Miitomo: Nintendo Launches Its Much-Anticipated First App
At the end of March, Japanese gaming giant Nintendo took a bold new step as it launched one of its products on a device other than its own—an unprecedented move in the company's long history. Having secured a deal with Apple, Nintendo released the Miitomo app to a very positive reception: there have been 3 million global downloads and Miitomo has topped the charts of Apple's free apps.
Hundreds of new apps launch each week, but few have been so hotly anticipated as Nintendo’s first effort. Miitomo showcases the company's knack for addictive ridiculousness, whilst somehow remaining accessible for all ages. It marks a new direction for a company renowned for franchises such as Mario and Pokémon. By tapping into the today's social media craze and launching itself into unfamiliar territory, Nintendo has set itself ambitious goals for the future.
Nintendo’s Journey to an App
Nintendo remains an enigmatic multinational company. Steeped in history dating back to 1889 (when it first traded hanafuda playing cards), since the mid-1980s it has been a video game developer which creates games exclusively for its consoles. During this period, it was run by the formidable businessman Hiroshi Yamauchi (1927-2013), whose often fearsome business tactics seemed at odds with the family-friendly nature of the brand.
Yamauchi ensured Nintendo was unique, and with creative output such as Donkey Kong and the NES in the 1980s, it soon reached an international stage. More recently, innovative consoles such as the Wii sold over 100 million units between 2006 and 2013. However, after the Wii's successor, the Wii U, suffered disappointing sales (only 11 million units in three years), Nintendo began considering branching out for the first time in its history. It finally signed a deal with Apple in 2015 and anticipation for the company’s first apps started to build. Now, with the launch of Miitomo, Nintendo showcases its talents to a new generation, one which is more familiar with Facebook, Instagram, Grand Theft Auto, and Call of Duty than its numerous franchises.
Miitomo
A few decades ago, Miitomo might have been too surreal for a Western audience, but with globalisation the West has come to fully appreciate Japan's kawaii culture (the commercial and cultural appeal of “cuteness”).
The app is free to download and allows the user to create a Mii—essentially a caricature of yourself. You can make this creation as unusual or normal as you like, and within the world of the app you can connect with your friends and family, ask them questions, post ridiculous pictures, and generally have fun fooling around.
It’s important to point out, considering Nintendo’s status, this isn’t a video game in any traditional sense—it’s more a form of interactive social media. It’s fun, often hilarious, regularly utterly bizarre, and it’s already proving highly addictive for many iPhone owners. With 3 million downloads and counting, the hilarious nature of the app’s image-making tools has led to widespread media coverage, and the app has become a massive hit.
Whilst it is free to download, it does also feature optional in-game purchases that furthers a user's progress, but principally the app has a focus on social media interaction and a large dose of absurdist humour.
Apple’s Most Popular Free App
Charting the launch and progress of an app (especially one from such a high-profile multinational company) is an intriguing business. It's been fascinating seeing how, in just over a week, Miitomo has turned from a bizarre concept into something of a sensation. One of the reasons Nintendo’s Wii U struggled to sell was due to poor marketing around its 2012 launch; it lost momentum immediately and never recovered. With Miitomo the company has enjoyed Apple's free marketing, such as a tweet on its App Store Twitter account with some 4 million followers, which led to 2,400+ retweets.
Being a free app, users downloaded it and began experimenting with its numerous features, of which the MiiFoto option has captured the most attention. Many users were immediately drawn to this photo creation tool, which is seemingly infinitely customisable and has led to a mass of absurd images ranging from silly to hilarious, provocative, strange, or witty (you can see how the Internet has reacted to Miitomo on popular technology websites such as Kotaku and Tech Insider).
After being on the North American and European market for less than one week, it had surpassed Snapchat in Apple's charts and is now the world's most popular free app! However, this isn't a one-off deal for Nintendo. More apps will follow, and industry experts believe the company is building a unified structure that will unite its consoles, handhelds, and mobile devices across one network.
Miitomo is the opening step in this ambitious schedule, with Nintendo’s next console (codenamed the NX) marking a major attempt to wrest back a significant share of the video game market. It's expected by 2017, and a success story such as Miitomo will certainly help it on its way.
