Konami is not ditching console gaming in favour of mobile growth, despite reports to the contrary earlier in the month.
The Metal Gear and Pro Evolution Soccer publisher is hoping to increase it share of the mobile market – but not at the cost of other formats such as consoles.
“We often hear the term ‘mobile first,’ and I want to specify that Konami’s idea of mobile first is not at all to focus purely on mobile games,” said Hideki Hayakawa, president of Konami, in an interview originally appearing in Japanese media Nippei at the start of the month, now translated in full and supplied to VG247.
“Our aim is to continue to build up a comprehensive portfolio of console, arcade, and card game titles for each IP while also making the best possible use of the mobile devices that accompany our customers in their daily life.”
“Until now, in addition to game development duties, our creators were handling a wide range of responsibilities including managerial roles. This can be a helpful approach when a studio concentrates on progressively specializing in a specific style of product, but we have found that a sudden market shift can render that specialization invalid and leave the studio unable to keep up,” he said.
“We faced difficulties in taking advantage of market shifts in areas such as licensing, with expansion of IPs outside of the games themselves, and also in leveraging IPs between different devices such as from consoles to the mobile platform.
“Based on these lessons, we have changed our approach to instead have managerial staff thoroughly focus on strategy and how their individual skills can be best applied, with that strategy then being executed together with the creative staff.”
