| sonicfan1373 said: I dare say it is because Nintendo does not fight back. Media loves to attack you when you are down and when you do not fight back (by media I do not include average fan boys seeking blood on the Internet and attacking various companies they do not like). One reason of course is that many media sites depend on advertising and so they need something that will sound a lot of alarms so that people come to their site.
AppleI remember something that Steve Jobs said about the media in the late 1990s (Apple went through a similar ordeal in the mid-1990s, but their situation was far worst and they did not have the financial position that Nintendo has today; I remember this quote from the MacWorld 1997 keynote [At least, I think it was this keynote]), he said that you cannot change the media and you are not really going to get anywhere by blaming the media, instead you have to work on improving yourself (by this I believe he meant products, self-image, customer relations, etc). Steve rarely appologized to people or investors (with a few acceptions like the antenna issues with iPhone 4, and maybe somewhat indirectly with MobileMe). When the press or anyone talked to Jobs he created what some refer to as a "reality distortion field" (no joke), where he would use numbers (20% increase, 2X faster) and cool visuals (like those simple keynotes) to appease people. Couple that with some serious branding and PR work and the situaion with the media changed dramatically. Now some of you say that Apple under Jobs became and instant success so the media had nothing bad to say, but if you look at their balance sheet up until around the year 2002 you would see that there were some serious issues then.
SonyI look at Sony's situation as a whole as being somewhat of a polar opposite to Nintendo. When I look at Sony as a whole I see a company that is deep in debt, a culture where the engineers are somewhat out of control and are holding the company hostage, and a company that makes great products that are somewhat impractical. Despite these issues, people look at Sony in a different manner, they look at Sony like it is a rebel that is thriving; to get a basic idea if this is true, just at random I asked some friends and family (both young and old; and I know it is still highly unscientific) about how healthy they believe Sony is right now and they told me that Sony is probably one of the most healthy and financially stable companies on the planet. This to me shows that Sony's PR machine is on fight mode and management is careful about what they are saying, which is a good thing when you want customer confidence. Much like Steve Jobs, Kaz Hirai rarely apologizes (unless he really feels something has gone absolutely horribly wrong); when I listen to his presentations or watched him at CES, he was not talking about past failures and constantly apologizing for them but he was planning ahead and any hindsight that he did have was used to plan ahead not for constant apology.
Nintendo (finally got there)Much of the success that Nintendo has had this year with 3DS (best selling dedicated game system in most regions in 2013, for goodness sake) has been spun into negativity because Nintendo has rarely publicized it (except for the odd PR release that few read or publish) and their overtly high expectations have turned the product into a failure in the eyes of the public (almost every article I read states that 3DS sales slumping, despite again the system being the best selling...you get the point; I feel this has a lot to do with those unrealistic 18 million targets that were made and constantly refered to by Iwata and CO in their recent press release). It also does not help that almost every time there is large press release (such as Nintendo Direct or Investor Presentations) you always hear the words, "Please understand" (now a sad punchline), "We are sorry", "we overestimated ourselves", "We made mistakes and we feel responsible". What is the media supposed to do with this, they are not exactly positive things and they make for excellent discussion stories. The sad thing is that Reggie and Iwata were not like that at the beginning. Just look at these quotes from Iwata and Reggie before the Wii launch: Iwata in 2004: "And my name is Iwata. I'm about making games and I'm about playing games. Last night, I played Super Smash Bros. That's my game. I kicked some... you know what and I took his name. His name was Reggie. As Nintendo president, I'm also all about asking questions. So Reggie, I have a question for you. Who's your daddy?". Iwata in 2005: "I've never once been embarrassed that children have supported Nintendo. I'm proud of it. That's because children judge products based on instinct. Everyone wants to appeal to people's instincts, but it's not easy. That doesn't mean we're making products just for children. We believe that there's interactive entertainment that people in their 60s, 70s and 80s can enjoy, so we're doing various things". Reggie in 2004: "My name is Reggie. I'm about kickin' ass, I'm about takin' names, and we're about makin' games". Reggie in 2004: "Over the years, I know you've heard a lot of Nintendo