I've seen an article about Nintendo looking at smartphone integration for a possible console.
Here's something I wrote back on June 14th 2018:
Back when Animal Crossing Pocket Camp came out I joked that perhaps one of Nintendo’s next endeavors would be a phone. Is it really that far fetched?
Nintendo, especially with the Pokémon series has always wanted to have a device that you would take with you on the go. Usually these devices would count steps and have little Pokémon mini games. Recently they announced Pokémon Let’s Go Pikachu / Eevee which works in tandem with the Pokémon go app.
The farthest back I can think of that’s a good example of Nintendo wanting you to have a product to take with you places is the DS. Certain stores would receive demo carts that you could download upcoming game demos and special content from. Then with the 3DS you have street pass, where even just passing someone else with a 3DS their mii would show up in your mii plaza and depending on which games you own, also receive content for those games as well.
Now with the Switch being a hybrid on-the-go and home console I really do believe it’s the next logical step. Everyone has a cellphone. With them venturing out into mobile app games and with this constant pushing for on-the-go gaming it just feels like it’s the direction they’re heading.
Nintendo also wants “every single person” to own a switch making it more logical that they would look into the phone market.
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What do you guys think? Is it possible that Nintendo would look into making a Smartphone? Or am I pulling this out of thin air?
The problem with a phone is that, especially in the Android space, people notice specs and performance a lot. You're not going to get people to give up their substantially better hardware so you can sell a 5 year old chip at a hefty markup.
It would take a massive philosophy switch away from "withered technology" to have a chance at being successful outside of Japan. You could absolutely price the phone aggressively with your own App Store, and as Nintendo, that would build out the ecosystem in terms of gaming significantly. But if you're expecting to make the same profit on the hardware you do now, you're gonna have a bad time.
I wrote that years ago, but now, I think it probably isn't the direction they would head.
The switch is probably the closest they're going to come to a device like that. The switch is already a tablet with controller attachments. Nintendo mist know about people hacking the switch, and they can't be happy about that. A smartphone form factor would probably appeal to that crowd, and that's definitely something Nintendo wouldn't want. So, I'm not sure if they'd go that route anymore.