Topic: Nintendo vs Apple: FIGHT!!!

[Spak-Spang]

Apple will not do that...but if it does...just watch the talent flee from Sony and anyone worth picking up will go to Nintendo. 

[Stogi]

I would LOVE to see this. Nothing better for consumers than challenging competition!

[BlackNMild2k1]

If they were to buy Sony (they aren't), then I wouldn't have hoped that this news happened last year and influenced the design and capabilities of the 3DS (more ram, more internal storage, etc etc)

but regardless of what Apple has up their sleeves (nothing that most of us will give a damn about I'm sure), they better not touch my Netflix. I do not like quicktime and the price I'm paying for service is fine where it is at(i'd be happier if it was lower). Leave Netflix Alone!! [/Chris Crocker]

[NWR_insanolord]

There's no way they'd switch it to QuickTime; Apple hasn't supported that as a web plugin for years. If they were going to change it, they'd change it to HTML5 video, but that would screw over a lot of people since it wouldn't work in IE (pre-IE9) or Firefox. Netflix would be an interesting acquisition, given Apple's efforts toward on-demand purchasing and renting of TV and movies, which most would see as being in competition with Netflix.

[Adrock]

Rumor fail.

Apple typically buys smaller companies and you can usually tell why they acquired them. Their largest acquisition was NeXT for some $430 million (a far cry less than what Sony is worth) in a move designed to replace Mac OS and basically bring Steve Job back, which ultimately was the best move Apple ever made and will probably ever make. I just don't see how purchasing Sony would really benefit Apple's very focused product line. Keep in mind, NO Apple product supports Blu-Ray and the Macbook Air not only doesn't include an optical disc drive, but it doesn't even come with recovery software on a DVD anymore (it's on a read only USB drive with the latest Air models). That's a major part of Sony's business that Apple has been slowly distancing itself from.

[NWR_insanolord]

Apple buying Adobe has been rumored so many times in the past. It never made much sense, and makes even less sense now given Steve's comments about Flash.

[Shorty McNostril]

OK.  I am not very well versed in the ways of business.  If this was to go ahead, would this be something Sony wouldn't want?  And if so, can Sony do anything to stop the buy-out?

[BlackNMild2k1]

Sony wouldn't have to let it happen because the Japanese Government would NEVER let it happen.

-While Apple could afford Sony with plenty left over, I doubt they would do it since Sony as a whole doesn't fit with the Apple business strategy. It would probably make more sense for Apple to buy off division of Sony, but why would Sony ever sell them? the only things Apple would be interested in would be SCE for the Playstation brand, but Sony would never let that go.
-Disney is worth more than Apple has in cash, and Disney is a whole lot more than Apple would like to get into (theme parks, cruise lines, comics, etc. etc.)
-Adobe might be a good fit if Apple was looking for more software standards to rip out of the hands of us common folks and apply only to the Mac userbase (pdf, flash, photoshop), but they would likely kill flash immediately.
-Netflix (which they better not even be considering) also involves a disc based plan which is and has been a big part of their business and Apple wants nothing to do with. All Apple would want is the userbase and the streaming content, but there are no guarantees they they get either in a buyout.

Like I said before, if anything comes of any of this, it will likely be nothing that any of us really give a damn about.

[NWR_insanolord]

Sony wouldn't have to let it happen because the Japanese Government would NEVER let it happen.

-While Apple could afford Sony with plenty left over, I doubt they would do it since Sony as a whole doesn't fit with the Apple business strategy. It would probably make more sense for Apple to buy off division of Sony, but why would Sony ever sell them? the only things Apple would be interested in would be SCE for the Playstation brand, but Sony would never let that go.

Given recent developments, I'm not so sure Sony wouldn't entertain offers for the gaming division, but I don't think Apple would be interested in it anyway. I really don't see Apple wanting to take a hands-on role in the gaming business. They're willing to work with other companies who want to do it for them (Valve's recent expansion of Steam to OS X) and set up basic infrastructure to prevent market fragmentation (iOS GameCenter), but I really don't think they intend to go further than that.

