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Japanese publishing giant Dai Nippon Printing (DNP) will open an e-book store with 300 titles for pre-school and young readers for the Nintendo 3DS platform.
The e-books will be available for purchase through the free Honto app this autumn, and will retail between ¥700 and ¥2,000 (£4.65 and £13.30). The launch list will focus on picture books and younger readers, but will have some titles geared for older children, including the Harry Potter series.
A Nintendo spokesperson denied the console maker was collaborating directly with DNP over the launch, as had been reported in the Japanese press. Books digitised by DNP, and any Japanese e-book, will be easily readable on the Nintendo 3DS’ high-resolution touch screens, she told The Bookseller.
Whilst Nintendo’s Wii has faltered recently, the console maker is still having success with the handheld 3DS. It has sold more than 31 million of the devices worldwide since its launch in 2011, notching its bestselling six months in 2013. Thirty-five per cent of total unit sales (11 million) have come from Japan.
DNP is trying to kick-start what has been a sluggish e-book and e-reader market in Japan. Despite high-profile launches of the Kobo e-readers and Amazon’s Kindle in 2012/13, in the past 12 months only 470,000 e-readers have been sold in the country, according to analysts MM Research.
Some industry insiders are unsure if the new marriage of game console and literature will succeed. Robin Birtle, founder of Tokyo-based e-book publisher Sakkam Press, said that the two companies would come up against stiff competition from Japan’s excellent local (physical book) libraries. For children who prefer e-books, Birtle said: “There are iOS and Android devices to which most Japanese children have access to in some form or other, and which connect to better stocked e-bookstores.
“DNP should know better. Three hundred titles might impress if each was a souped-up edition using sound and 3D effects. But if these are just vanilla e-books with some illustrations, as appears to be the case, there will be some incredibly tough competition.”