Can Nintendo’s mobile games succeed without targeting whales?

Nintendo’s entry into the mobile gaming market continues to grab industry press headlines. Only last week, Satoru Iwata, Nintendo’s CEO, caused a stir when he claimed that Nintendo would not be pursuing high-value consumers, aka whales, with its mobile free-to-play games.

“My understanding of how to succeed in the Japanese [mobile gaming] market now is to find a limited number of generous consumers who are willing to spend a lot and analyze what encourages them to spend.” Iwata said “However, if we did that, I don’t think that we would be able to entertain hundreds of millions of consumers all around the world or to produce large and long-lasting achievements.”

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