-Disney is worth more than Apple has in cash, and Disney is a whole lot more than Apple would like to get into (theme parks, cruise lines, comics, etc. etc.)

This is true, and I'll add that Apple doesn't need anything from Disney that they can't get currently via Steve Jobs' position as the largest Disney shareholder.

-Adobe might be a good fit if Apple was looking for more software standards to rip out of the hands of us common folks and apply only to the Mac userbase (pdf, flash, photoshop), but they would likely kill flash immediately.

Being in control of the PDF format would get them nothing and they clearly have no interest in Flash. Making the Creative Suite programs Mac-only could cause legal headaches, and since there's no danger of the programs dropping Mac support because a large portion of their sales already come from the Mac versions, this move would be of very little strategic value.

-Netflix (which they better not even be considering) also involves a disc based plan which is and has been a big part of their business and Apple wants nothing to do with. All Apple would want is the userbase and the streaming content, but there are no guarantees they they get either in a buyout.

I'm fairly sure Apple will continue their current on-demand video model, and if they were to go into the streaming market they'd do it themselves and not just buy it from Netflix.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Sony wouldn't have to let it happen because the Japanese Government would NEVER let it happen.

-While Apple could afford Sony with plenty left over, I doubt they would do it since Sony as a whole doesn't fit with the Apple business strategy. It would probably make more sense for Apple to buy off division of Sony, but why would Sony ever sell them? the only things Apple would be interested in would be SCE for the Playstation brand, but Sony would never let that go.

Given recent developments, I'm not so sure Sony wouldn't entertain offers for the gaming division, but I don't think Apple would be interested in it anyway. I really don't see Apple wanting to take a hands-on role in the gaming business. They're willing to work with other companies who want to do it for them (Valve's recent expansion of Steam to OS X) and set up basic infrastructure to prevent market fragmentation (iOS GameCenter), but I really don't think they intend to go further than that.

The purpose I was thinking for buying into the Playstation was to integrate AppleTV and therefore have it in over 30 million homes world wide. I don't see Apple getting into the games business, but they are definitely interested in an all in one set-top box next to the most important TV in the house. (all of them)

-Netflix (which they better not even be considering) also involves a disc based plan which is and has been a big part of their business and Apple wants nothing to do with. All Apple would want is the userbase and the streaming content, but there are no guarantees they they get either in a buyout.

I'm fairly sure Apple will continue their current on-demand video model, and if they were to go into the streaming market they'd do it themselves and not just buy it from Netflix.

Let's hope so, because I like Netflix and want Apple to stay very very far away from it. It's doing fine all on it's own.

[TheBlackCat]

-Adobe might be a good fit if Apple was looking for more software standards to rip out of the hands of us common folks and apply only to the Mac userbase (pdf, flash, photoshop), but they would likely kill flash immediately.

Per the ISO standards rules, I don't think they legally can make PDF Mac-exclusive, nor would they be able to enforce it effectively with all the third-party PDF handling programs that have cropped up since it became a standard.

Trying to make flash Mac-exclusive would only quicken its inevitable demise.  There is also, once again, an issue with enforcement since Adobe has actively encouraged third-party implementations by opening much of the format.  Trying to then restrict it would simply guarantee a lot of funding to the third-party implementations.

[NWR_insanolord]

Sony wouldn't have to let it happen because the Japanese Government would NEVER let it happen.

-While Apple could afford Sony with plenty left over, I doubt they would do it since Sony as a whole doesn't fit with the Apple business strategy. It would probably make more sense for Apple to buy off division of Sony, but why would Sony ever sell them? the only things Apple would be interested in would be SCE for the Playstation brand, but Sony would never let that go.

