Huge video game companies (i.e. Bethesda, Nintendo, Sony) take the mobile gaming world by storm by bringing their valuable IPs (intellectual property)
Bethesda, who released Fallout Shelter in 2015, had massive success after releasing one of their most popular IPs (Fallout) onto mobile platforms and are planning on exploring more options. Sony, the company responsible for the popular PlayStation console series, saw the success of Pokemon Go and is now throwing their hat into the ring. Pokemon Go goes without saying for Nintendo, now sporting over 500 million downloads and evolved into a global phenomenon. Now, Nintendo is bringing their most valuable IP, Mario, to iPhones as Super Mario Run.
Who knows? Electronic Arts (EA) and Microsoft (Xbox console series) may be hoping on the bandwagon train soon when they see the easy money to gain from mobile gaming.
However, what does that mean for console gaming? Well, with consoles fluctuating between favor and disfavor, especially with competition from existing mobile games and PC, it could mean some strange revitalization.
Pokemon Go and Fallout Shelter did something very important for Nintendo and Bethesda - it brought a more general audience to their platforms. The effects will not be immediate, but these companies hope to charm less game-oriented audience members with mobile games to their more traditional versions. For instance, a current Pokemon Go player may be so entranced by the game, they may buy a Nintendo 3DS and pick up Pokemon X Version. Someone may buy a Playstation 4 or fine tune their computer to download Fallout 4.
Does this mean that video game companies are going to abandon consoles? Not really.
Do they have competition? Oh, most definitely!
As long as there is a feasible market for them, video game consoles will stick around for a while. Gaming consoles evolved past their niche, like cell phones, becoming more computer-optimized than their original function to meet people's needs (or desires). It is no different than news media flocking to social media and websites to try and bring people back to their main source of news: newspapers, television, radio, etc.
By tailoring their products and IPs to an evolving audience, video game companies must appeal to a broader, and ever-changing field in order to stay in the game.
