Despite Nintendo’s efforts to make gaming accessible for everyone regardless of age, it’s been no secret that the company has had some difficulties over the years in figuring out what it means to slide into the modern age and remain relevant to youth culture.
This has meant a bit of a slide in the marketplace for the company, but it looks like things are turning around…or starting to, at least. With the announcement of mobile gaming partnerships and a massively increased online presence, Nintendo has skyrocketed the amount of online features at their disposal with which to interact with fans and offer content.
When Nintendo President Tatsumi Kimishima spoke during the investors meeting recently, he discussed how this change can be attributed to the company’s influx of young employees and younger developers who worked on games like Splatoon that really connected with Nintendo’s audience. He emphasized how important the input of these employees will be as the company moves into the future:
“ …When I became president, I stated that my role was to continue to proceed on the course that I helped to set with President Iwata and the rest of the management at that time. The ideas of our young employees are also key to our ability to transition to the next generation and to continue to produce exciting ideas. It is important to structure our organization so that these young people can take active roles. We have worked to establish such an organization; one that will allow our employees to reach their full potential in many different areas. It may be difficult to see from outside of the company, but we have made major changes to our organization. For example, our game developers have not had much of a public presence in the past, but we would like to create more and more opportunities for you to get to know them in the future.
As for business strategy, the hardware-software integrated business will remain the core of our game business, but we ensure that we will also expand this to include smart device activity and fuse these businesses into a synergistic whole. “My Nintendo” is a crucial part of this strategy as well. We seek to deepen our relationship with our consumers by having them join the “My Nintendo” program.”
We see this as a good sign and we hope you do too. It’ll be exciting to watch how Nintendo shapes its future now that the company is tackling the future head-on rather than trying to do things “how they’ve always been done.”
