This week’s Top5 is inspired by the recent news that Nintendo has taken a bit of a digger in regards to its annual sales numbers.  Hardcore gamers probably saw this coming a mile away, but I don’t think any of us were prepared for the type of losses that were reported early Monday.  As we all know, this isn’t the beginning of the end for the one brand that is synonymous with video games, but it does highlight the changes that are occuring right beneath our noses within the gaming and entertainment field.  Never fear Nintendo-ites, because with the release of the new 3DS portable and unveiling off the new “Project Cafe” last week, comes the promise of something unique and exciting from within the House of Mario!  Just as the NES, N64, Game Boy Advance and Nintendo Wii consoles whisked gamers away to never before seen lands full of color, beauty and grandure, the upcoming unveiling of the Cafe will almost assuredly offer up the promise of hundreds of hours lost within new and exciting virtual worlds.

#5)   Game Boy

To this day, the portable game market owes a debt of gratitude to the Nintendo Game Boy.  Not only did it help to create the entire portable gaming market, but it proved that a fun video game experience didn’t have to occur between a player and a television within the confines of a house.  Before the GB released back in July of 1989, the handheld gaming market was “ruled” by companies Tiger Electric, Atari and smaller Chinese/Taiwanese-owned companies.

It was clear that a portable console had to offer much more than an on-the-go gaming experience to entice the public into owning two gaming consoles at once.  Keep in mind, that most people couldn’t fathom owning two or three game consoles during this time because most games were built around quick 1 to 2 hour playtimes.  This meant that even core gamers would spend only a few hours a week gaming.  The culture was just different then, as it took another few years before gamers would fully adopt a gaming lifestyle more akin to what you see nowadays.  Heck, it wasn’t until the late 60′s, that Americans averaged more than 2 television sets in one household!

Even after the Atari Lynx (with color graphics and amazingly fast processing speeds) was announced, most consumers still couldn’t stomach forking over nearly $200 for a video game system that only offered up 4 or 5 hours of game time on a single charge.  But once the Nintendo Game Boy reached its true audience by around 1990, (8 months to a year after launch) Nintendo had proven once again, that games sell systems.  The combination of Super Mario Land and the pack-in game Tetris were enough to send the Game Boy into the stratosphere.    Over 118 million GB’s sold throughout the life of the console, with the United States being responsible for around 44 million units, while the Japanese market chomped up 32 million systems before the Game Boy Color took over the helm in 1997.

#4)   Nintendo DS

Some may question the choice to place the Nintendo DS ahead of the original Game Boy.  Trust me when I say, that more than a few hours of thought and debate have gone into this decision because the original Game Boy was very much a pioneer of the whole portable gaming market.  The one thing that has stuck out in my mind about the Nintendo DS is the touch screen gameplay.  Even before the Wii, the DS had broken the mold of how gamers should play games.  It has created new genres, new play-styles and most importantly, new philosophies as to how games can be implemented and interacted with.  From sports titles like Mario Hoops to J-RPS’s that use both screens to frame the action to racing titles that offer up a full diagram of the track that you are racing on, players would never look at gaming in the same way.

Some might argue that Sega’s VMU’s were the true progenitor to the use of dual screens and I would partially agree with that, but in the end, it was Nintendo’s need to break the mold of gaming that led us to where we are today.  By the way, I say “need” because the company was truly struggling at this time and they could not continue competing with the same console formula’s time-and-time again…it simply wasn’t working.  Sadly, the DS spun out of favor with adult gamers soon after its release, leaving the system as little more than a port-o-call for licensed movie crap and children’s games.  Regardless, the system has spurred on a whole new era in portable and home console gaming, creating more competition in the market, which will inevitably boil down to better prices and gaming experiences for the consumer in the coming years.

#3)   Super NES/Super Famicon

Even more so than the original Nintendo Entertainment System, the Super NES was the video game console that brought Nintendo to the masses.  If it wasn’t for the heated battle between the Sega Genesis and the SNES, the SNES could have probably outsold the NES, but at this point, the console wars began, as did the premise of a two system console race.  The modern console race has now grown to accommodate 3 consoles because of the exponential growth of the video game industry over the past decade.

The Super NES also helped to create a completely new market within the gaming industry.  Not only has import gaming grown to become a multi-billion dollar industry over the past twenty years, but it helped to break the expectations and limits of taste.  Both the SNES and the Super Famicon were the first time that gamers realized that Nintendo and other Japanese developers/publishers were creating games that were great, but that never made it across the Pacific.  Not only did this help to create a brisk import/export business for both countries, but it helped to put a finer point on gamer’s tastes, thus creating smaller subgenres for sports games, strategy, Role-Playing and even hentai.

#2)   Nintendo Wii

When asked the first thing that comes to mind when you say the word Nintendo, most young gamers will answer in the exact same way that older gamers do; they’ll almost certainly say “Mario”.  But unlike older gamers, youngbloods will typically answer “Wii!” when asked about the second thing that comes to mind.  The system has broken a bazillion records, while hurling Nintendo back into the limelight.  The biggest achievement of the system’s 5 ½ year lifespan is selling over 86 million units worldwide.  It achieved success by not only offering newer, more approachable controls, but it taught casual players that gaming can be fun for all ages.

The console’s family-friendly attitude was supported heavily by Nintendo’s choice to focus on party gaming.  In fact, the name of the console was changed mere weeks before it’s premiere to support this philosophy.  From a marketing perspective, this single move may have solidified the system’s success because it drummed up more and more debates online, keeping the system on gamer’s minds and on their tongues.  Sadly, Nintendo has officially decided to put the Wii out to pasture along with all of the other top-selling systems like the Sony PS2 and the Atari 2600.  On July 6^th-9^th, Nintendo will unveil the system’s predecessor.

#1)   Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)

The granddaddy of them all; the NES was a stroke of pure genius in nearly every way imaginable.  Released in 1985, the 8-bit wonder snuck onto the scene like a thief in the night, robbing game fans of any preconceived notions that they once had about what a home video game experience could be.  When I say that the NES did everything right, I mean everything.  First, Nintendo created the first D-pad controller that has been the inspiration for nearly every single controller since.  The execs at Nintendo also realized that the console could appeal to more people if they broadened the control scheme.  So they added a lightgun controller, as well as a robot named R.O.B. to the console package.  Even though Robbie never blossomed into the phenom they expected, the lightgun was a huge hit, inspiring a slew of target-shooting games that would inevitably lead to the creation of the most important genre within the video game market; the First-Person Shooter (FPS).  Hogan’s Alley and Duck Hunt were two of the most popular lightgun titles on the NES.

The standard for game consoles in the 1980’s was to sell each new system with a pack-in game, so that consumers would have a new game to play on their shiny new console once they got home.  Well, Nintendo decided to use this opportunity to create a full-fledged mascot for not only the system, but the company.  It turned out, that this game would not only become the reason most gamers purchased the system, but it became a symbol of the company’s devotion to making family-friendly gaming experiences.  Super Mario Bros. was unimaginably successful.  Though it never broke traditional sales records (first day, week or monthly sales) because it was a pack-in game, it has become the most successful and most recognizable franchise in all of videogamedom.