Hollis: Nintendo needs to bring more attention to DSiWare and WiiWare offerings
Former Rare man and current Zoonami CEO Martin Hollis believes Nintendo could do more to promote its DSiWare and WiiWare services.
Speaking with GI.biz, Hollis said he doesn't think Nintendo's supporting its downloadable offerings enough, and because of this, most users are unaware of what's being offered through the respective services.
"There's a huge number of people who have a Wii, and a goodly proportion of those download games from WiiWare - it's tens of millions of people, and it's not overloaded with games, unlike some other app stores I could mention," said Hollis.
"That's the chief thing. Nintendo doesn't give you a huge amount of support in that they won't launch a marketing campaign for your product, typically, you have to take that responsibility on yourself. But that's typical for all digital distribution.
"Apple have had such massive success in capturing media attention - they've sucked all of the air out of it. I don't know that Nintendo's putting a great deal of energy into trying to generate PR for WiiWare or Dsiware.
"[Maybe it's because] they're making so much money at retail, and helping their partners make money at retail, there has to be some kind of organizational inertia there. But I see Mr Iwata pushing the organization towards digital. He made a statement at some point this year, that he expected digital distribution to overtake retail in a few years, he put a date on it (see below-ed.), but I can't recall it.
"But that's a very interesting statement, and to me that's Mr Iwata trying to push the organization towards WiiWare.
"Maybe $50 dollar games will always be at retail and the $10 and the $5 and the $1 dollar games will be available digitally. My supposition is that that's what they're hoping to be able to generate."
Iwata said back in July Nintendo 3DS was the next step in the company’s digital distribution plan,but the company president also doesn't see digital distribution taking over retail for another 20 years or so.