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Super Mario Is Coming To The iPhone (popularmechanics.com) 108

One of the first announcements made at Apple's iPhone 7 launch event was that Nintendo's Super Mario Bros franchise will be coming to the iPhone. The announcement was short, sparse with details, but certainly well received. Popular Mechanics reports: "Nintendo head Shigeru Miyamoto took the stage early in Apple's iPhone 7 reveal in San Francisco today to announce and demonstrate the new game Super Mario Run, the first Mario game for the iPhone. The game is simple: Mario runs completely, a la Temple Run, and you push buttons to make him jump and try to reach the end of the levels. Miyamoto says 'you can play the game one-handed for the very first time.' There's a battle mode, too, where you try to top friends' scores. Super Mario Run will come out sometime this fall before the holiday season. Pricing is TBA, but Miyamoto promises there will be a single price and no in-app purchases." In a separate report via Kotaku, Nintendo said, "We do intend to release the game on Android devices at some point in the future." The news sent Nintendo's stock soaring, up 29 percent in U.S. trading after the announcement.
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Super Mario Is Coming To The iPhone

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  • by Black.Shuck ( 704538 ) on Thursday September 08, 2016 @05:06AM (#52846723)

    ...according to the App Store [apple.com] listing.

    • by Black.Shuck ( 704538 ) on Thursday September 08, 2016 @05:10AM (#52846733)

      ...is how /. works. Sorry forgot about that.

      Kotaku says that Miyamoto got it wrong: It'll be a free download with an in-App purchase to upgrade to the full-game.

      • by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08, 2016 @05:22AM (#52846763)

        I'm not sure it's really a case of him getting it wrong, at least beyond semantics. If you can effectively download a demo/trial of the game, then make a single payment in order to have the full product then there is a single purchase and although the purchase is technically in-app what was clearly meant was clearly that there wouldn't be things to buy in game like extra levels, funny costumes etc.

        • So it's Shareware from the 90s.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    Ah, 1980s calling? Hold, please.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    One thing I have to say Steve Jobs got absolutely right was not leaving eager customers hanging when it came to availability. Super Mario should have been available to download today, not at some unspecified date, and for an unspecified price in the future. Why spend so much money (I'm sure they paid Apple to lead the keynote) on marketing when you don't even have a product ready?

    • My guess is that they only started developing this when they saw how popular Pokemon Go was. Probably not much more than the single level that was demoed ready. But they'll certainly want it released for the Holidays, and there isn't another iPhone event before then.

      Mario is a big enough draw to be able to hold the hype for a couple of months.

      • They first announced their entry into mobile devices a little over a year ago, so I feel safe saying they've had this in development for quite a while.

        I think they're releasing slowly so that each title feels like an event when it comes out.

    • Because now is when all eyeballs are on Apple. In half a year, it would just be a footnote in the daily nerd news ticker.

  • by rsmith-mac ( 639075 ) on Thursday September 08, 2016 @05:44AM (#52846819)

    Congratulations, investors. Thanks to your shortsightedness, you've corralled Nintendo into making what will surely be a bad Mario platformer. This is how you kill the goose...

    And on a less dramatic note, I really do feel bad for Miyamoto. Just from his body language at the Apple event, he didn't look like he wanted to be there.

    • by Truekaiser ( 724672 ) on Thursday September 08, 2016 @06:32AM (#52846963)

      Nintendo's goose is Pokemon. Without it they would have followed sega years ago.

      • by ausekilis ( 1513635 ) on Thursday September 08, 2016 @07:44AM (#52847289)
        That depends on your perspective.

        With enough cash reserves [gamesradar.com] to lose $250M a year until 2052 before needing to call for bankruptcy... I'd say they are pretty financially smart.

        Combined with the fact that most Mario games outsell Poke'mon during a given generation of games. Don't forget that Poke'mon is owned by the Pokemon [wikipedia.org] Company, a consortium of three companies of which Nintendo is a part. So Nintendo won't see 100% of the profits from any of those sales.

        You're also omitting some of their other heavy hitting first party titles. Legend of Zelda, Metroid, Smash Bros., Mario Kart, Pikmin, Animal Crossing.

        Nintendo's biggest problem has been third-party developers for their consoles ever since the N64. The GameCube had a few really good titles, but nowhere near the PS2. The Wii hit it big, but again not a wide range of good titles like the PS3 and XB360. Wii U? well, we've seen how well that's been doing... Now if only they'd release that Zelda game and a Metroid or 2...
        • Just imagine how a Metroid game along the lines of Prime or Echos would do in VR...or even AR. Except for the Morph Ball. That would hurt.

