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May 07, 2013

Nintendo Might be Embracing Mobile Gaming

By Oliver VanDervoort, Contributing Writer

The Nintendo Wii U has long been the weak stepsister to the more powerful and popular consoles, the Playstation 3 and the Microsoft (News - Alert) Xbox 360. Nintendo has publicly claimed that it isn’t worried and is sure that the console – not even a year old – will eventually start seeing some positive sales numbers.



It appears that Nintendo is taking some unusual steps to try and jumpstart its sluggish sales. The Japanese gaming company is apparently offering conversion software to several developers in an effort to try and stimulate ports of smartphone games.

Console gaming has been losing ground to mobile gaming for quite a while now, and it looks like Nintendo is trying to take advantage of that. If the company can successfully find a way to get more of its game out on the more popular platform, it could go a long way to revitalizing the flagging console.

The company has not made this official, but inside sources say that Nintendo is looking to “modify” its hardware offerings. This means that popular smartphone games could also be coming to the console, which already basically comes with something that could be used as a tablet in its gamepad controller.

The company has also been working hard to promote its eShop, which is a way to purchase offerings digitally. The company has been moving from physical games to digital and to a point where they can actually offer popular Android (News - Alert) and iOS games on the platform seems like the next logical step.

The question that remains is whether or not this move would be one that could work long-term. The gamepad doesn’t support multitouch, which is important for a lot of the mobile platform’s most popular games. There is also the question as to whether or not anyone would buy the Wii U instead of just going out and getting a tablet.




Edited by Alisen Downey
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