Ben Gilbert: evaluation

Transcript context

…I think they're building into it. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has certainly become that, especially with the new waves that they're building into, which is their version of seasons. A Mario Kart 8 wave is the same as a League of Legends season. It's the same concept. Whether Nintendo is as good at seasons as Riot is, they're absolutely not. But they are building towards it clearly, As you look around it, I'm not sure it's a bear case. But it is interesting to just note where everyone else has ended up in this market, where Microsoft is trying to do the Netflix of gaming. They're really pushing into this predictable revenue, subscription, you pay us, we give you all you can eat. We don't even care if you play on Xboxes. We want this to be available anywhere, and you should use our app that you pay a subscription for to play games on all devices. That's a very different strategy than what Sony has done, at least for the last five years. They might be changing right now, but we're in the middle of a potential pivot for them. They're basically playing the same old console game, and they're playing it with the highest monetizing audience of people who want to pay a whole bunch of money for a game, get the unbelievable graphics experience out of it, and play it on that device. It's interesting how all three of these companies—Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft—after competing for a while, have now all chosen completely different lanes to occupy in terms of what they're marketing to consumers and what the business model around that is. I think the big question for Nintendo is, do they care about the strategic position, picking a lane, and deciding to be Microsoft be in this way with the subscription? Or is it really just like, do they pay attention to their shareholders? I don't know. It is a legitimate question. We don't know.…

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