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Reggie on talking more about NX, important lessons learned, Universal & mobile interactions

by rawmeatcowboy
26 August 2016
GN Version 5.0

A portion of an alistdaily interview with Reggie Fils-Aime, which was conducted at E3 2016...

A: How are you seeing things evolving in the console space with Sony and Microsoft launching new consoles this year and Nintendo NX coming out in 2017?

RFA: Nintendo has a quite appropriate reputation of doing its own thing, so whatever Microsoft and Sony decide to do, that’s for them to manage. From a Nintendo perspective, we are focused first on making sure that the consumer understands [The Legend of Zelda] Breath of the Wild and some of the other games that we’ve highlight here at the show, Pokémon Sun and Moon, Pokémon GO, Ever Oasis and Mario Party Star Rush. There was a lot of content that we wanted to showcase at E3. We’ve done that. Now, we’re going to start moving forward communicating more and more about NX as appropriate. For us, it’s all about the right communication at the right time. We believe we’ve got some games that are going to continue to drive our momentum this holiday, and we believe we’ve got a strong concept for NX that we’ll unveil in the future.

A: Many thought Nintendo was in dire straits after GameCube failed to find an audience, and then Wii exploded. Are there lessons learned from Wii U that are being applied to NX?

RFA: Every time we launch a new platform, every time we launch a critical new game, we always learn. We always do our breakdown of what worked, what didn’t, and certainly we’ve done that with Wii U, and we continue to believe that the innovation of the second screen was a worthwhile concept. The games that we’ve launched on the Wii U are hugely compelling: Splatoon, Super Mario Maker, Smash Bros., Bayonetta 2, the Super Mario game, The Legend of Zelda. Arguably, if you line up all of the single platform games for Wii U and the other two platforms, we have by far the most unique games that are highly rated by consumers and highly rated by the media. So those things worked.

One of the things that we have to do better when we launch the NX—we have to do a better job communicating the positioning for the product. We have to do a better job helping people to understand its uniqueness and what that means for the game playing experience. And we have to do a better job from a software planning standpoint to have that continuous beat of great new games that are motivating more and more people to pick up the hardware and more and more people to pick up the software. Those are the critical lessons. And as I verbalize them, they’re really traditional lessons within the industry. You have to make sure people understand the concept, you have to make sure you’ve got a great library of games, and when you do that, you tend to do well.

A: We’re starting to see a difference in the way theme park people create attractions because they know now everyone comes in with smartphones. What does that open up for Nintendo, now that you have mobile games and apps?

RFA: You hit the nail on the head. These theme park designers are considering that so many of their patrons have a smart device. They’re thinking about what that means to the overall experience. I’m not going to share anything in this interview, but certainly the Universal team is aware of it. Certainly it is something that they are considering as they work with us to create this theme park experience.

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