Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima talked about the 3DS and how it’ll live on with many unannounced titles, and he also talked about what they’ve been cooking up for the Nintendo Switch during the company’s financial results briefing for fiscal year ending March 2017.
Our thinking in arranging the 2017 software lineup is that it is important to continue to provide new titles regularly without long gaps. This encourages consumers to continue actively playing the system, maintains buzz, and spurs continued sales momentum for Nintendo Switch.
For that reason, we will be releasing Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, ARMS, which is making its debut on the Nintendo Switch during the first half of 2017, and Splatoon 2, which attracted consumers’ attention most during the hands-on events in Japan, in summer 2017. We believe that these titles exemplify the concept of the Nintendo Switch, which is to be able to play anywhere with anyone and at any time, and will expand and invigorate competition between players.
Splatoon 2 in particular will offer voice chat, a much-requested feature from our overseas fans, using smart-devices and the ability to bring eight Nintendo Switch systems together for eight-person local multiplayer. In this way, we are working to create titles and environments to invigorate the competitive gaming scene so that a wider demographic of customers can enjoy, talk about, and continue playing the Nintendo Switch.
Next I will provide a follow-up report about our software publisher partners. After the presentation on January 13, we have continued to receive requests from more and more software publishers who want to develop games for the system. At the presentation, we announced that there were over 80 titles in development from more than 50 software publishers, but that number has now climbed to over 100 titles from more than 70 publishers. Please look forward to more announcements about the software lineup in the future.
Finally, I would like to cover our sales company that is planned to start operations in Japan on April 3. In August 2016, we announced that we would acquire one of the largest distributors in Japan handling Nintendo products, JESNET Co. Ltd., as a subsidiary, and that we would accept an assignment of business from AJIOKA Co., Ltd. The purpose of the newly-established company is to provide an integrated system from the development through supply of our products, allowing for rapid decisionmaking and an improvement in sales service. It will operate under the name Nintendo Sale Co., Ltd. The company overview is presented here.
Nintendo Switch launches worldwide on March 3, 2017.
