Smartphones are not killing handhelds- Satoru Iwata

Contrary to what the general opinion these days says, smartphones are not killed the handheld market- or so says Nintendo boss Satoru Iwata.

He said, speaking during Nintendo’s recent financial call: “Last summer, when the sales pace of the Nintendo 3DS was slow, there were extreme remarks saying, ‘With the penetration of smartphones, will there still be a market for handheld hardware?’ which was almost equal to ‘handheld hardware is not necessary anymore.'”

While he agrees that initial sales of the handheld were “unsatisfactory”, he says that the 3DS’ impressive recent sales figures have “proved that such opinions are incorrect.”

Recently, Sony said the same thing, saying that the 3DS’ strong performance and impressive sales have proved that the smartphone market isn’t killing the handheld market, and that there is still room for dedicated handheld gaming systems in the market.

[Gamespot]