Given recent developments, I'm not so sure Sony wouldn't entertain offers for the gaming division, but I don't think Apple would be interested in it anyway. I really don't see Apple wanting to take a hands-on role in the gaming business. They're willing to work with other companies who want to do it for them (Valve's recent expansion of Steam to OS X) and set up basic infrastructure to prevent market fragmentation (iOS GameCenter), but I really don't think they intend to go further than that.

The purpose I was thinking for buying into the Playstation was to integrate AppleTV and therefore have it in over 30 million homes world wide. I don't see Apple getting into the games business, but they are definitely interested in an all in one set-top box next to the most important TV in the house. (all of them)

While that makes some sense, Apple would still have to take over running the games side of it too, which they don't want, and I don't think they could do a good job of it. Besides, I think Apple is confident in their current strategy with AppleTV. It has an attractive price point and is a good product, a revision or two away from being great.

[Kytim89]

I am sorry for bringing up the Rare thing again, but I can not help but notice a similarity between Nintendo and Apple. Both Nintendo and Apple had a second party developer for their systems that was eventually bought out by Microsoft. Nintendo had Rare and Apple had Bungie Studios. Both Nintendo and Apple sold their shares in each respective second party developer during turbulent times in their history only for them to be snatched up by Microsoft. Although Bungi would later regain independance.

http://kotaku.com/5674174/apple-tried-to-buy-halos-creators

[NWR_insanolord]

I've argued up and down that I don't think Apple wants to get involved in gaming, but that may not be true, or at least at one point wasn't true.

Ex Bungie dev: Apple got close to buying us

It's a big article, but this quote sums it up:

Tuncer Deniz, once a project lead at Bungie, believes the studio’s bosses “asked Apple if they were interested in buying us”.
His account of the circumstances was that Phil Schiller – Apple’s senior vice president of worldwide product marketing – then had a meeting with Steve Jobs to discuss if the Macintosh manufacturer should proceed with acquiring Bungie.
“Schiller asked Steve, who said no,” Deniz tells Develop. “[But] after a week, Steve said yes. Schiller calls Bungie, but Bungie had already consummated the deal with Microsoft”.

So Apple has in the past strongly considered getting directly involved in gaming (and very nearly destroyed the Xbox brand before it started).

[oohhboy]

The Rare sell off, as horrifying it was to us fans, was an move meant to get rid of dead weight. Rare was running itself into the ground, taking far too long to produce mediocre games at the end of it's term with Nintendo.

While the Rare name itself was still gold plated, it was a poison pill Nintendo was happy to sell to MS.

Apple isn't a major threat, not a direct one. It competes for attention like everything else. The iPhone/iPad will never be an adequate game machine. It lacks the hardware, controls, investment, good software. The crap game to good game ratio approaches divide by zero. On the game front it is not a lasting threat, but as something that takes time away from gaming? Yeah, it's a clear and present danger. The games are crap, but casuals being a fickle bunch, only want to waste time, which Apple can do a lot of, 5 Minutes at a time. As a game machine, it is woefully sub par to us, but a casual, it might be just be enough.

[TJ Spyke]

Apple would purchase Adobe and then end Flash.

Anyways, as the article points out Sony is almost guaranteed not to happen (although I won't rule out the possibility). Netflix keeps on growing and I don't think the owners want to give it up. Disney? Not a chance of their majority owners letting Apple buy them. I don't think they could afford to either since the company is worth more than $70 billion. MAYBE I could see Mark Zuckerberg and the others selling Facebook to Apple.

Kytim, there is no similiarity in terms of Rare/Bungie on this. Bungie was a independent third party developer/publisher who made computer games. Rare was a second party that was 49% owned by Nintendo and had almost all of their games publsihed and funded by Nintendo. Bungie was no more a second party than id Software, Activision Blizzard, or any other publisher that released Mac games.

[NWR_insanolord]

The Rare sell off, as horrifying it was to us fans, was an move meant to get rid of dead weight. Rare was running itself into the ground, taking far too long to produce mediocre games at the end of it's term with Nintendo.

