its ass and allowed GB, GBC, NES, SNES, and N64 games to be downloaded and played on the 3DS with a universal account system so I could hold many retro games on the 3DS, I would take it everywhere with me. Then it could be very competitive with iOS games.

But they aren't, so I really have no use for it except in bed before I go to sleep. Nintendo has the legacy and the ability to keep their handheld relevant even with the threat of the mobile's business model and prices, but they're simply too stupid/stubborn/clueless/incompetent to truly offer incentive to keep it a platform worth bothering with.

Nintendo is their own worst enemy, and they, not the iOS or Android, will be the reason for their downfall and irrelevance in the handheld market.

Very stupid post. People are willingly paying for their microtranscations, and they're getting what they paid for. There is no scam there, except when it involves children (who shouldn't have access to credit cards in the first place).

While mobile/phone games aren't generally as good as handheld, I think people are becoming perfectly happy to play games that are free or only cost a buck or two until they get home to play 'real' games on their console. The cost differential per game is so extreme and people already shelled out a few hundred for their phone that they're looking to not shell out an equal amount for something to game on when their phone does a bunch of decent games itself.

@MirkoS77: They just released a flood of good 3ds games last year. Bag on the wii u all you want but when it comes to the 3ds they are anything but lazy

I feel that the better games are only available on handhelds. Not to mention you cant even get a good mobile device to play games for the price of PSVITA.

Face it, phone gaming is nothing more than mindless and shallow games with bad controls, and the library is filled with garbage like Flappy Birds and Candy Crush Saga type games made for non-gamers who like to play for two minutes at a time while waiting in line when they're out and about.

Dedicated gamers avoid that crap like it was the aids virus.

Funny, when I look at what's on my phone I see games that are more than mindless and shallow games with bad controls. Osmos, World of Goo, Shogun, Crayon Physics, Kingdom Rush, Strikefleet Omega, Sentinel 3, Aquaria, Nihilumbra, etc. But maybe I'm not "dedicated" enough to see that these games are very very very bad, and meant to be played 2 minutes at a time...

Never said they were lazy. In its own right, the 3DS has been amazing this past year.

But again, it's not practical compared to mobile. To haul around the system and all the cartridges can't compete with simply having a phone in the pocket that has comparable games. But this could be overcome if Nintendo:

a) would finally get an UA system up an running so it'd be possible to buy games from their eshop and hold them all on one cart and not have to worry about losing them.

b) like I said, get their VC in order. Make GB, GBC, GBA, NES, SNES, N64 games all available on the 3DS at reasonable prices (which is what Nintendo will never even consider). They have an entire legacy to cash-in on that they're simply sitting on.

Neither of these are there, and they are BARE REQUIREMENTS to even begin competing with mobile gaming. Nintendo is, as usual, instead of seeing where the market is going and taking steps to adapt, sits there throwing a tantrum, kicking and screaming against the tide, failing to budge when the market demands change and offers something to consumers that threaten its traditional business model that's been successful for so long. They still don't want to give us accounts not tied to hardware, they still insist on charging $40+ for games.

Times have changed. Until Nintendo ceases with their stubborn attitude bred by their arrogant belief that they dictate where the market goes, their handheld will be in danger. If Nintendo refuses to develop and embrace the mobile model, they need to take steps towards making their handheld offering more attractive. As it stands now, it's not.

To be blunt, it won't. Besides most mobile games I played aren't that good anyway. I'd rather stick to an actual gaming handheld.

You're going to complain about Nintendo charging $40 for 3DS games and not mention Sony and their proprietary cards that are ridiculously over-priced? What about Vita games costing the same amount? What about Sony not supporting the Vita like they could have? What about too many indie games and ports on the system?

Some of the stuff you rant about like not having unified accounts is legit, but most of the other criticisms are extreme knit-picking. 3DS has been one of the most solid gaming system in existence over the past few years.

Absolutely not, and anyone arguing otherwise is a dullard.

Mobile games are incapable of providing the same quality as handhelds without buying extra peripherals, like smartphone controllers for example, which the average iPhone or Android user isn't going to get. Without these peripherals, the controls and the mechanics are limited to say the least.

If all mobiles have to offer are old-school stuff we've already played generations ago, then they're not comparable to the 3DS in any way whatsoever. The only kind of games that are profitable on mobiles are F2P stuff, not paid core gaming apps, which often sell for ridiculously low prices. It's no surprise that all the games you've mentioned are just ports that have already made their money elsewhere. Unless they go F2P, developers don't stand a chance in the mobile marketplace. There's just no financial incentive at all for developers to create quality core exclusives for mobiles, when they could be making way more profit doing so on the 3DS instead. And that's why the 3DS is continuing to thrive in spite of the mobile gaming boom.

Nice red-herring.

