Niantic: ‘It’s important to design games specifically for mobile’

The chief marketing officer of Pokmon Go firm Niantic, Mike Quigley, has said it’s important for titles on mobile to be made precisely for the platform.

In the past, companies such as Rockstar and Square Enix have brought ‘traditional’ console and PC experiences such as Grand Theft Auto III and Tomb Raider to mobile platforms with on-screen buttons in lieu of controller input.

But in the last few years, publishers have started to bring traditional IP to mobile designed specifically for that platform, such as Pokmon Go and Square Enix’s Go series, which has adapted the Hitman, Lara Croft and Deus Ex franchises for mobile.

If you look at killer apps over the history of the games market, they adapt for the platform,” Quigley said.

If you think about the killer apps on Wii, Xbox and PlayStation, the winners are the ones that don’t just port and bring things over, but are trying to think about how they can be optimised for that device. You are starting to see that now with mobile phones, VR and other types of experiences. That is the way to attack it for sure.”

Read more from Niantic in next week’s MCV.