The briefings Nintendo gives following its quarterly earnings results are usually relatively dry affairs, filled with charts of worldwide gaming hardware breakdowns and canned enthusiasm about upcoming game releases. But with the company flailing both financially and in terms of consumer market mind share of late, it was clear something different was in order for Nintendo's latest briefing to press and investors.

The briefing Nintendo President Satoru Iwata gave at Tokyo's New Otani hotel on Thursday was a wide-ranging affair, outlining a broad vision for Nintendo's future in the short and longer term. The presentation was full of interesting ideas, living up to previous hints from Iwata that a "new business structure" might be necessary for the company. Still, the lack of details or a specific focus to the remarks left us with the impression of a company that's throwing everything at the wall in a desperate attempt to find something new that will stick with consumers.

For Wii U, marginal improvements

Iwata used the conference first to quiet down any suggestion that Nintendo would be giving up on the business of releasing its own game-playing hardware. "We do not hold a pessimistic view of the future of dedicated video game platforms," he said. "We therefore believe that dedicated video game platforms which integrate hardware and software will remain our core business."

Instead, Iwata said, Nintendo will once again attempt to sell the value of the Wii U GamePad in creating unique gaming experiences (a message we've heard time and again from the company). Iwata announced that Wii U owners will soon be able to download and play Nintendo DS software on the living room console. In addition, a system update this summer will introduce a "Quick Start" menu that will allow players to start games more quickly from the GamePad. In Japan, players will soon be able to buy games by tapping their Suica subway card to the near-field communication chip in the GamePad.

While admitting that the Wii U is in a "very difficult position," Iwata said that a price reduction on the hardware is "not an option" given the company's current financial situation. It's true that Nintendo was on much more secure fiscal footing when it decided to jumpstart 3DS sales with a drastic price cut in 2011. Regardless, it's pretty clear that the decision to get that portable hardware into players' hands by any means necessary has paid off in the long run now that the 3DS is doing respectably in both hardware and software sales.

There's always the risk of throwing good discounts after bad systems, but simply adding new features to the Wii U at the margins seems unlikely to improve the system's fortunes going forward.

A token nod to smartphones

The bulk of Iwata's presentation, though, dealt with "redefining the concept of a video game platform." In part, that means acknowledging that Internet-enabled smart devices are "once again chang[ing] our definition of video games to keep up with the times," Iwata said. But the company president reiterated that this does not mean Nintendo will simply be bringing its stable of games to iOS and Android.

"In order to be absolutely clear, let me emphasize that this does not mean simply supplying Nintendo games on smart devices," he said. "We feel that simply releasing our games just as they are on smart devices would not provide the best entertainment for smart devices, so we are not going to take any approach of this nature."

Instead, Iwata said he has devoted a "small, select team of developers" to create software focused on "achieving greater ties with our consumers on smart devices." The presentation was light on details, but Iwata said he hopes Nintendo's smartphone apps will be "capable of attracting consumer attention and communicating the value of our entertainment offerings" and let consumers "engage with our offers frequently."

Those goals sure make it sound like Nintendo's big, bold move into smartphones is going to be... a social marketing app. Rather than offering smartphone games to compete directly with the myriad gaming experiences already on smartphones, it sounds like Nintendo wants to use mobile apps merely as a way to make people aware of and interested in buying the games the company makes on the Wii U and 3DS. That probably means mobile game trailers, "offers" like regular coupons, and the ability to purchase games when you're away from your Nintendo console.

There's nothing wrong with that kind of idea in and of itself, but it sounds more like a token acknowledgment that smartphones are a good place to run ads than a reflection that mobile gaming has revolutionized the market in the last few years. It's a marketing move that lives on smartphones but doesn't really address how mobile games, in Iwata's own words, are "chang[ing] our definition of video games."

There is a danger of pre-judging this effort, of course, and Iwata said we should all wait and "see how our approach yields results." Iwata also noted that he has "not given any restrictions to the development team, even not ruling out the possibility of making games or using our game characters" in mobile apps ("However, if you report that we will release Mario on smart devices, it would be a completely misleading statement," he quickly added).

That suggests Nintendo may be able to surprise us with a mobile app that does more than simply hocking Nintendo's existing consoles in a new ad medium. Still, the language Iwata used to talk about the company's mobile foray does not give us high hopes.