Nintendo’s handheld ecosystem ‘will fall apart’

Nintendo’s place in the handheld sector will fall apart because of smartphone gaming, says the CEO of Ngmoco.

As reported by Gamasutra, Neil Young said that Apple and Android had chipped away at Nintendo’s consumer base, and were defeating the Nintendo hardware machine.

He said that it was hard for users to spend upwards of $30 on any 3DS game that wasn’t a core Nintendo franchise such as Zelda, Mario and Pokemon.

He also believed that smartphones had affected sales of Sony’s handhelds, hinting it could be the end for traditional portable gaming devices.

“I think that Apple has done a number on Sony, and Apple and Android are now doing a number on Nintendo."

"What they’re really doing is defeating the Nintendo hardware machine.”

He added: "The ecosystem that they’ve created, it’s just really difficult to justify spending $30 on a game that is anything other than a Mario, a Zelda, a Pokemon. I think that ultimately their ecosystem starts to fall apart."