Tagged with: Satoru Iwata

Recently, there were reports that China could end its twelve-year ban on video game consoles, and since China is such a hugely-popular country, this would be a big opportunity for companies like Nintendo. But during the latest investor briefing from Nintendo, Satoru Iwata remained hesitant. He said that, despite the reports, he does “not think that the situation has actually changed drastically”.

If the ban is lifted though — and Nintendo has been preparing for that possibility — then “an announcement [will be made] from inside China”. For now, let’s just hope Iwata’s wrong in this case and that day will come sooner than he expects.

You can find the full quote after the break.

(via nintendo.co.jp)

Continue reading…

In an interview with Satoru Iwata, he’s said that:

Once the Miiverse hits the 3DS, it will be huge. Just imagine the possibilities of playing Animal Crossing: New Leaf while sharing your experiences on the Miiverse. Now that’s something!

Of course, that doesn’t given us a lot of understanding of what Miiverse will specifically be like on the 3DS, but it makes me happy to think of Iwata as an over-excited child holding back a secret. Let’s hope’s as mind-blowingly awesome as he wishes us to believe.

There are many detractors of downloadable content and its effect on the industry. But at this point, it’s not going anywhere. Nintendo, who were the most ambivalent about the shift, are on the bandwagon. But Satoru Iwata maintains that this content will only be available for their games in a specific context:

…when the player has exhausted what’s in an existing piece of software, when there are no more challenges and there is nothing more they can do, if we then introduce a new level or a new character—something new for them—we just increased their motivation to want to go back; we’ve also increased the amount of time they’re going to enjoy that software.

Or, in fewer words:

…what we are not going to do is create a full game and then say, ‘let’s hold this back for DLC.’ That’s not our plan.

Iwata said the goal “is to create DLC in such a way that consumers do not feel that they have been cheated or deceived.” But they had a strong stance against downloadable content a couple of years ago, so I’m curious if they “bend” their policy moving forward. Let’s hope they remain true to their ideals.

(via kotaku.com)

Satoru Iwata shared a message within Nintendo’s recent annual report, providing a brief overview of what we can expect from the 3DS, the Wii U, and Nintendo Network. You can check it out after the break.

Continue reading…

Satoru Iwata, speaking with The Independent:

I would say generally that 3D is better than 2D. It’s nice to have good graphics but not necessarily on their own, so I don’t think we’ll present [3D graphics] as one of the key features of our consoles but will probably stick with 3D as one of the minor elements of our consoles in the future.

Even if the inclusion of 3D was a wild-success though, I still have a feeling it would be been relegated to that of a minor feature once the new handhelds come around. It could never be the selling-point twice in a row.

The 3DS XL launches at the end of next month and Satoru Iwata has made it clear that “there are no plans in the near future for new models” of the system. Of course, we’ve heard similar things before, and we didn’t expect to see a 3DS XL so soon. But he said that “the 3DS XL was the result of there being great need for a large screen”, implying that there’s no other sort of tweak that would be classified as a “great need”.

Satoru Iwata shared the above chart in an investor meeting, also mentioning that:

…at the end of last year which reported that the total unit sales of the Nintendo 3DS reached four million faster than the Nintendo DS or the Wii. However, at that time, this pace was not the fastest in Japan’s video game history, since it was slower than that of the Game Boy Advance. But, the Nintendo 3DS did not lose its momentum even after the new year, and two weeks ago it broke the record of the fastest sales pace.

And I’m assuming we can stop saying the 3DS is doomed. It seems to be doing quite well.