Nintendo Announces First Mobile Game, But Delays Hurt Shares

miitomoGaming giant Nintendos first mobile game has been announced, but enthusiasm was tempered with the news that release of the title had been pushed back to March 2016, dropping the companys share price by over 10 per cent.

The company partnered with Japanese mobile game specialist DeNA back in March and has licensed games to other mobile developers in the past, but the newly announced Miitomo will be the first in-house game the firm has created.

Miitomo will be free-to-play with in-app purchases, and appears to be a combination of game and social network which will make use of Nintendos new My Nintendo service which aims to bridge the gap between consoles and mobile devices. Nintendo has announced it will be releasing five titles by March 2017, and the others will all be paid downloads.

Nintendo is entering the mobile market cautiously and is wary of cannibalising its own sales, which is probably why the company is delaying past the festive season, when consoles and games perform strongest.

“The year-end is traditionally our peak season for sales,” said Tatsumi Kimishima, chief executive of Nintendo. “This way, wed be able to introduce our new applications after the holiday season is over.”

It is the same wariness that has likely led the company to avoid featuring any of its iconic characters such as Mario, Link or characters from the Pokémon franchise, but this move has angered many fans who were looking forward to playing titles featuring their favourite characters on their mobile devices.