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I would love to know more about the inner workings of Nintendo corporate culture. For the company to have survived for so long means they clearly know something

I would love to know more about the inner workings of Nintendo corporate culture. For the company to have survived for so long means they clearly know something most games studios and tech companies don't. That their offices don't seem to include any of the flashy bullshit populating the offices of most tech companies seems telling.

rublev 8y ago
>they clearly know something most games studios and tech companies don't. money
Izkata 8y ago
Something I vaguely remember from years ago in an interview: Rather like this comment [0] I just read on another submission, it's along the lines of: Don't listen to what people say, throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. Two things that stuck crazy-well were the touchscreen on the NDS in 2004 and the motion controls on the Wii in 2006. In either case, they were the first to market with both ideas, but before that people would've said the idea was crazy. Two other examples that didn't stick at all, off the top of my head: Virtual Boy and the Power Glove. (Small aside: It's long enough ago that plenty of people seem to have forgotten, but the touchscreen on the NDS was a crazy idea at the time because that was nearly 3 years before the iPhone was released, let alone smartphones becoming common/popular. The got-to-have phone at the time was the Motorola RAZR.) [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17387468 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17387468
- sh33mp 8y ago
  Just a gamer here, but there's something to be said about the success and failure of the 3DS and PS Vita. The 3DS, based on hardware/system alone, should have failed. It was tremendously underpowered, and it forced a terrible 3D technology on all its users, which never really took off or became anything other than a novelty while raising the cost of manufacturing. The Vita was a truly next-generation portable gaming device, with a beautiful screen, incredible graphics, properly analog sticks, an extremely modern interface, and great connectivity and human-interface (camera, capacitative touch) features. Even incorporating the cost of a proprietary Sony memory card, for the amount of power you got, I think it was very reasonably priced. Comparing the 3DS and Vita was like night and day in terms of a modern gaming device. Even today, I think it can stand head-to-head with the Switch in terms of portable gaming. But Nintendo continued to pour resources into developing top-tier games for the 3DS, slashing its price to bolster adoption, and sticking to its still unorthodox 3D screen/touch screen combo. Whereas for the Vita, Sony quickly got spooked that the Vita didn't perform as well as the PSP, pulled first-party support and general marketing support, and major 3rd party developers (particularly outside Japan) fled the device. The 3DS is now seen as a major success for Nintendo, while the Vita died (or is still dying) a slow and unceremonious death. Sometimes sticking to your crazy guns works.
  - Mindless2112 8y ago
    > it forced a terrible 3D technology on all its users That's a little strong, considering there's a switch to turn it off or even the option to get a 2DS. I usually turned it off (except for Bravely Default which has gorgeous 3D art in the towns).
    - sh33mp 8y ago
      I guess I was a little unclear in what I meant. I meant that everyone (prior to the much later 2DS) had to pay for the 3D tech that most people didn't really want. I absolutely turned my 3D off about a week in and never really used it again.
  - voltagex_ 8y ago
