Baby steps with Pikmin, here. Pikmin's trouble is that, so far, it's just a "Nintendo Core" franchise, slightly under Metroid's sales potential without the critical chops that Metroid has accrued. Nintendo's needs to focus on increasing the software appeal, and this ad gives a vibe similar to Pokemon: summon your monsters, have them fight other monsters. Also vaguely reminiscent of Skylanders.

If Nintendo makes up some console ads for Wii U, *those* should be more all-ages oriented. In Pikmin's case, they have to worry about selling Pikmin. Sell Pikmin, sell Wii Us.

Well another problem I see is most kids can't afford a $350 console, and if they ask their parents they'll probably get the stock "don't you already have a Wii?" answer.

Nintendo needs to get the price down fast if this is the market they are targeting. $300+ is for luxury/life style products, not kids products, if they want to market more towards kids, that's fine, but the price point has to be much more affordable.

Great points, and yes I do see a barage of Nintendo ads on kids programing, and a lack on adult programing.

Are you trying to refer to my comment? If so, I don't think you got what I was talking about.

It's not NoA, it's strictly Wii U. 3DS ads have been great this year

I like the Luigi's Mansion one quite a bit, but the rest are just sorta OK.

Here's the Animal Crossing one for example (again a kid is the "main" character):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HCGEXQ9Pm9c

The Fire Emblem spot doesn't feature any actors, it's just a sizzle reel of gameplay footage/cinematics with a serious narrator, it's OK. I'm guessing Nintendo ran this commercial like five times total, lol.:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mg7qQnxFQ-g

They are better than the Wii U ads though, but it's kinda hard to be worse.

@famousringo Which company has been able to live up to pass successes?
@Soundwave Its funny everytime I walk into gamestop I see pre teens with 360 games lol. But ok I'm sure you believe majority of video games aren't played by children still.

That's kind of the point though, marketing to kids doesn't work, because even kids don't like things that are marketed in a "childish" manner. A lot of kids, especially by the time they hit 11/12 years old want what they percieve as what older teenagers are playing. I'm sure we have all experienced this ourselves or seen it with relatives, especially young boys.

I remember Phil Harrison when he was at Sony saying they basically based all their marketing for Playstation on the "rule of 19", meaning that anyone under the age of 19 (like say a 12 year old) really wants to be 19. And when you're 27 and married with kids, with regards to gaming you want to be 19 again too.

So Sony focused all their marketing efforts on the average 19 year old, and to a large degree, I think they are onto to something with that.

You're right everytime I walk into a gamestop most kids above the age of 10 are clamoured around the 360 or PS3 area.

If you're trying to make the point that all the hardware manufacturers are foolish, you'll get no disagreement from me.

I don't see how that makes your case that Nintendo knows what it's doing, though.