Nintendo Boss Keeping NGP Thoughts to Himself

[Logan Westbrook]

Nintendo Boss Keeping NGP Thoughts to Himself

The head of Nintendo is worried about being misquoted, not just by the press, but by translators as well.

Nintendo Boss Satoru Iwata almost certainly has an opinion on Sony's new handheld, the NGP. You shouldn't expect him to share that opinion though - at least not on the record - as he doesn't want the nuances of his thoughts to get lost in translation.

Iwata said that his remarks about the iPad last year had been distorted when they were converted to English. He claimed that his comments about the device didn't originally have any slant on them, either positive or negative. The translation, however, made it seem like he was bashing the iPad for being nothing more than a big iPod Touch. Iwata said that he didn't want the same thing to happen with the NGP, so he was keeping his opinion to himself.

He also wouldn't say how Nintendo would respond to the NGP as a company, commenting that Nintendo's focus was on building its own business, not trying to counter someone else's. He did acknowledge that Sony's approach with the NGP was different to Nintendo's strategy with the 3DS, but said that it would ultimately be the customers who decided which company had the best product.

It's much too soon to think about picking a "winner," especially as we're talking about products that are at completely different stages of development. Sony's success or failure will depend on a lot of factors, such as what games are available, how much they cost, how much the NGP itself costs, and how Sony markets it. Until we've got this information, it's impossible to make any proper comparisons between the NGP and the 3DS, or indeed, the NGP and anything else.

Source: Kotaku [http://kotaku.com/5745718/why-nintendo-wont-give-its-sony-ngp-impressions]





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[Irridium]

I wouldn't say things get lost in transition, I'd say its more of sites skewing the words to make it sound like bashing, in order to get more views.

 

[gigastar]

Aww id love to know what Nintendo thinks of their competition, but everyones entitles to 'no comment' i guess.

as he doesn't want the nuance of his thoughts to get lost in translation.

Might want to fix that.

 

[Delusibeta]

Video Game Truths, number 326:

"The ones who will decide which is best are the customers." Satoru Iwata

Say what you want about Nintendo, their management have their heads screwed on, unlike companies I could care to mention *cough*Activision-Blizzard*cough*.

 

[SaintWaldo]

It's much too soon to think about picking a "winner," especially as we're talking about products that are at completely different stages of development. Sony's success or failure will depend on a lot of factors, such as what games are available, how much they cost, how much the NGP itself costs, and how Sony markets it. Until we've got this information, it's impossible to make any proper comparisons between the NGP and the 3DS, or indeed, the NGP and anything else.

Why does one have to make comparisons to anything at all? Device sales are not necessarily a zero sum game. What makes any platform a success is really whether it returns on the effort or not. Sony's success also depends on its ability to recapture its current market that doesn't want Nintendo, and also its ability to grow that market.

Look, like them or not, XBox was a success because it enabled the XBox 360, despite not "beating" the PS2 in sales. Dreamcast was NOT a success because it pretty much killed SEGA hardware. PSP is a success because it returned on the effort and enabled the PSP2, not to mention the side-stream PSPGo (which is/was indeed a failure).

Note how those are all couched in their respective ecosystems. They do NOT share the same fan base or pools of disposable income. Yes, there is overlap, but that does not excuse collapsing everything into a zero-sum, "yearly orange crop" model for reporting or assessment's sake. Iwata seems to be telegraphing a bit of this, IMO. Investors certainly don't see it that way. Neither do most of the intelligent people I talk to. I don't understand why the gaming press insists that it be reported thus.

 

[mjc0961]

+100 respect points for you, Mr. Iwata. See, on one hand we have Sony, who never learns from their constant statements bashing this thing Microsoft did or bashing that thing Nintendo did. I want to punch Sony in the face right now. On the other hand, we have Mr. Iwata. He says "Last time I made a comment, it was skewed and I didn't like that. So now I'll just keep quiet to avoid any PR problems." I do not want to punch Mr. Iwata in the face right now, in fact I'd rather send him a nice box of cookies.

 

[Logan Westbrook]

*Cut for length*

Comparisons provide context. You use the word ecosystem to describe the links between platforms, but I think your view - or at least the portion of your view that you present in your comment - is a little too narrow. To use your example of the Dreamcast, you're right when you say it wasn't a success, but to get the full picture of why it failed, you have to compare it to other hardware. It's true that a big part of what led to the Dreamcast's demise was what Sega did wrong, but another part of it is what Sony did right.


The situation is the same with NGP. As I've already said, the decisions that Sony makes will have a big impact on the success of the device. Those decisions don't exist in a vacuum, however, and neither do those Nintendo, Apple, Google or Microsoft. I agree with you 100% that the audiences for the NGP, 3DS, iPad, et al, are different, but the amount of crossover is sufficient that the actions of one platform holder will influence the decisions of the others.

 

[cairocat]

Wow, kudos to that statement. Maybe not the 'no comment' alone, but after reading the article I have to say his (press-release) opinion on Nintendo vs Sony is quite grown-up.

 

[Exort]

I wouldn't say things get lost in transition, I'd say its more of sites skewing the words to make it sound like bashing, in order to get more views.

This too. but some word is different langauge have a different feel to it. Just like in english some word naturly relates to negative side.

 

[Exort]

Wow, kudos to that statement. Maybe not the 'no comment' alone, but after reading the article I have to say his (press-release) opinion on Nintendo vs Sony is quite grown-up.

Expect Mircosoft and Sony haven't grown up at all.

 

[SaintWaldo]

*Cut for length*

I agree with you 100% that the audiences for the NGP, 3DS, iPad, et al, are different, but the amount of crossover is sufficient that the actions of one platform holder will have influence (on) the decisions of the others.