    It's frustrating - Sony (to some extent) "gets" online functionality where Nintendo is still stumbling all the way. I own a 3DS and a Switch and you have to be on each of those platforms to buy games online. I've got a PayPal account linked to the Switch but it's unavailable on the 3DS. In Australia they never opened up ec.nintendo.com so you can't buy games in a web browser. I'd say the 3DS is in the "dead, but doesn't know it yet" stage - killed not by a competitor, but by the Switch itself. PS: The price of Vita memory cards is still a travesty.
  - djhworld 8y ago
    > Two other examples that didn't stick at all, off the top of my head: Virtual Boy and the Power Glove. ...and the Wii U
  - tboyd47 8y ago
    Another thing is Nintendo's focus on intellectual property over technological superiority. Nintendo has at least 8 different game franchises that consistently deliver (Mario, Mario Party, Mario Kart, Smash, Zelda, Kirby, Metroid, Pokemon...), while I can't think of any time in Nintendo's history where they were ahead of the competition in hardware. They use their dated hardware only as a platform to sell games. This might be changing, though, as online play takes off. It makes good business sense when you think about it; if you try to out-engineer the competition on hardware, well, any company can hire good engineers. And they're only going to be able give you the same or slightly better. But no other company can produce Mario and Zelda games, at least, as long as they defend their IP to the extent that they do, and make decent hardware and decent Mario/Zelda games at the standards they themselves set, they will make money. That and the fact that they're sitting on a massive pile of cash means they be creative when other companies can't because their shareholders are terrified of negative numbers. Something American companies really need to learn. Lean isn't always good.
- PostOnce 8y ago
  Palm Pilot & friends (back to newton and earlier?) had the same stylus and resistive touchscreen for quite a few years before the DS, and the Palm at least sold millions of units, and they had a cellphone model a long time before the iPhone existed, so it's not like the tech was unheard of or untested or even really that alien. The motion stuff for the wii was a lot more insane and worked out really well, there was no major market product for that stuff prior afaik, so that's a fair point.
bluedino 8y ago
>> That their offices don't seem to include any of the flashy bullshit populating the offices of most tech companies seems telling. Nintendo basically funded Rare's offices before Microsoft bought them (when they were doing N64 games) and those were full of flashy bullshit
- midnightclubbed 8y ago
  While Nintendo did own 49% of Rare at the time they did not have any control of how Rare built its offices or how the company was run. They obviously had a close working relationship with the Stamper brothers and Joel Hochberg but I don't know of any Nintendo input on general operations. I'm not sure how you would characterize flashy bullshit, but the Rare offices were basically based on the same premise as the old offices up the road at Manor Farm... isolated developments teams in their own buildings (or at least their own floor) with a central building containing HR etc. Yes there was a full restaurant, but Manor Farm had that too, and it's kinda essential if your offices are in the countryside. The entire office was designed to be a distraction free as possible. True the building had a bunch of expensive environmental features to help it blend in to the existing rural landscape and to reduce carbon footprint but I'm sure it was way cheaper than building or leasing any kind of generic office space in London or heaven forbid in SF.
sotojuan 8y ago
Well, Nintendo is not an American tech company. Nintendo is a traditional Japanese company (with its own twists, obviously) and is run as such, which in some ways it's the opposite of our tech industry. Nintendo is fairly secretive about their inner workings and facilities, so I doubt we'd get much info about what goes on inside.

