"TOKYO—Pokémon Co.’s chief executive said Tuesday his company plans to create games for Nintendo Co.’s next-generation system, which people familiar with the plans say is likely to meld features of traditional consoles and hand-held devices.
Tsunekazu Ishihara was speaking in an interview as his company, an affiliate of Nintendo that handles licensing of Pokémon characters, responds to the world-wide social phenomenon generated by its smartphone game “Pokémon Go.” Its makers say the game has been downloaded more than 500 million times since its introduction in July.
Mr. Ishihara said sales of other Pokémon products have been lifted by the game’s popularity, and the company is hoping to bring “Pokémon Go” to China and South Korea.
With higher global awareness of the characters, fans and analysts have been watching whether Pokémon Co. would roll out its games on new platforms such as Nintendo’s next game system, code-named NX, which Nintendo has said it would start selling by March 2017. People familiar with the matter have said NX could be used both as a console with a television set and as a hand-held device.
“The NX is trying to change the concept of what it means to be a home console device or a hand-held device,” said Mr. Ishihara. “We will make games for the NX.”
He declined to say whether the games would be available when the NX hardware first goes on sale.
Attractive game titles are critical for any videogame platform, and Pokémon has become one of the strongest global game franchises thanks to “Pokémon Go,” which was produced by Pokémon Co. and developed by Niantic Inc., a spinout from Alphabet Inc.’s Google. Although “Pokémon Go” is free to download, players can pay for in-game items such as incense to attract animated creatures, which are superimposed on real-world street images. Official revenue figures haven’t been disclosed, but research company App Annie estimates that the game has earned more than $700 million—generating controversy along the way because of accidents a few players have suffered while concentrating on the game. Other revenue estimates are lower.
“I feel like the reaction we saw was 10 times or even 100 times bigger than we expected,” Mr. Ishihara said.
He said more features were planned for “Pokémon Go,” including player-to-player battles and character trades. But these features will come slowly to avoid overwhelming entry-level players, he added.
“Battling is a category that we do best at Pokémon, after all,” Mr. Ishihara said, but “it’s important to really carefully consider any feature that may increase the difficulty and raise the barrier to entry for more casual users.”
As for expanding “Pokémon Go” to China, one of the world’s largest smartphone games markets, Mr. Ishihara said he wanted to do so but he said issues with maps need to be addressed first. Use of Google Maps, the service on which “Pokémon Go” is built, is limited in China and South Korea.
Nintendo owns 32% of Pokémon, and its stock price surged with the popularity of “Pokémon Go.” Nintendo has said “Pokémon Go” would have a limited impact on its own earnings because it doesn’t directly sell the game.
But information from videogame data provider Famitsu shows rising sales of Nintendo’s five-year-old hand-held console, the 3DS, and the most recent Pokémon games for the device, released two years ago, both of which profit Nintendo directly. More Pokémon games are coming in November for the Nintendo 3DS system.
Analysts said “Pokémon Go” brought in new consumers and brought back old videogame fans. “Pokémon Go” is also available in many countries where Nintendo isn’t operating its games business, such as Brazil, bringing in a further new market for Pokémon Co.
Mr. Ishihara declined to give specific figures, but he said sales of Pokémon products such as Nintendo games software and trading cards are in some cases running 30% to 50% ahead of what would normally be expected thanks to “Pokémon Go” publicity. He said that the effect was especially notable in the U.S., where the company ran an ad during the Super Bowl in February to mark Pokémon’s 20th anniversary."
- Taken from
http://www.wsj.com/articles/pokemon-to-c...1474371834 (you have to subscribe to read the article)
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