Nintendo

Nintendo Co. Ltd.

Type: Publisher, Console Manufacturer

Founded: September 23, 1889

Status: Active

Bestselling Game: Super Mario Bros.

First Party Developers

Brownie Brown - EAD Tokyo

Integrated R&D - Intelligent Systems

Nintendo EAD - NST - Retro Studios

Second Party Developers

AlphaDream - Ambrella - Camelot

Fuse Games - Game Freak

Genius Sorority - HAL Laboratory

NDCube - Nexon - NOISE

Saru Brunei - skip Ltd.

Nintendo Co. Ltd. is the oldest intact company in the video game industry. They are well-known for both their consoles and quality games. At the beginning of 2006, they had sold over 387 million hardware units and nearly 2.2 billion software units worldwide. They are also the majority stockholder of the Seattle Mariners and partial owner of the Atlanta Hawks.

History

Early Life

Nintendo was founded in 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi as Nintendo Koppai. Based in Kyoto, Nintendo's original product was hanafuda cards. The cards gained popularity and Yamauchi soon had to hire assistants to keep up with demand. After Yamauchi retired, his son-in-law, Sekiryo Yamauchi, took over. He continuued to run the company until 1949.

Middle Life

Hiroshi Yamauchi, Sekiryo Yamauchi's grandchild, took over the company upon his retirement. Upon a visit to United States Playing Card Company, the U.S.A.'s largest card company, he was surprised at how small their office was. He realized that there was a limit to how much you could grow producing only cards. He immediately secured the rights to print Disney characters on their cards in order to boost sales.

In 1963, Yamauchi renamed the company to Nintendo Company, Limited. They started dabbling in new lines of business using the extra money from the Disney cards. Between 1963 and 1968, Nintendo had set up a taxi company, a love hotel, a TV network, a food company that produced instant rice, and a toy company. They also produced Chiritory, a remote controlled vacuum cleaner. All of these ventures except the toy company failed.

By this time, Nintendo was far in debt and struggling to compete with the larger toy companies, including Bandai and Tomy. Because toys had a small product life, they had to constantly come up with something new.

During a visit to the Hanafuda factory in 1970, Yamauchi noticed an employee, Gunpei Yokoi, playing with an extendable arm. Yamauchi ordered Yokoi to develop it into a product for the Christmas rush. The Ultra Hand, as it was known, sold 1.2 million units.

Electronic Age

Nintendo took it's first step toward the video game industry by agreeing to distribute the Magnavox Odyssesy in Japan in 1975. They didn't know how to make their own console, so this gave them a chance to see how things worked under the plastic.

Nintendo released their first arcade game, Computer Othello, in 1978. In the next few years, Nintendo released more arcade games, notably Radarscope and Donkey Kong. Around this time, they began experimenting with the Game & Watch series of handhelds. Finally, in 1985, Nintendo stuck gold with the Nintendo Entertainment System. The rest is history.

Hardware

Consoles

Handhelds

Other

Locations

Nintendo Company, Limited has it's main office in Kyoto, Japan. It has smaller offices in Redmond, Washington; Richmond, British Columbia; Scoresby, Australia; Grobostheim, Germany; and Seoul, South Korea. iQue, a company that distributes their products in China, is located in Suzhou, China.

Slogans

Now you're playing with power! (1986 - 1992)
The best play here! (1992 - 1994)
Play it loud! (1994 - 1996)
Get N or get out! (1996 - 2000)
Who are you? (2002 - 2007) (GBA)
Touching is good (2003 - Present) (DS)
Wii would like to play (2007 - Present) (Wii)

Controversies

Universal Studios v. Nintendo Co. Ltd.

In 1982, Universal Studios wanted to try to get into the video game industry. They noticed that Donkey Kong seemed similar to King Kong. Nintendo was represented by future Nintendo of America chairman Howard Lincoln.

It was discovered that Universal Studios didn't actually own the rights to King Kong.

Censorship

During the NES era, and the first part of the Super Nintendo era, Nintendo enforced a strict censorship policy on every game on their system. In order to keep their image as a family-friendly company, they didn't allow excessive violence, profane language, sexual content, Nazi imagery, religious imagery, animal abuse, ethnic stereo types, or references to drugs, alcohol, or tobacco. They have censored 17 games, the latest of which is The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. This practice was largely discontinued with the establishment of the ESRB.

Nintendo of America, Inc. v. Lewis Galoob Toys, Inc.

Galoob is a toy company that created the Game Genie. The Game Genie modified the games code in order to let the player cheat. Nintendo sued Galoob claiming that the Game Genie created derivative works, infringing on their copyright.

The court decided to rule in favor of Galoob. They ruled that the modifications were not derivative works and if they were, they'd be Fair Use. The court wrote, "Having paid Nintendo a fair return, the consumer may experiment with the product and create new variations of play, for personal enjoyment, without creating a derivative work."