rublev 8y ago

>they clearly know something most games studios and tech companies don't. money

Izkata 8y ago

Something I vaguely remember from years ago in an interview: Rather like this comment [0] I just read on another submission, it's along the lines of: Don't listen to what people say, throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. Two things that stuck crazy-well were the touchscreen on the NDS in 2004 and the motion controls on the Wii in 2006. In either case, they were the first to market with both ideas, but before that people would've said the idea was crazy. Two other examples that didn't stick at all, off the top of my head: Virtual Boy and the Power Glove. (Small aside: It's long enough ago that plenty of people seem to have forgotten, but the touchscreen on the NDS was a crazy idea at the time because that was nearly 3 years before the iPhone was released, let alone smartphones becoming common/popular. The got-to-have phone at the time was the Motorola RAZR.) [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17387468 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17387468

sh33mp 8y ago
Just a gamer here, but there's something to be said about the success and failure of the 3DS and PS Vita. The 3DS, based on hardware/system alone, should have failed. It was tremendously underpowered, and it forced a terrible 3D technology on all its users, which never really took off or became anything other than a novelty while raising the cost of manufacturing. The Vita was a truly next-generation portable gaming device, with a beautiful screen, incredible graphics, properly analog sticks, an extremely modern interface, and great connectivity and human-interface (camera, capacitative touch) features. Even incorporating the cost of a proprietary Sony memory card, for the amount of power you got, I think it was very reasonably priced. Comparing the 3DS and Vita was like night and day in terms of a modern gaming device. Even today, I think it can stand head-to-head with the Switch in terms of portable gaming. But Nintendo continued to pour resources into developing top-tier games for the 3DS, slashing its price to bolster adoption, and sticking to its still unorthodox 3D screen/touch screen combo. Whereas for the Vita, Sony quickly got spooked that the Vita didn't perform as well as the PSP, pulled first-party support and general marketing support, and major 3rd party developers (particularly outside Japan) fled the device. The 3DS is now seen as a major success for Nintendo, while the Vita died (or is still dying) a slow and unceremonious death. Sometimes sticking to your crazy guns works.
- Mindless2112 8y ago
  > it forced a terrible 3D technology on all its users That's a little strong, considering there's a switch to turn it off or even the option to get a 2DS. I usually turned it off (except for Bravely Default which has gorgeous 3D art in the towns).
  - sh33mp 8y ago
    I guess I was a little unclear in what I meant. I meant that everyone (prior to the much later 2DS) had to pay for the 3D tech that most people didn't really want. I absolutely turned my 3D off about a week in and never really used it again.
- voltagex_ 8y ago
  It's frustrating - Sony (to some extent) "gets" online functionality where Nintendo is still stumbling all the way. I own a 3DS and a Switch and you have to be on each of those platforms to buy games online. I've got a PayPal account linked to the Switch but it's unavailable on the 3DS. In Australia they never opened up ec.nintendo.com so you can't buy games in a web browser. I'd say the 3DS is in the "dead, but doesn't know it yet" stage - killed not by a competitor, but by the Switch itself. PS: The price of Vita memory cards is still a travesty.
- djhworld 8y ago
  > Two other examples that didn't stick at all, off the top of my head: Virtual Boy and the Power Glove. ...and the Wii U
- tboyd47 8y ago
  Another thing is Nintendo's focus on intellectual property over technological superiority. Nintendo has at least 8 different game franchises that consistently deliver (Mario, Mario Party, Mario Kart, Smash, Zelda, Kirby, Metroid, Pokemon...), while I can't think of any time in Nintendo's history where they were ahead of the competition in hardware. They use their dated hardware only as a platform to sell games. This might be changing, though, as online play takes off. It makes good business sense when you think about it; if you try to out-engineer the competition on hardware, well, any company can hire good engineers. And they're only going to be able give you the same or slightly better. But no other company can produce Mario and Zelda games, at least, as long as they defend their IP to the extent that they do, and make decent hardware and decent Mario/Zelda games at the standards they themselves set, they will make money. That and the fact that they're sitting on a massive pile of cash means they be creative when other companies can't because their shareholders are terrified of negative numbers. Something American companies really need to learn. Lean isn't always good.
PostOnce 8y ago
Palm Pilot & friends (back to newton and earlier?) had the same stylus and resistive touchscreen for quite a few years before the DS, and the Palm at least sold millions of units, and they had a cellphone model a long time before the iPhone existed, so it's not like the tech was unheard of or untested or even really that alien. The motion stuff for the wii was a lot more insane and worked out really well, there was no major market product for that stuff prior afaik, so that's a fair point.

bluedino 8y ago

>> That their offices don't seem to include any of the flashy bullshit populating the offices of most tech companies seems telling. Nintendo basically funded Rare's offices before Microsoft bought them (when they were doing N64 games) and those were full of flashy bullshit

midnightclubbed 8y ago
While Nintendo did own 49% of Rare at the time they did not have any control of how Rare built its offices or how the company was run. They obviously had a close working relationship with the Stamper brothers and Joel Hochberg but I don't know of any Nintendo input on general operations. I'm not sure how you would characterize flashy bullshit, but the Rare offices were basically based on the same premise as the old offices up the road at Manor Farm... isolated developments teams in their own buildings (or at least their own floor) with a central building containing HR etc. Yes there was a full restaurant, but Manor Farm had that too, and it's kinda essential if your offices are in the countryside. The entire office was designed to be a distraction free as possible. True the building had a bunch of expensive environmental features to help it blend in to the existing rural landscape and to reduce carbon footprint but I'm sure it was way cheaper than building or leasing any kind of generic office space in London or heaven forbid in SF.

sotojuan 8y ago

Well, Nintendo is not an American tech company. Nintendo is a traditional Japanese company (with its own twists, obviously) and is run as such, which in some ways it's the opposite of our tech industry. Nintendo is fairly secretive about their inner workings and facilities, so I doubt we'd get much info about what goes on inside.