Nintendo\'s Projections

"It still has a long way to go, however, to catch Sony Corp\'s PlayStation 2, the dominant home video game platform worldwide with more than 30 million units shipped since its debut in March 2000.

Nintendo launched the GameCube last September and has set a shipment target of 12 million units for the business year that started in April, compared with Sony\'s target of 20 million PlayStation 2s.

President Satoru Iwata reiterated Nintendo\'s strategy of appealing to consumers with innovative games, rather than trying to build ambitious entertainment platforms like Sony\'s PlayStation 2 and Microsoft Corp\'s Xbox."

Just a projection, but pretty bold, I\'d say... We\'ll see, I\'d like to see them do it.  2005 isn\'t that far off.

-Eik

is this part of the statement that people seem to think nintendo is gonna go the sega route and give up on hardware sales?

I haven\'t heard that rumor, but that won\'t happen.  Nintendo makes its own systems to make more money off of other company\'s games.  That\'s why they made propietary discs, to keep that extra cash.  They\'re worth 900 billion yen, btw, if that means anything to you...

-Eik

here\'s the artivle in case u didnt see it


http://gamespot.com/gamespot/stories/news/0,10870,2869633,00.html

Nintendo to focus on making games



During an analyst meeting, newly appointed Nintendo president Satoru Iwata explained the company\'s new direction.

In a meeting with analysts on Thursday, newly appointed Nintendo president Satoru Iwata revealed the company\'s new direction. Nintendo plans to expand its share of the video game market by focusing on making better games rather than on building increasingly powerful consoles, its new president said Thursday.
"We can\'t be optimistic about the game market," he said, referring to consoles at a meeting with analysts at a Tokyo hotel. "No matter what great product you come up with, people get bored. I feel like a chef cooking for a king who\'s full." Iwata also revealed Nintendo\'s intent to sell 50 million GameCube consoles by March 2005. Nintendo has already shipped 4 million GameCubes since the system\'s launch in September of 2002.

Iwata reiterated Nintendo\'s strategy of appealing to consumers with innovative games, rather than trying to build ambitious, all-encompassing entertainment platforms like Sony\'s PlayStation 2 and Microsoft\'s Xbox. "We\'re reaching the limits of how far we can appeal to consumers by boosting the machine\'s performance or providing more compelling graphics and sound," Iwata said during the meeting. "For the past few years we\'ve been looking for new ways to surprise people, new ways for them to have fun."

Iwata also defended the company\'s policy of maintaining a stockpile of cash rather than investing it in new businesses. "We have 900 billion yen ($7.25 billion), but one of our rivals, Microsoft, has 5 trillion yen," he said. "This is a high-risk business. There may come a time when we would have to make intensive investments."

This meeting comes shortly after the company posted a profit of 106 billion yen ($849 million), up 10 percent from the previous year, on a 20 percent rise in sales. Nintendo has also met other console manufacturers Microsoft and Sony in a price-slashing war, dropping the price of its GameCube from $199 to $149. Iwata expressed concern, however, that the price-cutting fever in hardware may spread to software, where it could do severe damage to game makers\' bottom lines.

"We have a sense of crisis, that price cuts in software could destroy the game industry," he said. "The effort to produce machines with better technology has reached its limit," Iwata said. "If things continue, they may lead to the decline of the entire game industry."

Oh yea, that\'s not intending to follow Sega\'s lead.

He\'s talking specifically of the so-called "Gaming Giants" like Star Fox, Wario, Zelda, Mario, Eternal Darkness, Metroid, 1080, Mario Kart, Mario Tennis, etc, and also what he called "innovative games" which we would take to mean more Pikmins, Doshins, and Animal Crossings, but what he most likely means as turning Metroid first person.

But yea, he means to focus on games in order to sell systems and in turn, more games.  Not to abandon systems at all...

Btw, Satoru Iwata is the new president, if you didn\'t know.  Hiroshi Yamauchi has officially stepped down now.

-Eik

could you guys ever imagine a day when consoles are sold practically free and all money is made off of software?

It probably wouldnt work if all consoles did it but imagine if one just did it?  software sales would skyrocket.

sega tried that with the DC and it killed them

ya i guess but i was thinking more on the lines of just handing them out.....and early in the life of the console.

I hope Nintendo don\'t pull the plug on the GC and do a Sega...that would make everything...so...well, boring. It\'s bad enough that the Dreamcast failed, let alone the GC.

I mean, PS2 is fun and all, but wouldn\'t it be a boring scene if there was just X-Boxes and Playstations?

Originally posted by CS2x
I hope Nintendo don\'t pull the plug on the GC and do a Sega...that would make everything...so...well, boring. It\'s bad enough that the Dreamcast failed, let alone the GC.

I mean, PS2 is fun and all, but wouldn\'t it be a boring scene if there was just X-Boxes and Playstations?

It would be. I mean, would having no competitors mean that Sony would slack off and produce lackluster games? For that reason, I hope that Nintendo doesn\'t go the way of Sega.

Originally posted by Tom G


It would be. I mean, would having no competitors mean that Sony would slack off and produce lackluster games? For that reason, I hope that Nintendo doesn\'t go the way of Sega.

I doubt this would be the result. Game developers would always be in competition in one another - and if they were to only develop on one system, the competition would be even higher. Where Sony could slack is in the hardware - that\'s where the monopoly could do the industry bad - but not the games.

Of course, I wouldn\'t like to see only Sony/Microsoft though. I also agree that it is sad enough that Sega went out with Dreamcast.

I think everyone should remember that Nintnedo likes to play headgames with the media. You can\'t trust what they say at face value, becuse it\'s almost never true... even if it isn\'t a lie.

Remember when the GameCube was first getting hyped up but still hadn\'t been revealed and Nintnedo said something along the lines of.. "We\'re going to be focusing on Portables this generation". Everyone assumed that the NGC would be a small sideproject and that Nintnedo was throwing it\'s full weight behind the GBA where it had some "easy sales". What was the result.....?

A NGC with a handle.

SonyFan: Hehe, yep.

Besides.. where does it say that Nintendo is abandoning hardware in Iwata\'s statement? I think that a lot of anti-Nintendo people like Nintendo more than they let on.. and really want to see \'em as a 3rd-party.

There just needs to be one console, so you dont have to buy multiple ones to get all the games.

MS and GC need to throw in the towel

[Living-In-Clip]

Originally posted by Clowd
There just needs to be one console, so you dont have to buy multiple ones to get all the games.

MS and GC need to throw in the towel

Simply the dumbest thing I have had the displeasure of reading in quite sometime. Do you realize that if Nintendo or MS (not so much MS) where not in the industry that quality control would decline? Anytime there is one company that has a monoply over the industry , the industry suffers a mass decline. You wanting Sony to be the only console maker means you want the industry to die....Gee, wizz....
:rolleyes:

Oh and if Sony was the only one making consoles, you wouldn\'t have these nice price drops and your games would be even more expensive.

Yeah, you\'re right...MS and Nintendo need to "throw in the towel".