Nintendo addresses issues of the day

The amusingly named Ken Toyota, Nintendo chief of Public Relations, recently issued statements on the present and future interests of his company. Specifically, comments on Sales of the DS, the appearance of Revolution at E3, and mocking laughter that punters were foolish enough to shell out almost full price for old NES ports ( well, maybe not that last one ).

With DS interest already cooling in the face of Sony’s explosive PSP launch, we’ll take a look at his Revolution comments first. The forthcoming console will need to strike some balances which Nintendo haven’t been terribly accurate with lately; namely a steady release catalogue, strong third-party support, and bringing the company’s renowned sense of originality and fun to the mass-market lest Revolution end up a console adored, but only by those dedicated few ala Gamecube.

“E3 will be the starting point for the Revolution. [We haven’t decided] whether we will show the real machine, videos, or unveil the concept. … We want to receive some level of evaluation, but releasing too much information is also another issue. We don’t have the slightest intention of making a machine that follows the same path as conventional game hardware. Right now, we are thinking of how we can accurately convey to people at E3 the different path that the Revolution will take and how it will change the way that games will be enjoyed.”

Best show something which is actually backed up Ken, how long have we been waiting for Mario 128 now?

As to the DS, Nintendo has cut its game sales estimates for the system ( perhaps because there isn’t more than a repetitive handful of them out at the moment ) from 15 million units to 10 million. Initial projections were enthusiastically made following the buzz for the DS at last year’s E3, perhaps even Nintendo forgot they didn’t have any of the new, exciting, and dynamic releases we were promised.

Working damage control, Toyota singled out the decision to package the DS with games ( even if those were just Pictochat and a Metroid demo ) in the U.S and Japan as damaging to software sales, also the delay of ‘Puppy Times’ which was expected to be a big seller to April didn’t help matters, at least in the system’s native Japan.

Finally, Toyota gushed over the success of the Famicom classics series for the Gameboy Advance, stating that the collection which includes such creaky classics as Castlevania, Metroid, and Dr Mario has sold approximately 7.21 million copies to date. Further comments about money for old rope were, sadly, later derided by Nintendo as false.