people say, "we're all about the games". Well, guess what? We are. Whether you're talking about Donkey Kong or Tetris, Madden or Mario, Metal Gear or Resident Evil, he with the best games wins. Always been that way, always will". Reggie in 2004: "I hope if we've done anything, it's to show you that this is a new day for Nintendo. We remain all about the game, all about the gamer, or in other words, all about you". Reggie in 2004: "Nintendo DS is not standing still. As a tenth serious competitor decides to make a run at Game Boy, DS raises the bar on portable gaming, before they even get started". Reggie in 2005: "To date, global sellthrough for Nintendo DS stands at over 5 million, or more than twice the level for the PSP. Now, I know what some of you are thinking: "Well, the PSP hasn't arrived in Europe yet." So we got there when we said we would, and they didn't. You know what? That's Sony's issue, not my problem". The saddest quote I have heard from Nintendo's management in 2004, which is what their purpose was then, a purpose they seem to have lost now (at least in the eyes of the public). Looking at the situation right now, this quote is somewhat ironic: Reggie: "The graveyard of any industry is filled with the headstones of companies who decided to keep doing things the same old way. Playing only on the margin, making things just a little bit better. That strategy works....for a while, but ultimately it's fatal. Over the years our industry has come to accept progress simply by what’s on the screen". The above gives you an idea of how Nintendo's leaders have somewhat lost their edge and motivation, to the media they seem like they have turned into some old suits that are stuck in their ways (there is nothing wrong with basing your 100+ year old company on some core ideals, but it is important to keep looking ahead [which I am sure Iwata is doing, but he is not looking very confident when he talks about it] and more importantly showing the world that you are looking ahead). There are plenty of things in Wii U and 3DS that are innovative (admitadly nothing as big Wii or DS which is part of the problem) and have become essential to many of us who have come to love these systems, but the public does not see it, in both cases (for the 3DS it was at the start of its life) actually the public sees it as a minor update rather than an upgrade worth having. The simple solution to attacks on the company is that they have to start working on their self-image. They have to capture their audience. Here is my response directly to Nintendo in terms of marketing themselves to people and the media: On day-time TV, show that soccer mom why she should buy the Wii U for herself and her kids. On Cartoon channels show those Mario games, Skylanders, WWHD and be proud of making fun games for everyone. During sports shows (all age male demographic), show off some of Wii Sports Resort and some games that (even third-party) that appeals to that demographic. Continue Nintendo Directs for fans, but do an E3 so that we can hear all the cheering and clapping for when you show your games (it makes a big difference). Have some pride, do not let the media tell people who you are, don't let fan boys of other companies tell your story for you and have fan boys of your company defend you, you are a good company with great talent, fantastic IPs, a history of innovation, and a purpose in this industry (to make purely fun products that people can afford and have fun with out of the box; I know they know this is their purpose but they have been beat around so much so that management is unsure of it self right now, but deep down they know, Iwata and much of the management were all developers first who contributed to this purpose before they went into the business aspect). Moreover, DS & Wii were great, but their developement process and life do not define your future products to the letter (nor does the performance of 3DS and Wii U); you just have to take the purpose for why you created them and why they were successful, they were a success because you said that you wanted to do something out of this world that everyone would have fun with (gamer and non-gamer), that last point is all that you need to take from the success of those two products (that was the point you used to build NES and Gameboy); you do not need their name, you do not need their specific IPs, you just need to remember why you built them and why you so heavily pushed them in the market. People did not care about the Wii or DS name, they care about what the products stood for at the time. Now build something else that we can all have fun with right-out-of-the-box, something that might be complex to you but simple and fun ot us. More importantly, remind yourself and the world of your achievements, do not capitlize on the negative and forget to mention the positive. |
This is quite an insightful post and some of these lessons can be applied to real, everyday life too. Thanks again for typing all this and not wasting others time by yet another mediocre post just because people always have to say something, even when they have nothing meaningful to say.
Yes, that includes me too.
