Nintendo Responds to Robin Williams Legend of Zelda Petition

[PunkRex]

Wow, Nintendo really can't say ANYTHING that's not committee written can they...

yeah, because it's a company and not a bunch of individual people who think they're nintendo

what were you expecting, microsoft?

I don't necessarily mean it as a negative, just that every message they ever seem to post looks like it took 2 minutes to write and 2 days to pass it's editors.

I understand that they're careful, which is a smart move considering the rage the internet can stir itself into given the slightest inkling, but it would also be nice to feel like they're actually talking to the fans and not at them.

It's not a big deal, just kind of odd.

Every time someone at Nintendo says anything that isn't scrubbed by the PR drones they get accused or racism or sexism or homophobia. It probably took 2 minutes to figure out what they wanted to say and 2 days to look at it from every possible angle so no one could accuse them of hating Robin Williams. Gamer culture is aggressive, quick to jump to conclusions, and rarely forgives or forgets even the slightest misstep. It isn't Nintendo's fault that they need to run every little statement through the PR machine.

The only one I can think of though is the recent Tomodachi Life exclusion of homosexual relationships thing and no matter how they worded it that was going to go badly. I'm fairly sure the response I read was similar to this one, about maintaining the standard and keeping it casual.

I don't want to seem like i'm criticizing Nintendo too harshly, as indie developers are pushed more and more into the spot light and the AAA studios rely on their 'star' designers to handle PR, it's nice to see a big company keeping it professional.

Just seems cold is all.

 

[-Dragmire-]

"Robin Williams was loved at Nintendo. Our hearts go out to his entire family, and especially to Zelda Williams who we've worked with multiple times. We appreciate the outpouring of support from the gaming community, and hear the request of fans to honor him in a future game. We will not be discussing what might be possible for future games during this difficult time, but we will hold our memories of Robin close."

I like this answer, it's an understandable, polite and clear message. For whatever reason, it doesn't give me that itch in the back of my head I get when reading usual PR speak.

 

[michael87cn]

Of course. Robin was a yucky foreigner. He'd need to be Japanese to be honored by a Japanese company. This might sound offensive if you don't know how Japanese people think, but they really could not care less about what happened outside of their island.

 

[anthony87]

So because they responded to fans in a short amount of time it's tasteless? It's not like they just went "OOOH! Dead famous person! Get him there!"

From an Associated Press interview with Ion Hazzikostas:

"All of us are massive Robin Williams fans," said Hazzikostas. "We love and appreciate his work. We grew up watching his movies and stand-up. We knew he was an avid WoW player, which was awesome. We have a number of pop culture references and things that reflect great figures of our time here and there. We're just thinking about the appropriate and right way to do it."

Link

Yeah...how tasteless.

It's a shame you think of it as just some attention seeking cash grab but this isn't the first time Blizzard have done something like this for players who've died. Famous or not.

You're trolling. This very article has links to how Blizzard is planning to put a Robin Williams NPC into WoW.

I never denied that they were doing that.

What I've been saying is that it's not as tasteless as you seem to think it is.

 

[happyninja42]

Wow, Nintendo really can't say ANYTHING that's not committee written can they...

....well no, they are a company, they're not a person. Statements that they make as a company can be taken out of context or construed as some corporate policy or agenda. So they stay vague until they have an official statement based on corporate policy.

 

[Johnny Novgorod]

I'm guessing they asked the American branch of Nintendo. I wouldn't be surprised if the Japanese branch had only "heard of him somewhere."

This article proves otherwise. He was a worldwide celebrity.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/08/13/world/robin-williams-fondly-remembered-by-japans-film-industry/#.U_I1UPl5OSo

 

[Steve the Pocket]

It really is a shame that the man never got to do any voice acting for video games. Especially Zelda games, which stubbornly cling to the tradition of not having voices purely for tradition's sake.

 

[CaitSeith]

Maybe quoting his commercial in the game would be enough.

- Dad!
- Yes, honey?
- Are you mixing me up with the princess again?
- I have to say, both of you are pretty magical.