What's up with the Handheld market?

[thatmariolover]

Sony has redesigned their handheld with the PSP Go. Nintendo is redesigning theirs for the second time with the DSi XL. And while they're wasting time doing the same stuff over again, there's something brewing that could completely change the game. All it will take is a few simple ingredients and Nintendo will find themselves being toppled from the handheld market - competing with Sony for table scraps from those willing to innovate.

More and more phones are going to have smartphone abilities. Even the midrange phones will be able to compete with the DS or PSP within a year. Once better controls are put into place more developers will be able to port their titles to smartphones.

And they WILL.

You can't compete with what Apple has done with the App store without mimicking it. The biggest trouble for Nintendo and Sony in the fight vs Smartphones is the pricing scheme that Apple has brought to the game. The over-the-air low price scheme is garnering a ton of profit for very creative development. Primarily because developers get such a generous cut of the sales (70%) with no need to go through a publisher.

And yet, both Sony and Nintendo, the leaders int he handheld gaming market, are remarkably slow to adapt. I'm seriously starting to think it's because both companies are run with an iron fist by a bunch of aging Japanese businessmen with no grasp of their own market.

Maybe it's just me though.

[manasecret]

I don't have any numbers, but I think they can probably coexist separately for a long time, for several reasons:

1. Cell phones don't have a true gaming interface. No D-pad, no analog stick, no big gaming buttons or shoulder buttons. Not that cell phones couldn't integrate those, but then it would be more of a handheld console than a cell phone and probably much harder to sell to the cell phone masses.

2. As I understand it, most games on the iPhone and elsewhere are games-lite. There are no or very few epic games like you can find on the DS or PSP. How many full-fledged, epic Metroid-type or Zelda-type games do the cell phones have? 0?

3. And speaking of that, the market always goes to where the games are. Whoever has the epic and good games, and has more of them, will do fine in the market.

4. If anything, I think the handheld market will steal from the cell phone market in this fight. People will always need cell phones, and people will always want full-fledged handheld consoles, but I think the vast majority do not want both in one product. This goes, I think, especially for people buying primarily for the cell phone. Going back to point 1, if you add video game style buttons to a cell phone, people will think of it as a handheld and so it won't appeal to the masses of cell phone buyers. But, if you add calling capibilities and app store style games to a handheld, it wouldn't detract from the handheld-ness of it and so would likely sell even more to the handheld-market and even steal some from the cell phone market.

So both markets can I think coexist quite happily, and if anything the handheld market will benefit from the rise of cell-phone games. It's like the fact that you could play every single game that comes out on a console on a PC instead (if it were so made), but obviously the market allows PCs and consoles to coexist quite well, and the consoles actually do far better than PCs in game sales.

[Thespis721]

Or someone could be a genius and make a cell phone that is also a handheld system! Genius! What? Nokia made what?

Seriously though, I'm starting to see just as many people on the subway playing games on their iPhones and Droids (and soon Pre's now that they went gaming) as DS's. I'd count PSPs, but I see those rarely.

[TheSlyMoogle]

http://www.geekpicks.net/2009/06/sony-may-look-to-merge-psp-with-cell.html

Japan is already there. I know several of the phones you can get there have D pads and button functionality, I just can't find the pictures.

Japan is a mass-market for cell phone games. Even as far as having several final fantasy games on phones, and I think the professor layton games are now on phones over there.

[manasecret]

Just proves my point: Have the DS or PSP sales slowed down in Japan, despite the numerous options of cell phones with handheld type buttons? If I remember right, sales of the DS and PSP are disproportionately higher there than anywhere else in the world.

[TheSlyMoogle]

Just proves my point: Have the DS or PSP sales slowed down in Japan, despite the numerous options of cell phones with handheld type buttons? If I remember right, sales of the DS and PSP are disproportionately higher there than anywhere else in the world.

Yeah basically. Mostly because the games offered on phones in Japan are quite different from those offered on PSP/DS.

I assume that if DS/PSP games started popping up on phones and DS/PSP it would be quite different.

Some Japanese phones are simply amazing. They're so far ahead of the US market.

[thatmariolover]

Final Fantasy 1 and 2 both coming to the App Store:

http://www.redmondpie.com/final-fantasy-headed-to-iphone-and-ipod-touch-9140375/

[Jason1]

but you wont get teh mario and teh zelda on the IPHONE!

[Zen]

speaking of apple, and I know this is semi off topic, but I wouldnt make a thread over it.

ipod classic 160gb vs ipod touch 32gb, which one would you get?

160gb is nice for i could carry my entire collection at all times, sure people say i will never listen to that much music, but i can listen to whatever, whenever.

touch is awesome due to the apps on it, I had am 8gb touch but that got kind of submerged in alcohol :P

[Thespis721]

Unless you really feel the need to have any song you want at your fingertips instead of the songs you love plus more, then I suggest the Touch. You just get more for it.

[gekko]

You could make a nearly identical argument for PCs vs. consoles, yet they co-exist.

[manasecret]

You could make a nearly identical argument for PCs vs. consoles, yet they co-exist.

Couldn't agree more.

[BreakABone]

You could make a nearly identical argument for PCs vs. consoles, yet they co-exist.

I'll be a monkey's uncle. Gekko makes a point that seems well-rounded, and doesn't insult anyone in the process.

Kudos to you. Kudos to you.

[thatmariolover]

You could make a nearly identical argument for PCs vs. consoles, yet they co-exist.

I really don't think the comparison holds water. Consoles have a much lower entry cost than PC's yet still offer a comparable gaming experience. Smartphones offer way more than just games, it's something you're probably already going to buy, and ultimately with a price that's comparable.

Then again, I'm not saying they can't coexist. I'm just saying that they're going to have to innovate to compete.

[Thespis721]

PCs have Steam to really thank for their existance. Have you seen the PCs section of any gaming store? It's smaller then the DVD section.

That and The Sims....

[Angrist]

Talking about PC games: I've recently walked into some stores to see what discounted games they had for PC. It was mostly crap, and I decided I preferred to play games on my Wii.

The only PC game I'm slightly interested in is Aliens vs. Predator.

[thatmariolover]

Nintendo just posted a 23% decline in profits from last quarter due to slumping DS sales and the Wii price cut.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE60R1R320100128?type=technologyNews

[Angrist]

The market's starting to become saturated. I think.

A DS is something I'd like to have sooner or later... I guess they depend on me.