Nintendo’s choice to offer only digital games isn’t a reward for everybody.
Today, Nintendo revealed the Club Nintendo year-end rewards for North America. As most of you know, these are free rewards given to people who have reached Gold or Platinum status within Club Nintendo. In order to hit those tiers, Nintendo fans need to buy approximately $300 (Gold) to $600 (Platinum) worth of Nintendo games throughout the year.
Every year I make sure to spend a ton of time on the Club Nintendo website. I register my hardware and software purchases, and take hours to fill out surveys full of questions. However, I do this for great rewards, which I do end up spending my coins on.
However, some of the coolest rewards ever offered have been in the form of the year-end Platinum rewards. Here in North America, such rewards have included a Mario Hat, Doc Louis’s Punch-Out!! (an exclusive game), a Super Mario Bros. Character Diorama, a Super Mario Bros. Pin Set, Mario Playing Cards, Limited Edition Poster Sets, and a Zelda Soundtrack. In addition to this, Gold members have always been able to receive a cool Club Nintendo calendar and, in recent years, been able to choose from a few digital game downloads.
Many of you know I’m a giant Nintendo collector, and as such, was eagerly waiting for Nintendo to inform everyone of the cool rewards we could get for supporting the company over the last year. Hell, I could have hit triple Platinum status if it were a thing. Then, to my utter shock and disappointment, I saw the awful selection of Club Nintendo 2014 Elite Status rewards.
The rewards this year are all digital games. No longer will club members be treated to cool physical rewards. Instead, for hitting Platinum status, Nintendo wants me to pick from a list of digital games to download, and at the Platinum level, I own them all. Sure, there are some Gold level rewards that I don’t have digitally, but I think I own them all in one format or another. Not even the yearly traditional Gold level calendar can be selected.
These rewards are terrible to me for several reasons.
1. Nintendo is rewarding people by giving them the very thing they need to buy in order to earn these rewards.
2. The rewards aren’t special. In the past all the physical rewards Nintendo has sent members have been unique and only available through the program. This time Nintendo is giving something that is available to anyone.
3. The rewards aren’t that valuable. I can get almost anything here for under $14.99 on the eShop. The exceptions here are Game & Wario and Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D. Again, I already own both.
4. I prefer not to have digital games whenever possible. The fact is, I never get any digital game rewards on Club Nintendo. I hate them.
5. As stated before, I already own most of the games listed. Of those I don’t have, I could get several for $1.00 by upgrading the games from my Wii to my Wii U.
Even if Nintendo were to offer all digital rewards, they could have done a better job or done something more interesting. Last year, the rewards in Japan consisted of a digital copy of Advance Wars: Days of Ruin, a title that had never been released in the region. Imagine if Nintendo of America offered us a similar reward such as Disaster Day of Crisis or anything that hasn’t been released in North America? Oh yeah, Japan could also pick a real calendar as well.
Nintendo, this year’s gifts set a poor precedent as how you want to reward your most loyal customers. Something the company president, Satoru Iwata, stated he wanted to improve in the future in the form of loyalty discounts. Well here is a tip, don’t give discounts on the games many of us already purchased in order to get the discounts in the first place.
Overall, this year’s selection of rewards screams cheap, rushed, and very unthoughtful. I know some people out there like digital game rewards, but there are many people who don’t. Now I’m left with figuring out what games to get digitally and whether or not I will just give the codes out to friends.
