But this was just the beginning. In , a groundbreaking game was developed by the Nintendo artist Shigeru Miyamoto. The game was called Donkey Kong. The villain was a giant gorilla with an inexhaustible supply of barrels, while the hero was a man in a red boiler suit wearing a little red hat. He was known as Jumpman, but you might recognise him better as the Italian plumber - Mario. Donkey Kong took the world by storm and it became a hit in arcades.
Jumpman was soon renamed. His name was inspired by the landlord who owned the warehouse in which the American headquarters of Nintendo was based - Mario Segale. Super Mario Bros was a smash hit and soon the character of Mario was recognised all over the world.
With the success of these games, Nintendo also launched a new home game console known as the Nintendo Entertainment System - or NES for short. It was first released in Japan as Famicom, but hit US stores two years later and helped revived the gaming industry.
By , Nintendo had managed to develop the technology to release its first handheld console - the Game Boy. This was not the first hand-held game console - the first had been created ten years earlier - but Game Boy was popular because of its original design and long battery life. The rise of Nintendo's success has at times seemed unstoppable. Over the past 30 years to present day, it has created a host of loved characters and popular games.
Mario gained a brother, Luigi. Both in turn gained evil alter-egos, Wario and Waluigi. New consoles such as the Nintendo DS - a two-screen device with multiplayer capability - and the Nintendo Wii, with its motion sensitive console, allowed the company to expand its reach and influence.
According to the Guinness World of Records, Nintendo has secured four places in the top ten best-selling game consoles - second only to Sony's PlayStation which has five.
Their Nintendo DS has been their most popular console to date, selling Nintendo was soon considered to be at the heart of modern game innovation. But a major piece of Nintendo's success is down to two gaming enthusiasts who self-published a magazine called Game Freak. Starting as the writers and artists of a gaming magazine in Japan, the creators of Game Freak Satoshi Tajiri and Ken Sugimori decided to develop their own game after they were disappointed with what the market was offering.
But in , two new games hit the Japanese market that soon became a global sensation. Capsule Monsters was pitched to Nintendo a few times, but without success. Soon it was redeveloped into Pocket Monsters. Players could capture monsters in little balls as they travelled around a fictional universe full of trainers, battles and badges. The release of two games for Game Boy - Pokemon Red and Pokemon Blue - meant that the different monsters that players had to collect could only be done by either purchasing both games or by sharing Pokemon with friends via the Game Link Cable that connected two different Game Boys together.
Following the global success of Pokemon, a huge franchise was created - Pokemon toys, trading cards , anime, manga and movies all followed, leading to the continued success of Pokemon today. The partnership between Pokemon creators - Game Freak - and Nintendo was cemented.
Since Nintendo's humble beginnings, it has risen to dizzying heights. Its successes are undeniable, but it now competes in a market packed with creativity and innovation. Read An Excerpt. What Is Nintendo? Jan 12, ISBN Add to Cart. Buy from Other Retailers:. Paperback —. Add to Cart Add to Cart. About What Is Nintendo?
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The player would have to run, jump, and climb a series of obstacles in an attempt to save her. Sources: The New Yorker , Nintendo. Executives even wondered whether the name would sit well. In Japanese, "kong" means gorilla, and "donkey" was a word Miyamoto found in an English dictionary that meant stupid.
As we know today, "Donkey Kong" ended up doing very well. Nintendo bet big when it decided to make gaming consoles for at home use — and it paid off. According to the company, the NES sold over 60 million units. The New York Times called the buzz for the gaming system a "teen-age cultural phenomenon" in According to Nintendo's website, "Studies at the time showed that children were as or more familiar with Mario as they were with Mickey Mouse and Bugs Bunny.
This worked, because Mario and his brother Luigi, turned out to be a full-blown sensation. Sources: Business Insider. The game is also a cult favorite among those who grew up playing it, typically Gen X and millennials. According to some fan sites, the original game has sold nearly 8 million copies throughout its lifetime.
Source: The Atlantic , Business Insider. According to Nintendo , "Since its introduction in , Game Boy has sold well over million systems worldwide. Nintendo's SNES sold over 49 million units. By the turn of the century, Nintendo was dominating the video game space, though competitors like SEGA were close behind.
Sources: Business Insider , Fortune , Nintendo. According to The New York Times, "the 64 [ The Nintendo 64 went on to be one of the world's most popular at-home gaming consoles, with nearly 33 million sold worldwide during its 6-year run.
In , the Nintendo DS was considered to be one of the best "portable console[s]. Sources: Nintendo. For the next five years, Nintendo would deeply invest in this console, creating a litany of spin-off products to go along with it — including Wii Fit, Mario Kart Wii, Wii Wheel, and its successor, the Wii U. In , Nintendo said it had sold over million Wii consoles worldwide — Nintendo's fastest-selling console ever in the US. Since its release, Nintendo has sold over 35 million Switches.
Mario's likeness, along with his signature buddies, played a huge role in Nintendo's overall earnings for Nintendo has experienced sales fluctuations throughout the years, booms and plateaus, but it continues to successfully market its consoles and games to the child in us all.
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