Why it’s hard to go from building games on console to mobile

It’s exceedingly hard to take a hit game franchise on consoles and make it successful on mobile devices. Pokémon Go has made that seem easy, but it is a very rare title. When it comes to moving from console to mobile, a lot of games with mixed success come to mind, such as Bethesda’s Fallout Shelter, Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto series, Sega’s Sonic games, and Ubisoft’s Watch Dogs companion app.

But succeeding in mobile, which has become the largest game market with $36 billion in revenues in 2016, is a must. Big console-focused game companies are still trying to succeed in the space, but more often than not, it takes “mobile first” game companies to succeed. I moderated a panel on this subject at the Casual Connect USA game conference last week.