Japanese games giant Nintendo Co is teaming up with the US firm behind runaway hit Pokemon Go to develop augmented reality (AR) smartphone games, the two companies said yesterday.
Their first joint venture is to involve Nintendo’s lovable half-vegetable, half-animal Pikmin characters in a game expected to launch sometime this year.
AR technology allows images and animations to be superimposed on the real-world view seen on a smartphone’s rear camera.
Photo: AFP
It was crucial to the success of Niantic Inc’s Pokemon Go, which thrilled users around the world with the appearance of Pokemon characters in their neighborhoods across the globe.
“Niantic’s AR technology has made it possible for us to experience the world as if Pikmin are secretly living all around us,” Nintendo representative director Shigeru Miyamoto said in a news release.
Miyamoto, creator of Pikmin and other famed Nintendo characters, including Super Mario and Donkey Kong, said that the new app would be designed around “making walking fun.”
Nintendo had in the past been reluctant to let its characters venture outside traditional consoles and into the increasingly popular world of smartphone gaming.
However, in recent years, it has released a string of mobile titles, including 2016’s Super Mario Run and 2019’s Mario Kart Tour.
“The deal could help address complaints among investors that Nintendo hasn’t been able to earn much from smartphone apps,” Ace Research Institute analyst Hideki Yasuda said.
“As we continue to expand our games portfolio, it was a natural next step to team up with Nintendo,” Niantic CEO John Hanke said in a joint news release.
“We’re looking forward to shaping the future of AR together,” he added, without offering details on which other Nintendo characters might be in line for AR games.
Pokemon Go has been hugely successful since its 2016 launch, earning more than US$1 billion dollars in the first 10 months of last year alone, tracker Sensor Tower said.
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) today announced that his company has selected "Beitou Shilin" in Taipei for its new Taiwan office, called Nvidia Constellation, putting an end to months of speculation. Industry sources have said that the tech giant has been eyeing the Beitou Shilin Science Park as the site of its new overseas headquarters, and speculated that the new headquarters would be built on two plots of land designated as "T17" and "T18," which span 3.89 hectares in the park. "I think it's time for us to reveal one of the largest products we've ever built," Huang said near the
China yesterday announced anti-dumping duties as high as 74.9 percent on imports of polyoxymethylene (POM) copolymers, a type of engineering plastic, from Taiwan, the US, the EU and Japan. The Chinese Ministry of Commerce’s findings conclude a probe launched in May last year, shortly after the US sharply increased tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, computer chips and other imports. POM copolymers can partially replace metals such as copper and zinc, and have various applications, including in auto parts, electronics and medical equipment, the Chinese ministry has said. In January, it said initial investigations had determined that dumping was taking place, and implemented preliminary
Intel Corp yesterday reinforced its determination to strengthen its partnerships with Taiwan’s ecosystem partners including original-electronic-manufacturing (OEM) companies such as Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) and chipmaker United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電). “Tonight marks a new beginning. We renew our new partnership with Taiwan ecosystem,” Intel new chief executive officer Tan Lip-bu (陳立武) said at a dinner with representatives from the company’s local partners, celebrating the 40th anniversary of the US chip giant’s presence in Taiwan. Tan took the reins at Intel six weeks ago aiming to reform the chipmaker and revive its past glory. This is the first time Tan
CUSTOMERS’ BURDEN: TSMC already has operations in the US and is a foundry, so any tariff increase would mostly affect US customers, not the company, the minister said Taiwanese manufacturers are “not afraid” of US tariffs, but are concerned about being affected more heavily than regional economic competitors Japan and South Korea, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said. “Taiwan has many advantages that other countries do not have, the most notable of which is its semiconductor ecosystem,” Kuo said. The US “must rely on Taiwan” to boost its microchip manufacturing capacities, Kuo said in an interview ahead of his one-year anniversary in office tomorrow. Taiwan has submitted a position paper under Section 232 of the US Trade Expansion Act to explain the “complementary relationship” between Taiwan and the US
RSS