While the Rare name itself was still gold plated, it was a poison pill Nintendo was happy to sell to MS.

Apple isn't a major threat, not a direct one. It competes for attention like everything else. The iPhone/iPad will never be an adequate game machine. It lacks the hardware, controls, investment, good software. The crap game to good game ratio approaches divide by zero. On the game front it is not a lasting threat, but as something that takes time away from gaming? Yeah, it's a clear and present danger. The games are crap, but casuals being a fickle bunch, only want to waste time, which Apple can do a lot of, 5 Minutes at a time. As a game machine, it is woefully sub par to us, but a casual, it might be just be enough.

There are a lot of really good games for iOS. There are probably a hundred times more awful ones, but the quality is there if you know how to find it.

[oohhboy]

I don't need to know where to find it.

I already have a far superior set of sources of gaming without an Apple portable product (Ironically, typing this on a Hackintosh which is the primary partition). As it stands, the controls are awful, kills the battery of your primary comms device, the games are shallow as a puddle and worth as much. The only game I have liked playing on an iPhone is Flight Control, which is a glorified flash game.

I had an iPhone for a week when I jailed broke one for a friend and pissed around with some games. Even the so called hardcore or highly rated games were found lacking. Compared to the stuff you find on the DS or the PSP, I wouldn't have given any game more than a 5/10.

[NWR_insanolord]

The controls are only awful if you're playing games that use an on-screen d-pad and buttons, which is the equivalent of saying the Wii's controls are awful based entirely on games that use forced waggle. Most of the good games are simple (though certainly not all of them), but that's usually what I'm looking for in a portable device.

[Adrock]

Apple would purchase Adobe and then end Flash.

I disagree. That's more of a Microsoft move. Apple typically purchases a company with the intent of applying the technology gained from the acquisition into their product line so I don't see how buying Adobe with the intent of destroying Flash benefits Apple at all. They already barred Flash from the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad and just recently made it an optional download on all future Mac computers. Seems like they're doing just fine shunning Flash without spending a dime. Steve Jobs wants to standardize HTML5 ASAP, but putting an end to Flash won't help that happen any faster. It just makes Apple and Jobs look douche-ier than usual, stall HTML5 negotiations, and may even help Microsoft's Silverlight gain some ground as Flash's main alternative.

[TheBlackCat]

Trying to push the switch to HTML5 made sense back when people were grudgingly accepting H264 as the de-facto standard, but now that everyone besides Apple has jumped ship to webM it will probably end up biting them in the ass.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Iwata wasn't kidding when he said that Apple was their main competition.

Cafe hasn't even been officially announced and Apple is already trying to steal it's thunder
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4GPGlEsu_Xs

iPad2 used as a controller while monitor linked to an HDTV playing RealHD Racing.

granted that Cafe will do this with 4 players at the same time, but, I must say that I am impressed. iPad2 actually has some pretty damn good grafix too.

My only issue with the demo is how do you gas or brake? up shift down shift? honk your horn? slide it into reverse? That will just be another advantage of Cafe.... buttons and control options.

I just hope Nintendo doesn't cheap out and gives us a multi-touch screen even if they have no immediate use for it.

[Ceric]

Interesting, when your getting beaten by a tablet PC its time to update your system.

[NWR_insanolord]

There are several games that can use an iPhone/iTouch/iPad as a controller for a game on another screen, and have been since well before the Project Cafe rumors came about.

[BlackNMild2k1]

While that may be true, still doesn't take away from the point that Apple is already trying to steal Nintendo thunder before Nintendo even officially announced that their new console is gonna be doing a similar feature only better and x4.

It's a relatively minor thing going on with iProducts right now, but after HYPE build on the Wii2 reveal, Apple will probably push the feature more and likely even attempt to make it do as the Wii2 does.

I'm glad that Nintendo is seeing Apple as it's competitors though as it will mean that they will try to innovate in ways that MS & Sony obviously weren't motivating them to do. Touch screens, appz, style, UI, etc etc.