Blog FeedWhat’s Pink…
…has two heads, and just demands to be touched?
Why my wife’s new toy! Just earlier this week, Katy’s ‘Candy Pink’ Nintendo DS arrived from Japan. I can hear readers right now going ‘boo hiss! you did that on purpose. two heads? that’s a bit of a stretch!‘ Well yes and no. The DS has two displays, obviously, and in the PC world we call that ‘dual head’.
Anyways, I’m digressing. While Katy had a GBA, she didn’t really play with it that much and it was as much mine as hers. I wanted to have 4 GBAs so that I could play four swords as it was meant to be played, and boy are both versions of that game a heap more fun with 4 people. So, it wasn’t exclusively hers, but then the GBA didn’t have a game like Nintendogs.
Nintendo’s secret weapon in this round of the hand held wars is a game about puppies. The reason that the DS is destroying the PSP in Japan, is puppies, and since Nintendogs came out, the DS hasn’t come close to slowing down.
E3 talks rarely are anything more than setting out your fighting stance. Mostly they’re just words. The PS3 is a super computer. The XBox 360 is a HD experience…
But I’ve already walked these boards before. Nintendo said they wanted to expand into untapped markets. Older people, women, places that preaching to the converted at E3 won’t take you. It all sounded like the typical hyperbole, until Nintendogs came out in Japan.
My wife saw the game while I was watching Nintendo’s E3 presentation and I knew then, right away, that I’d have to buy her a DS. It’s that or never see mine again.
I admit, I’m one of the Nintendo faithful, but I also own an XBox and PS2, and a PSP is on my want list because of a few titles heading that way my other work dictates that I can’t miss, but you really have to hand it to Nintendo.
They went after women and adults and won them over. That’s impressive. Whether it was fluke or inspired marketing or game design, both Nintendogs and that brain exercise learning game both topped the charts for weeks… and both sold to demographics that just don’t buy games. It just doesn’t happen.
But the DS is leading the way. My wife has a pink DS ready for Nintendogs next week, and a copy of Puyo Pop Fever which she’s having a good time with. In many ways it feels like a parallel universe that she desperately wants a game that I don’t have much interest in beyond the impact it’s having, but sure enough there it is. She’s excited about playing Animal Crossing online with her friends and family… and just like all those kids who grew up on Nintendo, she’s going to have that attitude that Nintendo is different because it has games for her too.
It’s unlikely that Nintendogs will make the DS the best selling console in America, as it did in Japan, but it’s impossible to gauge how big an effect puppies (combined with a $20 price drop on the system) might have. How amusing that cute fuzzy dogs might take down Sony’s best hope here too… and how exciting it is to see gaming expanding.
I know the hardcore gamer often worries about gaming becoming too mainstream, but they seem to forget that, who ever else starts playing games, the hardcore market will always exist. There’s always going to be games aimed at gamers, for the same reason that there are art house cinemas. Sure most of the games coming out won’t be aimed at us anymore, but there’s a good chance that there’ll be just as many hardcore titles as there are now. The market’s going to expand but it’s not going to ignore us…
And as our girlfriends and loved ones get more used to the idea of gaming, as they get better at games, the mainstream is going to get more hardcore too. Those DDR kids are the best examples of that. Hardcore gamers may sniff at DDR, but that game is as hardcore as it comes in difficulty.
Moving beyond the idea that games should be competitive and have winning and losing, there is obviously a market for titles like Animal Crossing, and co operative games seems to be making a comeback. Katy and I can play and enjoy Four Swords, because I can bring her along for the ride, I can protect her, I can do the hard work. Its fun for me and fun for her and when the game shows up on DS we’re both going to be all over that title.
It’s not exclusive to Nintendo. Katamari Damacy crossed over in a big way, and it’s just the beginning. Every girl in a group of friends that starts talking about how she got a DS, and it’s actually really fun… will probably get another girl to buy one. It might take a portable device because having it with you and putting it into the hands of your coworkers and friends is a lot easier than getting them over to play a console or a pc game. It’s not likely they’ll be walking into EB games.
Heck, Nintendogs is bound to be a great thing for the guy gamer to show his sensitive side to a prospective female companion. Oh sure I have a hand held console but look… it’s not all killing and death, here I have this game where I’m raising, nurturing and training a puppy… forget spanish fly, that’s going to do it for a girl in ways she has no idea about now.
So it’ll probably end up with the girl spending more time with your DS than with you, having a girlfriend who plays games is apparently the dream of the male gamer, you have to expect a bit of ‘console envy’ to go along with that prize…
20th August | Reply
My girlfriend got me a DS with Kirby: Canvas Curse for my birthday last week. She likes to play games, but doesn’t have much time to do so. She wound up playing Kirby for a solid hour in the car as we rode to her sister’s house.
Similarly, her 27 year old sister vehemently states every chance she can that she doesn’t like games. She saw the DS and wanted to play with Kirby. We left her to go hunting for slurpees (yes, hunting. it is damn hard to find a 7-Eleven with a slurpee machine with the proper consistency) and an hour later we arrive back at her house to find that her sister hasn’t moved an inch and is still playing Kirby. A half-hour later, she is still playing the game, even though I have to leave.
I really felt like writing Nintendo a letter telling them that their strategy seems to be working, at least in part. While I don’t expect my girlfriend or her sister to run out and buy a DS anytime soon, for a variety of reasons, if both of them can become so entranced by a deceptively simple game, I’m sure a lot people, who don’t normally think of themselves as “gamers” will find they want a DS.
In short, I agree with everything you say and think that as long as Nintendo keeps marketing the DS right, it has a real winner on its hands…again.
What the hell is spainish fly?
21st August | Reply
One of my (female) friends is one of those people who has a great dislike for games in general. She would much rather read a book, or watch a movie than play a computer game which she sees as the realm of geeks and males.
However, despite this, she fell in love with Warioware Touched. Because the game was not a conventional game, and required you to do something different than just guide a character around a world she became addicted. She ended up getting massive scores on each of the challenges, much to the chagrin of her brother whose game it was, and eventually got a DS and the game herself.
Now I see this as a very good thing for Nintendo, and I only hope that maybe the Revolution can do something similar, although I don’t think ti will as consoles will always be a bit more ‘hardcore’ than handhelds.
22nd August | Reply
Spanish Fly (from dictionary.com)
A toxic preparation of the crushed, dried bodies of this beetle, formerly used as a counter-irritant for skin blisters and as an aphrodisiac.
25th August | Reply
Nintendogs sold out locally. Fortunately we had it pre-ordered. This is a good sign for Nintendo. Let’s see the numbers at the end of the week.
28th August | Reply
I went to my local EB as well, looking for AW:DS. They had a whole section of a wall dedicated to Nintendogs and it was sold out. This was Tuesday, the day after release.
30th August | Reply
See, that’s pretty interesting. I’m probably going to try picking up a copy this week, I hope it is around. No worries though, I’m sure Advance Wars will be waiting for me, with bated breath.