Nintendo Analysts And Fans Discuss A Potential Apple Arcade-Like Service, And What Happens When Miyamoto Retires

Last week, CNBC published a special documentary about Nintendo, its history, and where they may be headed next.

During the feature, CNBC spoke with numerous Nintendo analysts, fans, and other industry members about various topics related to Nintendo. In one segment, Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter shared his belief that Nintendo should consider an “Apple Arcade-Like” service for its older games, not dissimilar to the Virtual Console of old:

One thing they have that nobody else has is a gigantic library, more than a thousand handheld games, and if they were to emulate Apple Arcade and put a thousand games on it, they would have 100 million subscribers paying them $5 a month. It’s not reflecting in their share price because they haven’t monetized it yet, but if you’re looking at Nintendo going forward, I think that’s the answer.

Another interesting topic covered was Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto, his importance to the company, and what might happen to it once he retires. In the documentary, fans and other industry members shared their thoughts on his potential retirement, some of believing that Nintendo would still carry on as normal, while others were a bit more uncertain:

Johnathan Mann (creator of the Mario Opera): People like to say that Shigeru Miyamoto is like the Walt Disney of Nintendo; in many ways, Nintendo is Miyamoto and Miyamoto is Nintendo. They’re so interlocked. Whether or not Nintendo can survive without Miyamoto is a bit like asking if Apple can survive without Steve Jobs. It’s the same level of importance to the company, so using that as a framework, I would say the answer is yes; Miyamoto has infused so much of his DNA into the company.

Amir Anvarzadeh (Japan equity market strategist at Asymmetric Advisors): Miyamoto-san has obviously been a driving force of the gaming business initially for Nintendo, but Nintendo has a very deep bench; Nintendo has a very, very strong development base.

Alex Handy (founder and director of The Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment): I think that some of the talent they have is once-in-a-generation talent and can never be replaced, so I wonder what happens to a post-Shigeru Miyamoto Nintendo.

If you’re interested in watching the full documentary for yourself, you can find it on Youtube here.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.