Vita is so irrelevant it's not worth mentioning, which is why I don't. Nintendo's handheld is the only one in proximity and potential of competing with the iOS market considering their backlog and current software lineups, and you bringing Sony into the equation does not lessen Nintendo's problems in being able to compete in it.

3DS is an amazing system, of that I don't deny. But the topic is about whether mobile gaming will be the end of handhelds. Nintendo is the only dominant handheld on the market, and Vita is pretty much a non-issue. Like I said, 3DS is solid in its own right, but in comparison? Even if you refuse to admit it with your apparent bias and disregard for the platform, mobile has proven to be able to give gaming experiences that stand up to (iXcom: EU) the 3DS library. Mobile users are getting last gen experiences (and great remakes, like FFV VI) in their pocket for very reasonable costs. Unless Nintendo enacts changes in accordance with the trends in this market, they will continue to struggle and lose marketshare for their portable.

3DS sales have been extremely solid since its price cut. Sales of its games have been outstanding, given the price of the software compared to those on phones.

You claim I'm bias yet you outright dismiss Vita based on sales while ignoring the merit of its games.

The libraries of dedicated gaming systems vs those with games as a HUGE after-thought is ridiculous. I've no doubt that a few of phone gaming's exclusives are good, but there's really no comparing them because it would be like measuring Reader's Digest stories to classic novels at best.

It's easy to see why Nintendo continually loses market share to phones when those appetizers are f2p trash and $5 games. There will never be a time when gamers will not want deeper games with button controls and deeper mobile gaming experiences, so Nintendo handheld gaming will not go away or be drowned out as long as they continue to have the franchises gamers want, like Pokemon etc.

PC gamers try to make the same flawed argument about console going away, but look at how popular they still are today. Dedicated handheld gaming, like console gaming, is here to stay despite these casual and short-lived trends.

Just to add to my previous post, a case in point would be the Japanese market: It has both the largest handheld gaming market and the largest mobile gaming market, both of which have been co-existing for over a decade. If it was true that mobiles are eating into the handheld market, then handhelds should've already died out in the largest mobile gaming market (Japan) years ago, but instead what we see is continued handheld dominance there, completely contradicting the notion of mobiles being a threat to handhelds. Mobiles and handhelds are two different markets, and they will both continue to co-exist for a long time to come.

Core gaming does sell on mobile, Square has been making consistent profits with its Final Fantasy releases or else they wouldn't bother, as have games such as KoToR and Xcom.

The 3DS has considerably less marketshare than its forebear at the same point in its life, and if you don't think that mobile has anything to do with that (especially considering Nintendo has offered pretty much bar-none the best lineup that has been seen on a dedicated handheld in many years this past year alone), then I don't know what to tell you. I said in my OP that the "potential's there", not that it's a certainty, and I stand by that assertion. Just because all iOS offers now is old-school stuff (though Xcom EU was not, and a not too long ago release) doesn't mean that we will not be seeing more of the like in the future. Isn't that an example of the threat that mobile presents to traditional handhelds?

I mean, hell, we're getting games on mobile that are CONSOLE caliber (Xcom, KotoR), technically better than what handhelds offer, for half the price of what Nintendo charges for software on their handhelds. How can dedicated handhelds compete with that?

Look, the dedicated market has shrunk. Sales figures show this, it's in decline. The mobile market is exploding, over a billion people own smart devices to some degree, and core games are beginning to appear on it that transcend the majority F2P trash that it's so well-known for with a traditional pricing model that neither Nintendo or Sony are attempting or seemingly willing to compete with. At present, no, mobile won't kill dedicated. But the hardware capability is there. Control pads are available. Pricing is extremely competitive and aggressive in comparison to traditional offerings. The potential exists.

Given all of those, I don't see how anyone can outright dismiss mobile as a serious threat to dedicated. If it wasn't, Nintendo wouldn't be trying to advertise within its audience, nor saying things such as "we're not ruling out games on mobile", which Iwata came out and said.

While Iwata didn’t directly address the issue of Nintendo games appearing on smartphones, he did add that “I have not given any restrictions to the development team, even not ruling out the possibility of making games or using our game characters. However, if you report that we will release Mario on smart devices, it would be a completely misleading statement”

http://androidspin.com/2014/01/30/nintendo-making-smartphone-apps-says-satoru-iwata-chance-games/

We probably won't see Mario, but still may see games.

Deep experiences are possible without button controls, believe it or not. And as I've stated, pads are available for mobile. With those, there is no difference between a phone and 3DS. Well, aside from phones being much more powerful, and they'll continue to become much more powerful as time goes on. With core gaming experiences at half the price that dedicated games are demanding.

@Jag85 mobile devices are just getting to the point where the hardware is more powerful and capable than of what handhelds were capable of offering 10 years ago. Your example really doesn't hold weight.

While you're right about a few things, there are some important points you're overlooking here. A lot of what you're saying sounds good from a consumer perspective, but those same things are actually pretty bad from a developer perspective.

