Nintendo's plans to introduce the Switch and its games to the Chinese market appears to have taken another positive step today as the company, along with partner Tencent, have revealed more concrete plans.
The information comes from a press event hosted at the ChinaJoy gaming conference in Shanghai. Various Tencent staffers including Qian Wei, the general manager of the company's Nintendo Cooperation Department, and ex-Nintendo of Europe president Satoru Shibata took to the stage to discuss the partnership and how the two would complement each other going forward.
Essentially, it appears Tencent will offer cloud services and servers necessary for Switch's online platform and will localise Nintendo's games into Simplified Chinese for release in the market. The Switch's eShop will be slightly different in China, with Tencent's WeChat payment system being implemented for easy payments, and games like Super Mario Odyssey and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild have now been announced.
Nintendo shares were seen to significantly rise recently after it was confirmed that Tencent would distribute the Switch in the country a few months ago.
[source media.weibo.cn, via theverge.com]
Comments 19
Switch sales are already fantastic, but releasing the console to a new market - one of the biggest in the world, I'd imagine - is just going to increase them, maybe even help push sales past the Wii's numbers. It's a smart move by Nintendo, though I do hope Tencent doesn't dip their toes into trying to acquire them in the process, as unlikely as succeeding in that would be.
The more Switches, the merrier!
That article image is such a tease. I love those red Joy-cons. It's a shame they were so limited.
If it takes off over there it could be their biggest market easily.
Chinese Localization for Animal Crossing
If ACNH doesn't have region exclusive holidays and items like the previous games did, we could have Chinese New Year and many other chinese events and items come into the game world wide. It'd be amazing if this happened
Good luck China
A ton of people in the mainland are already ordering their Switches from Hong Kong and Japan, but I’d be down with more retailers making these games available. Now you gotta use Taobao or go to some back alley joint to get them.
@Tyranexx If you go to store.nintendo.co.jp or amazon.co.jp you can still order the red ones. You can actually order the case that came with the Odyssey bundle as well. Now go live out your red Joy-Con dreams.
Interesting.
Wonder how much people's Social Credit Scores will drop for buying one (since supposedly, buying video games lowers it).
@HikaruKitsune
If you are born on the mainland, your score should start at -50.
@HikaruKitsune There will be a civil war soon so none of this will matter.
I really hope this takes off! The Chinese video game market to my knowledge is just fakes and pirated games, with mobile games as well. If a big games producer like Nintendo can take off there, they'll have majorative market share until everyone else follows. This could be huge!
I’m still unsure on whether it will really take off in China. Those people who wanted one and, more importantly, could afford one already either imported it or bought it from a local importer. The majority of the population neither have the money or the interest in console gaming. Those people that do game are mostly interested in mobile or PC gaming. That being said, these games being translated into simplified Chinese is awesome and I’ll certainly be crossing my fingers for Nintendo!
@NotTelevision which is actually no big deal, because taobao will remain the main source for switch games anyway. It will just have less import games and more localized stuff.
I also don't think the sales numbers will be crazy high, because of exactly what you said. Import from HK, Taiwan or Japan was not that expensive. Only the online service sucked over there amd the fact that you couldntt use the eshop with local currency.
Unfortunately Sony have tried to crack this nut before and it hasn't worked for them. China's copyright laws are too flimsy to effectively protect IPs. They have pirate copies of everything.
If Nintendo can succeed in Russia, it can succeed in China.
@Thraxmo I suppose those places will be worth checking out. Thanks! With most of the places I've tried, they've been way overpriced.
@Thraxmo @Tyranexx You don't even need to go to Japanese sites, you can get them directly from amazon.com: https://www.amazon.com/Nintendo-Switch-Joy-Japan-Super-Odyssey/dp/B077Z9FJ2S/
@RennanNT Thanks for the link!
Will not boost the sales that much as switch can already be purchased on china. I see lots of people playing on the metro for example.
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