DeNA: the free-to-start model will appeal to both the East and the West
Nintendo games, which will be monetized using the free-to-start model, will become popular both in Asian and Western markets,” says Shintaro Asako, CEO of DeNA’s western branch.
He shared his point of view at the Pocket Gamer Connects 2015 conference in San Francisco.
First, he voiced the obvious truth: Nintendo licenses are “perfect” for smartphones. Therefore, the deal with the company was a great success for DeNA. Asako said that the path to cooperation was long. “It took us five or six years to convince them,” he said.
Asako did not share details about the games that the two companies will create in cooperation. But he is convinced that they will affect the entire mobile industry. “I think our projects can generally change the way people play mobile games,” he said.
The CEO of the western branch of DeNA is confident that free-to-start is the next step in the evolution of monetization schemes. The industry will move to this model in the same way as it once moved from free games to shareware. “I am convinced that hundreds of millions of people will want to play free-to-start games from Nintendo,” he shares.
At the end of his speech, Asako noted that few games could appeal to Western markets, China and Japan at the same time. However, he has no doubt that the joint projects of Nintendo and DeNA will succeed.
A source: http://www.pocketgamer.biz
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