This is certainly true, but let's not disappear the also present fact that, "affecting the decisions of the others," often means, "picking up what the others left on the table". Going after a market the other guy refuses to court means that numbers are a useless frame for a complex set of events.

It's neither a hose race nor a football game. Period. It's not zero sum. "Winner" is a broken model and using it is a weak form of storytelling in place of reportage. IMO.

 

[Logan Westbrook]

This is certainly true, but let's not disappear the also present fact that, "affecting the decisions of the others," often means, "picking up what the others left on the table". Going after a market the other guy refuses to court means that numbers are a useless frame for a complex set of events.

It's neither a hose race nor a football game. Period. It's not zero sum. "Winner" is a broken model and using it is a weak form of storytelling in place of reportage. IMO.

I wouldn't say that numbers are useless, but they definitely shouldn't be the only metric that people examine. As you rightly said in your previous comment, there are lot of different ways to measure success beyond raw sales figures.

As for one platform "winning" out over the others, I whole-heartedly agree that it's a broken idea. I used the word "winner" because I've seen people discussing the 3DS and NGP in that context. But I put the word in quotes to indicate that it wasn't as simple as having a winner and a loser, and point out that there's a lot we don't know yet.

 

[Jumplion]

+100 respect points for you, Mr. Iwata. See, on one hand we have Sony, who never learns from their constant statements bashing this thing Microsoft did or bashing that thing Nintendo did. I want to punch Sony in the face right now. On the other hand, we have Mr. Iwata. He says "Last time I made a comment, it was skewed and I didn't like that. So now I'll just keep quiet to avoid any PR problems." I do not want to punch Mr. Iwata in the face right now, in fact I'd rather send him a nice box of cookies.

Oh please, shugah, don't try to skew this one way or the other, all companies have their shining moments and idiocy moments, it's just that this week happened to be Nintendo's (and partially Sony's if you count the announcment) shining moment.

OT: Still, I respect Iwata a whole lot more right now. It's good that he's being careful with his words, the media will pry on every morsel of titbits they can get for hits.

 

[Vyress]

It's much too soon to think about picking a "winner," especially as we're talking about products that are at completely different stages of development. Sony's success or failure will depend on a lot of factors, such as what games are available, how much they cost, how much the NGP itself costs, and how Sony markets it. Until we've got this information, it's impossible to make any proper comparisons between the NGP and the 3DS, or indeed, the NGP and anything else.

H-hold on o.o; For starters, let at least ONE of the two be released before we make assumptions on what handheld will be 'better'. Especially since the 3D on the 3DS can't really be valued properly from just reading about it on paper.
Same thing with the touch controls on the back of the NGP.

Who knows? Maybe the 3DS makes people sick? Maybe the NGP will cause cramps in the gamers hands?
New info on them is great and all but even if we have the information on the price of the games and all let's not jump to conclusions when both of them have yet to be released.

 

[Logan Westbrook]

H-hold on o.o; For starters, let at least ONE of the two be released before we make assumptions on what handheld will be 'better'. Especially since the 3D on the 3DS can't really be valued properly from just reading about it on paper.
Same thing with the touch controls on the back of the NGP.

Who knows? Maybe the 3DS makes people sick? Maybe the NGP will cause cramps in the gamers hands?
New info on them is great and all but even if we have the information on the price of the games and all let's not jump to conclusions when both of them have yet to be released.

I'm a little confused by your comment, because the paragraph you quoted is urging people not to jump to any conclusions. It think you've misunderstood what I said about more information. I'm not suggesting that once we know what games are coming out and how much everything is going to cost, we can declare a "winner," it was just an example of some of the things we don't know.

 

[RatRace123]

Aww, come one, they bashed the 3DS. It's only fair that Nintendo calls Sony out on their new toy.

 

[Vyress]

H-hold on o.o; For starters, let at least ONE of the two be released before we make assumptions on what handheld will be 'better'. Especially since the 3D on the 3DS can't really be valued properly from just reading about it on paper.
Same thing with the touch controls on the back of the NGP.

Who knows? Maybe the 3DS makes people sick? Maybe the NGP will cause cramps in the gamers hands?
New info on them is great and all but even if we have the information on the price of the games and all let's not jump to conclusions when both of them have yet to be released.

I'm a little confused by your comment, because the paragraph you quoted is urging people not to jump to any conclusions. It think you've misunderstood what I said about more information. I'm not suggesting that once we know what games are coming out and how much everything is going to cost, we can declare a "winner," it was just an example of some of the things we don't know.

Well you did say that we need to know more about the NGP to properly compare it with the 3DS. I say to properly compare them we need to have them both released.

Sony's success or failure will depend on a lot of factors, such as what games are available, how much they cost, how much the NGP itself costs, and how Sony markets it. Until we've got this information, it's impossible to make any proper comparisons between the NGP and the 3DS, or indeed, the NGP and anything else.

Comparing 2 handhelds that we only read about on paper is jumping to conclusions in my book. I mean you test drive a car before you buy it as well, right?

 

[Logan Westbrook]

Well you did say that we need to know more about the NGP to properly compare it with the 3DS. I say to properly compare them we need to have them both released.

Comparing 2 handhelds that we only read about on paper is jumping to conclusions in my book. I mean you test drive a car before you buy it as well, right?

Ah, I see where you're coming from now. I think you misunderstood what I meant. Hands-on experience with the platforms would certainly come under the heading of more information, but I thought that was implied.

 

[nipsen]

"..commenting that Nintendo's focus was on building its own business, not trying to counter someone else's."

When asked for his comment, Andrew House exclaimed: "Wow! That sounds so logical to me now, coming from another successful business. Can we do that too!? I'll get right on it! Right after we release this stream of shovelware for our new groundbreaking touch-device!!!!".