Yes, mobiles now have hardcore games like Final Fantasy, Chrono Trigger, X-COM, and KOTOR, all for fairly cheap prices, but these are all just ports of older games (though maybe not that old in X-COM's case). These were games originally released for consoles and PC, before being ported down for mobiles long after, rather than being made for mobiles in mind to begin with.

On the other hand, the 3DS has lots of exclusives which are designed from the ground-up with the 3DS in mind, which is almost never the case for mobiles. With the kinds of budgets required to make core games, selling them at cheap mobile app prices just wouldn't be profitable. While you might be complaining about expensive 3DS game prices, that is exactly what allows these games to be profitable for the developers who make them. Like I said above, there just isn't any financial incentive for developers to create quality core exclusives for mobiles.

As for the 3DS sales, yes it's not exactly at DS levels, but it is at least selling at a better rate than the older Game Boy and GBA handhelds (and let's not forget how the 3DS outsold all the consoles last year too). And the reason why it's not selling at DS levels is obviously because most of the casuals who brought the DS for its casual touchscreen gaming have now moved on to smartphones, with the ones remaining behind being the traditional core gamers, just like in the older Game Boy days. There is no decline here, but the DS was just an anomaly compared to Nintendo's usual handheld sales.

And finally, the reason why so many Japanese gaming companies, including even Nintendo, are considering going mobile, is because of how much money the F2P model brings in. For example, GungHo's Japanese mobile game Puzzle & Dragons grossed nearly $1.5 billion last year, almost approaching the kind of revenue that GTA5's 30 million sales (at $60 each) made. With so much money being made from relatively cheap F2P mobile apps, it would be difficult for even Nintendo to not take notice of how much money can be made there.

i really, really hope not. Phones suck when it comes to controls

No, if anything mobile gaming is getting worse. So many half assed games or bad games in general.

I don't know if I necessarily believe that core games (not past ports, but games designed for exclusively for mobile) would not be profitable, even if their asking price was halved. I think there's huge incentive: look at the userbase. Mobile has what.....a billion+ users? How big is the 3DS audience? Wiki says (including 2DS sales), as of Dec 31st, 42 million have been sold. So let's say currently, 45-50 million. If that's the case, that's 1/2 of 1/10th of mobile. That's nuts, and if I were a developer (even for core games), I know where my attention would be drawn to.

Even if Nintendo, or <insert developer here> made exclusives for mobile and priced them at $15 or less, wouldn't the immense userbase of mobile offset the reduction in asking price directed towards a much smaller userbase of dedicated? 1000 people paying $15 makes more money than 100 paying $40. I know Nintendo doesn't want to "devalue" their wares by competing with mobile (though Iwata's reasoning for this is entirely nonsensical.....value is always subjectively determined by the buyer, it is not some objective entity dictated by what the seller's asking). I would be willing to wager money that, say, Advance Wars mobile at $15 would see more profit than Advance Wars 3DS at $40 when the audience is taken into account. The price, userbase, not having to haul around carts, and consumer friendly features like unified accounts blow away what Nintendo or Sony can (or are willing to offer) at this point.

F2P is a shit model, I abhor it, hope it disappears, but even so the sales of core games have gone on to demonstrate that they can bring in profit despite it. If F2P ceased to exist, the success of the core titles so far released wouldn't.

You're probably right, I doubt mobile will KILL dedicated outright, but I still think that the latter will be highly marginalized in the future unless Sony and Nintendo take steps to offer incentive to invest in their offerings when many can get games that measure up just as well on a platform that is vastly cheaper and offers features that they don't (UAs), as well as give people the option to play these games the same way dedicateds are (Bluetooth controllers).

Yes, in theory, the large mobile user base should result in higher sales, but in reality, that's rarely ever the case. For example, Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy VI only sold about 50,000-100,000 each on Google Play, out of a billion Android devices (and I doubt it's any different on iPhone), and it's a similar case for most other core games on mobiles, despite the cheaper prices.

One reason why core games don't sell as well on mobiles is for the same reason they didn't sell as well on the Wii: these devices are mainly marketed towards casual users. The Wii had the largest user base last gen, yet third-party core games generally sold worse on it compared to how well core games sold on the PS360. Simply having having a larger user base doesn't guarantee higher sales, but you need to take into account the target audience. It's highly unlikely most of the 'soccer moms' who got a Wii for Wii Fit would be very interested in playing RPG's, for example. Likewise, handheld gamers and mobile gamers are, for the most part, very different user bases. In fact, premium apps in general don't really sell that well anymore on mobiles, now that F2P is dominating.

And yes, mobiles have marginalized dedicated handhelds when it comes to casual gaming, 'stealing' away most of the casual gamers who made the DS the second best-selling console of all time. But when it comes to core gaming, which is what Nintendo was previously doing with the Game Boy line anyway, mobiles don't yet present any legitimate threat to the 3DS. But the PS Vita is another story, of course.