News on the soon-to-be-released Nintendo mobile games has surfaced on Friday, saying that everything will be offered for free and will earn a meager revenue from in-app microtransactions, The Wall Street Journal reports.
DeNA Co has confirmed the report during the earnings briefing which was reportedly attended by The Wall Street Journal. "Games currently in the pipeline are all free to play," DeNA CEO Isao Moriyasu said, as quoted in the report.
"This was confirmed during an earnings briefing today by Isao Moriyasu, president and CEO of DeNA, the mobile studio working with Nintendo to produce its new series of smartphone games. The chief executive clarified that all five games arriving by spring 2017 will be free downloads with additional paid content," Polygon reports.
According to Gamespot, a document earnings report of DeNA shows that the company is planning to monetize the games developed by Nintendo via microtransactions. But the company stressed that such plan will be "carefully decided based on user expectation and gameplay."
"The main objective is to produce multiple hit titles and make the collaborated business profitable on its own. Contribution from this alliance is expected to start in Fiscal Year 2016. Miitomo will be free to download with optional paid items.Monetization methods will be carefully decided based on user expectation and gameplay," reads an excerpt monetization plan of the DeNA with Nintendo.
"Miitomo and Nintendo's other upcoming smartphone games will also tap into a new membership service that's being called Nintendo Account. This will use a cloud-based data service to transfer game data between mobile games and console games. In addition, a new rewards program called My Nintendo is in the works, but no additional details were provided regarding that service," the report said.
It can be recalled that Nintendo's Miitomo was officially revealed last month during the investors meeting. At first, Nintendo President Tatsumi Kimishima branded Miitomo as a communication-based app. Kimishima previously announced that Nintendo loyalists can download the games for free. He also mentioned that subsequent apps are expected to feature microtransactions.