Should Nintendo Target Adults More With Their Next Handheld?

[DanneSandin]

Soundwave said:

More proof in the pudding:

Kids age 6-12 choose the Apple brand over Disney, Nickeldeon, McDonalds (presumably Nintendo too):

http://variety.com/2014/digital/news/kids-love-apples-ipad-more-than-disney-nickelodeon-youtube-survey-1201322460/

Apple’s iPad is the No. 1 brand among children 6-12, beating out Disney, Nickelodeon, YouTube, Netflix, Toys ‘R’ Us, McDonald’s, and multiple snack-food brands, according to a new survey.

Kids see the iPad as the all-in-one digital tool, according to the three-month survey by Tennessee-based consulting firm Smarty Parts. The 2014 survey results represent the culmination of the “tablet takeover,” according to Smarty Pants president Wynne Tyree.

Apple does not market towards kids. At all. They don't make products that look like toys. Yet there you go. Nintendo needs to recognize what's happening here.

Kids want the same thing their parents/older siblings are using, not the dumbed down "for kids" stuff. By age 10/11 they become obsessed with being cool to boot. 

Marketing to an older demographic simultaneously appeals to kids precisely because it's something not meant for them. Tell a kid they can have anything they want except pasta, and five minutes they're going to be crying that they don't want pizza or hamburgers but they want pasta. 

I think you're missing one very important point here: iPad is very popular among kids because EVERY house hold has one! That's how kids come in contact with it. They don't see the ads, they see that every family have one. And that's never gonna happen with a handheld gaming device. A gaming device will never become as cool as an Apple product because gaming is somewhat "niche" when compared to the universal appeal of an iDevice. The best selling gaming systems ever sold 150m each over the course of 5 years each. How many iPads/iPhones have been sold in the same time frame? I think that's one of the key things as to why these devices are considered cool among kids; they're new things and they are quite wide spread.  In 5-10 years time they won't be the coolest things around. By then, it'll be an old idea. A tried concept. No one thinks TV's are the coolest shit around anymore. But they used to be. As were the radio when that first hit the market.

Targeting adults with ads as to also sell to kids only works if the thing becomes widely popular, or else the Vita would be the best selling portable gaming device around now, and PSP would have beaten DS.