          Also, they would need to keep away from the Samus Whining Channel that they tapped into with Other M. Several of those cut-scenes were pointless with a narrative drawn out far beyond relevance... needlessly detracting from the flow of the station exploration and leaving me wanting for a skip option that was never there.

      • by Eloking ( 877834 )

        Nintendo's goose is Pokemon. Without it they would have followed sega years ago.

        Nintendo would have gone a different path, but it's a little big to speculate that far. You can't really just get all the money they got from Pokémon, subtract it to their finance and yell "Hey, they would have been bankrupt with that less money". For instance, the company could have opted for a simple Wii2 instead of the extravagant WiiU and be more successful now.

        Compared to SEGA's Sonic, Nintendo have far more "money maker" franchise like Mario, Zelda, Metroid, hell just look at the cast of their Sm

    • Congratulations, investors. Thanks to your shortsightedness, you've corralled Nintendo into making what will surely be a bad Mario platformer. This is how you kill the goose...

      There's been no shortage of terrible Mario games over the years.

  • Did you watch the video of the event? How much longer would you have liked the announcement to have been!??
  • Why would a stock jump 29% based on the release of a game? Such insanity. In contrast, Apples stock went up 0.6%.
    • Because shareholders don't care about sales, they care about expectations. What you sell today affected your stock a few months ago.

    • I usually ignore crap like this, but a jump of 29% actually has gotten my attention. $30 to $36? This could be a great opportunity to make a quick return on selling stock short.

      • exactly! who cares Why it jumped - sell and make your profit.

        The market is like roulette. Who cares WHY your ball landed on Red?! Just be happy and take the money.

    • Why would a stock jump 29% based on the release of a game? Such insanity. In contrast, Apples stock went up 0.6%.

      Because it (perhaps) shows that Nintendo is finally getting a clue about the profitability of mobile gaming and may start monetizing their assets. Up until this date, you've never seen a Mario game running on non-Nintendo hardware*.

      * I know someone is going to link some obscure Mario game that was licensed on the CDI or something. Okay, point taken.

  • Great.... (Score:2, Funny)

    by IMightB ( 533307 )

    A one hour event is going to turn into 5-6 /. stories parsed out over the next few days. It was probably the lamest Apple event with the weakest tech I've ever seen. All the Apple FanBoi's in my office gathered around Projectors and TV's in slaverish anticipation. I'll spoil the next few articles for you dongle, special modified BT chip on wireless headphones. iWatch2 - faster, GPS and brighter screen. Iphone 7 has 2 front cameras that can take pictures. super mario.... Tim Cook does lame Stev

    • Well just wait until the iPhone 8: wireless charging and THREE cameras to take 3D pictures! I can't wait, but I'll get an iPhone 7 to hold me over until then. Then I can finally throw my 8 month old iPhone 6+ in the garbage! It would be embarrassing to be seen with such old tech.
    • Sounds like SOMEONE is still sore that Samsung crisped his favorite pair of jeans.

  • by zifn4b ( 1040588 ) on Thursday September 08, 2016 @07:00AM (#52847083)
    Oh Nintendo, you missed a golden opportunity here. We have already had Subway Surfers and Temple run for years now. Have you considered either Super Mario RPG or Mario Party? Heck, Mario Kart would even make sense. Square Enix figured out that you could make Final Fantasy into a decent touch-screen app.
    • by phorm ( 591458 )

      Mooooore Metroid, please!
      (and for Android rather than iOS, as well).

  • by Curunir_wolf ( 588405 ) on Thursday September 08, 2016 @08:05AM (#52847407) Homepage Journal
    If it's not an augmented reality game, I want nothing to do with it. I want a super mario that jumps desks and pounds on people's heads in augmented reality. Otherwise, it's crap.
  • So... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 08, 2016 @08:05AM (#52847409)

    essentially this is just Flappy Bird with the bird swapped out with Mario.

  • I spent $160 on these damn AirBuds and I've already lost one! If anyone sees my AirBud, can you please return it? Thanks!

  • Apple must buy Nintendo. It's the only way for Nintendo to survive. I say this because their upcoming console looks like another disaster.
  • It looks like Nintendo isn't in the industry of actually creating games any more. Just like Pokémon Go is a licensed shell dropped over Ingress, now we have a Super Mario game that has nothing to do with the actual game at all. Does Nintendo still make games, or does it just make game mods now?

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