Students have had fond memories of Nintendo, whether they were collecting coins with Mario, fighting through enemies in the Legend of Zelda universe, or trying to become the strongest trainer in Pokémon.

The handheld gaming craze was pioneered by Nintendo, with popular early lines including the Game & Watch and Game Boy.

For many smartphone users, all those memories could be revisited now that Nintendo has made the bold decision to publish mobile games.

On March 17, Nintendo announced its move to partner with Japanese mobile gaming company DeNA in order to develop games for mobile platforms.

In a Q&A hosted on Nintendo’s Japanese website, Nintendo’s Director and President Satoru Iwata gave insight as to why it took a while to embrace the new form of handheld gaming.

“Certain issues” had prevented Nintendo from exploring new waters, issues that happened to be what gamers feared: ports.

Many gamers expressed fear over social media that Nintendo would simply port their existing games onto smartphones.

But Iwata says this won’t happen because he doesn’t want to “devaluate the content” of the game “if the ported game does not reproduce the same satisfactory experiences that the original game provided.”

Iwata goes on to explain that Nintendo sees potential in mobile gaming.

“It was important for Nintendo to analyze and clearly recognize that smart devices and dedicated video game systems are two completely different things,” Iwata said in the Q&A.

In many of today’s market-dominating mobile games, several have been coined the term “free-to-play.”

This means they can be downloaded for free, but in order to have the full experience, the gamer might have to fork over a few bucks.

Nintendo may also follow suite and produce “free-to-play” games, although Iwata prefers the term “free-to-start” because  he believes these games aren’t really free.

Senior Ryan Siu sees the decision to invest in the mobile market as a benefit.

“Mobile games are sure to make some extra revenue for Nintendo,” said Siu.

Despite the commitment to existing and future platforms, senior Henry Leou is afraid smartphones could hinder the performance of the Nintendo 3DS, their current handheld platform.

“Smartphone games cost less, so what would be the point of buying much higher priced 3DS games?” said Leou.

This is another concern of Nintendo enthusiasts, whether the company will abandon creating console games in favor of making apps.

Iwata made it clear in his press release that Nintendo is still committed to good old-fashioned gaming.

To exemplify Nintendo’s commitment to traditional console games, Iwata mentioned that Nintendo has a new system on the way, codenamed “NX.”

Details on Nintendo’s new project are still scarce, but it promises more information on the next generation console to be out next year.

In the next few years, it seems as if Nintendo will be entering a whole new level of gaming with easy-to-access mobile games, a successor to the Wii U, and a universal membership program.