How About You Decide? (Gaming Post No.2)

Pic from www.guardian.co.uk

The launch of the WiiU has caused a lot of debate around the gaming community. As with the first Wii console, the 'hardcore' gamers have been scathing in criticising Nintendo for producing something that isn't an all powerful technical behemoth, even though they haven't done that for any machine in over a decade.

Nintendo have always been smart at making the very most from their machines, taking something that is technically less powerful, but utilising it in a way that produces great end results, and importantly, is profitable. Sony got every major technical decision on Playstation 3 wrong, Nintendo rarely do.

The key question though, is what exactly IS WiiU? It feels initially like a machine that has had tons of things chucked at it in the hope that some of them will stick, yet on closer inspection it feels far more clever.

A touch screen in the middle of a gamepad, compatibility with the Wii controllers, it feels a bit like trying to cash in on iPad mania, until you look more closely at the details.

The handheld screen shows two bits of possible thinking that are beyond what Microsoft or Sony have previously done. Firstly, sales of handheld consoles are dropping. Ownership of phones and smartphone gaming mean fewer people are buying, and those that do are far less likely to play them outdoors. So suddenly this screen gives you the option to play your game in bed without having to buy a separate handheld machine and a new catalogue of games. You could also use it to watch Netflix in bed.

Secondly, multiplayer gaming in the same room has always been spoiled by the need to use split screen. The new controller screen finally takes that away, allowing two player gaming with one TV and no splitting of the screen. It also means the usual four player limit on games can go up to five.

Cute pictures and game related chat.
Miiverse even adds a tick to let you know if the person
 writing actually owns the game they are talking about!

Even Miiverse and it's ability to draw players into a simple online community around each game they play, without the horrific over competitiveness and conflict you get on Xbox Live or PSN. Several early users have said the Miiverse has become like Facebook, something they check each morning.

When Apple launched the iPad, there was a lot of talk about where it would sit in the world. People have laptops and smartphones, why would they want a hybrid? Apple, instead of trying to define a position for the device, just showed all of the possibilities and let people and developers work out for themselves what they wanted it to be. Nintendo appear to follow the same strategy in recent years, DS, Wii and now WiiU all take cheap and clever technologies and compile them together into a bundle that can be used in many different ways.

For example: The streaming technology means that the console can process a controller action, send it to the console, update the game, compress the image, send it to the controller and display it with less lag than the average high quality LCD screen. This makes it remarkably responsive, even when used several metres from the machine. It also opens up the WiiU to be used with technologies like Onlive.

So while it looks a little bodged together, what Nintendo have actually delivered is something flexible. A machine that gives developers and gamers a huge scope of choice in the way they wish to play their games. This is why, no matter how weird their machines looks initially, I always trust Nintendo to deliver something worth owning, they think better and they plan better than the competition. Now if only their ads matched up to that thinking!

If you are interested in more games stuff, I've also been doing some writing for a new Gaming Site - Voxel Arcade.

Not In Defence of Traditional Advertising

Don't get me wrong, I think the calls that TV is dead are completely and utterly rubbish made up by people with headlines to generate and space to sell. But I did read a comment this week that I felt needed putting right.

It started with a comment in Edge that (summised) said "Sony and Microsoft have gone after being cool and infiltrating under the surface, yet the Nintendo Wii has been amazingly successful using traditional ads."

Well not really, the ads have simply helped bolster success that happened for two very good reasons. And it is these things that are entirely responsible for the Wii being where it is now.

1. R&D that truly considered the audience, not just what to sell. A controller shaped like a remote so non-gamers would be encouraged to pick it up. Small design to stop mums disliking it being in the living room, backwards compatibility so mums could get rid of the kid's Gamecube and reduce clutter.

Nintendo went against ALL convential product wisdom with Wii. They didn't increase the graphical power, they scrapped standard controls, and gave it a name that invoked months of ridicule.

2. The brilliant R&D meant people wanted to try it, people who owned it wanted to show it off. Which brings to absolutely the success story:

Word of mouth.

I know for an absolute fact that at least 3 people bought a Wii because they tried mine. Times this by thousands of early buyers, and then keep that chain going. Everyone I know who bought a Wii in the first year spent months constantly introducing people to it.

Great R&D x Customer Insight x Effective Communication with Core Customers = Phenomenal Word of Mouth Success

The ads worked because effectively they were videos showing what this crazy machine could do. Identical to the promo materal Nintendo used to show everyone could enjoy the Wii. But you could have had a media budget of practically zero and the machine would still be market leader; and if that isn't reason enough to improve your R&D...

Nintendoh!

Apparently Leo Burnett has resigned the Nintendo account in the US.

"Weeks before the Wii launch, it insisted that ads for the console were reshot to 'look more like ads', rather than the documentary-style spots Leo Burnett had created (Marketing, 22 November 2006). Leo Burnett had subsequently been unhappy with the lack of creative authority it had on the account."

Which is ironic as they are the best ads Nintendo had in years...

From: Kotaku

Future Marketing Summit Day Two - Part 2

Mike Mathieson and the other guy whose name is not in my booklet – the founders of Cake talking about entertainment insights.

Firstly, I absolutely love the fact that Cake was names after the Cake episode of Brass Eye. They also showed some interesting examples of their work.

They talked about the Internet as a social transformer, about entertainment as an ice breaker; and about how focus is moving towards shared experiences.

They showed some good examples, including work for Motorola and Nintendo Wii (hurrah!). They seem to be very good at creating attention and press coverage gaining events… but the question for me is, how good are they outside their safety zone, which appears to be mostly music?