Going into SpaceWorld, Peter Main spoke with EBGames to discuss the upcoming GameCube system & other fun stuff!
EBGames recently interviewed Peter Main, who had some informative responses to a handful of great questions.
Check it out:
Peter Main, executive vice president of sales and marketing, Nintendo
Western Hemisphere, has been around the video game business for quite
a while and has participated in some of the most successful products
and launches in video game history.
The launch of Nintendo’s GameCube on November 5, 2001, will be Main’s
seventh platform launch in 15 years. “Eight if you count Virtual
Boy,” added Main. We talked recently to Main to get his thoughts on
the upcoming launch and the immense popularity of Nintendo games.
Question #1 Nintendo has said that the GameCube will carry on the DNA of Nintendo games and give birth to a new kind of entertainment. Would you elaborate on that?
Peter Main: The DNA of Nintendo games is, in essence, what we’re referring to as the Nintendo difference. We continue to believe that, perhaps unlike some of our competitors, there is a continuing, real interest in plug-and-play gaming activity built upon better quality entertainment. It’s not technology driven. It’s not about online or new media. It’s about game-based entertainment that can provide great value to kids from 2 to 102.
So our DNA is still built around some of those original precepts that
were behind the Mario, Donkey Kong, Zelda and other character
franchises that we successfully built over the years. Video gaming is
still dependent on us finding better ways to spin a finite number of
tried and true gaming ideas. It’s a puzzle game, it’s an
action/adventure game, it’s about good over evil, it’s about all
those basics. The Nintendo DNA has resulted in products that have had
the highest level of acceptance of any gaming products in the world.
Now, what is the next level? Some believe it is technology driven and
that it’s going to be about multiplayer online gaming. We say maybe,
but it doesn’t appear to us that it’s going to imminent.
A few years ago, our company introduced a phenomenon called Pokémon,
built on a very fundamental notion that kids have embraced around the
world forever of finding, collecting and trading.
We built a gaming exercise that, with 2D graphics running on an 8-bit
processor, became the most compelling gaming in the entire world.
Pokémon titles represented 11 percent of the entire industry sales
last year. This is telling you something; it’s not technology, but
it’s spinning some of those tried and true stories in a different
way.
The GameCube has the best technology that IBM can bring to it. It’s
got unique internal workings that were designed first, second and
third as a gaming machine, not as a multi-tasking set-top box.
GameCube is a lean, mean gamer’s machine, ready for today, but really
prepared for tomorrow by virtue of its 56K and broadband adapter
capabilities.
We are going to have the biggest array of proprietary games of any of
the three systems because we have, between first and second party,
more development resources than anybody in the world. And when we add
to that a line-up of all the leading third-party publishers bringing
GameCube products that are playing in differing versions on Xbox or
PS2, we’re coming to market with a dynamo line-up.
If everybody’s got the same sports games and puzzle games, then the
real decision comes down to, who’s got the unique stuff that takes
that over the top? We believe we do, and we bring that to market at
$199 and, if you’re in the business of enjoying a little bit of fun
from game-based interactive entertainment, we think GameCube is going
to be your answer.
Question #2 You talked about the fact that Nintendo has been very successful in developing game franchises that really have a lasting appeal like Zelda and Mario and Pokémon. Is the new Shigeru Miyamoto game Pikmin in the same league?
Peter Main: When we first showed Pokémon, it was greeted with yawns, it was greeted with quizzical looks. What’s a Pokémon? What are the names of those things? What are you talking about? Do kids want anything that difficult?
Pikmin has many of the same, very interesting characteristics. The
story line behind it is really simplistic: if you want to do things
on your own, you’re going to have all kinds of challenges. If you can
organize collective behavior, you can run your own army. It comes
right down to that.
Coming out of the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in May, we were
intrigued with how much real positive feedback came from a group that
was much older than we thought was the primary target group for this
thing. While it looks and seems and feels like kid stuff, there was
huge interest amongst the game fanatics, who write for the gaming
magazines and work with other developers, saying that the gameplay
values of this thing are phenomenal.
So, to answer your question, we think it has huge potential. All the
early indicators are that he’s got a very, very interesting new
paradigm in gaming. I don’t even know what I call that thing. I don’t
even know what I call Eternal Darkness. Those are new paradigms on
old stories. Our mandate is to innovate, innovate, innovate.
Question #4 It seems that going into E3, much of the focus was on another company that’s introducing a new console....
Peter Main: Yeah, down the street from me here.
Question #5 But people were really impressed by the quality of the GameCube games that were shown at E3. What was your take on all that?
Peter Main: We were just absolutely pleased with the overall reception to everything that was shown there. I think that the commentary by analysts, media and retailers paid tribute to our corporate culture. It’s our only business and we’re heavily focused on it.
Our engineers were telling us that this simplistic device, which was
being directed -- not by a hardware engineer -- but by Miyamoto-type
people, would prove to be the better gaming device. We started to see
the first examples of that at E3. And that’s why we come right back
to the question: “What’s it all about?” To use the vernacular, we
think we’re gonna really deliver some kick-ass gaming from a quirky
little cube, and the world’s going to be blown away by it.
Question #1 So the fact that the GameCube launch is scheduled for the same week as that other company down the street?
Peter Main: We didn’t know that! We kind of stumbled into it, but we feel very good.
The feeling we came away from the show with was, again, just
tremendous, tremendous response. We were measuring very carefully how
long people were spending on the machines and what their comments
were. Our management in Japan was very anxious to hear that feedback
before the end of the show so that they could go public with what
they believed was a very aggressive price point and an aggressive
timetable to bring it to market.
But in this business, and I’ve been around it for a while, you feel
real good, and then you put back on your care and caution glasses and
say, “Get that software finished! Let’s get the advertising done!”
We’re every bit as focused on the nitty-gritty detail as we’ve ever been to make sure this turns out right.
Question #6 Do you have a favorite GameCube game yet?
Peter Main: The quirky one you were talking is very, very interesting, but I think I’m a Wave Race guy. I thought that was a fabulous game. I thought the weather, the realism of the wave action. I tend to boat a lot. I’m not on that kind of vehicle, as a rule, but I find Wave Race a very exhilarating, fun, social action product that I think is going to do extremely well.
Thanks to MrCivic and Justin Ng for the heads up!