It was last May at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, when Nintendo said that it would ship the GameCube on Nov. 5, three days before the Nov. 8 release of Microsoft’s first-ever videogame machine, the Xbox.
According to Peter Main, vice president of sales and marketing for Nintendo of America, the brief delay will enable it to meet demand by increasing its first-day shipment numbers from 500,000 units to 700,000. “We noted the misfire that occurred one year ago when [Sony] came to market with 400,000 units [of PlayStation 2],” he said from the company’s annual Space World conference in Tokyo.
But by pushing back the introduction of GameCube, newcomer Microsoft could get a much-needed 10-day window in which to establish the Xbox in the minds of gamers. “We certainly think so,” says Microsoft spokesperson James Bernard. “Kids who are waiting for Nintendo are going to have to wait a little bit longer.” Main, however, insists that “a week or 10-day headstart is immaterial.”
That said, there was good news, as Nintendo again showed why it is second to none when it comes to the creation of appealing videogames. The company’s chief designer, Shigeru Miyamoto, showed a brief clip at the conference of Mario Sunshine, in which the diminutive Italian plumber ran, jumped and bounced his way through enormous 3D environments under the blazing noonday sun. But the real showstopper was Zelda. Originally shown at last year’s Space World as a semi-realistic 3D action adventure, Zelda has been thoroughly reconceived as an interactive cartoon-and it looks fabulous. The footage that Miyamoto showed–our hero Link running through a castle with an army of pig-faced guards in hot pursuit–looked as though it could have come straight out of Disney’s hit movie “The Lion King,” boasting a visual wit, flair and all-ages appeal that rivals anything that Pixar has ever done.
The crowd was disappointed when Miyamoto informed them that both games wouldn’t be available until 2002, bringing back memories of the glacial pace at which the company released software for its previous machine, the Nintendo 64. But it was also a sign that at Nintendo, just as at Ford, quality is job one. “The Nintendo Difference” would just be another empty slogan on a PowerPoint deck if it weren’t for Miyamoto and his tireless developers, who at this early stage seem to not only be the top dogs in videogames, but in mass entertainment, period. “People say you need a big software lineup,” says Miyamoto, in a slap at his size-matters competitors Sony and Microsoft. “There is so much game software [available]. But who is enjoying such a situation? Game shops and distributors are now in hard times. So many game developers have slipped into the red. And despite huge lineups, users feel it’s hard to find really new, really fun games. Quantity doesn’t matter. Heavyweight computer graphics also don’t matter. I think we industry people have to remember why our business in the early stages was so exciting.” Looking at Nintendo’s software lineup for the next 18 months, it looks like that early-stage excitement is on its way back.
