So Nintendo has turned 120 years old! That's a helluva long time, for ANY company, and Nintendo have survived and adapted, and always ensured they definied the marketplae, rather than the marketplace defining them.
Some excerpts from IGN's article outlinig their history:
Did you know that there is a videogame company older than the Model T? It's Nintendo, which was founded this month in 1889. That's only a little over twenty years following the conclusion of the American Civil War.
Now technically, it's only been in the videogame trade since the mid-seventies, but for its entire 120 years, Nintendo has been in the gaming business. Founder Fusajiro Yamauchi started Nintendo as a small producer of Hanafuda (which translates to "flower cards") cards, a card game in Japan that was accepted by the government as an alternate to Western-syle numbered cards that were associated with gambling. Thanks to their beautiful designs, Nintendo's Hanafuda cards gained popularity and lead Yamauchi to turn the single-person operation into a multi-employee enterprise.
As Nintendo grew as a playing card company, the business changed hands from one generation of the family to the next. Yamauchi did not have a son, so he adopted his son-in-law Sekiryo to take over the business in 1929. Sekiryo Yamauchi (he took his adopted father's last name) did not have any sons either, so he too turned to a son-in-law to take over Nintendo. However, this son-in-law abandoned his family, leaving no natural progression for passing the business. Instead, Yamauchi turned to the grandson he raised – a name many Nintendo fans will recognize: Hiroshi. When Sekiryo Yamauchi passed away in 1949, Hiroshi Yamauchi took over as president of Nintendo.
This new president stayed the course as a playing card company for several years. Yamauchi oversaw a licensing deal with Disney that allowed Nintendo to produce cards with Disney characters, such as Mickey Mouse. Post-war Japan was developing a serious interest in Western culture (partially imposed on the country due to the occupation) and the Disney-themed cards were a major hit for Nintendo.
1970: Gunpei Yokoi's talents as a toymaker are discovered by Yamauchi after observing his extendable arm contraption. Yokoi's arm toy is mass-produced by Nintendo and becomes an instant hit. Yokoi is transferred to development and designs many other toys for Nintendo, including a light gun toy, love tester, and electronic monkey barrel puzzle. His repeat successes for Nintendo make him one its most trusted employees. For more on Yokoi's influence and career at Nintendo, read our retrospective: From Janitor to Superstar.
1975: Recognizing that videogames are about to explode worldwide, Nintendo licensed the Magnavox Odyssey and releases it in Japan. It is a modest success but leads Nintendo to direct further resources into videogame development.
1977:Shigeru Miyamoto is hired by Nintendo as an artist and designer.
1980: After watching a salaryman on a train playing with a calculator, Yokoi comes up with the Game & Watch line of handhelds with LCD screens. The Game & Watch line eventually grows to include dual-screen handhelds which look remarkably like a Nintendo DS.
1981: After the failure of the Radar Scope arcade game, Nintendo tasks Miyamoto with designing an alternate game to replace the board in the cabinets. With Yokoi's supervision, Miyamoto creates the seminal arcade game Donkey Kong following an unsuccessful effort to license Popeye. The characters in Donkey Kong go on to become Nintendo icons, especially Mario – who was only known as Jumpman in Donkey Kong.
1983: Following the great videogame crash in America, Nintendo enters the home console market in Japan with the Famicom. The cartridge-based system flounders until the release of Miyamoto's Super Mario Bros., one of the industry's defining games. Super Mario Bros. cements Miyamoto's reputation as a videogame visionary.
1985: Nintendo releases the Famicom in America as the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) after Atari passes on the opportunity to distribute it. The NES was an immediate hit thanks to the strength of Super Mario Bros. and a resurgence of interest in videogames. The same year, Nintendo founds its three flagship development team in Japan: R&D 1, R&D 2, and R&D 3. R&D 1 was lead by Yokoi and is responsible for a number of hit games, such as Metroid.
1988: After success with its Fun Club newsletter, Nintendo launches the Nintendo Power magazine. Nintendo Power is still published today, although by Future instead of Nintendo.
1989: Created under Yokoi's supervision, the handheld gaming system Game Boy is released. It is a hit, although the decision to include the puzzler phenomenon Tetris -- created by Alexey Pajitnov -- as a pack-in game is credited with its worldwide success. The platformer Super Mario Land is another driver for the Game Boy, which sold over 14 million copies worldwide. The Game Boy line continues over the next two decades, including updates like the Game Boy Pocket, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance, and Game Boy Micro.
1990: Nintendo launches Super Mario Bros. 3 in America and becomes the highest-selling non-pack-in game (18 million copies) until the release of Wii Sports in 2006. Super Mario Bros. 3 was released in Japan in 1988, but due to chip shortages, the game was delayed for other territories. The game release was hyped in America by appearing in the film "The Wizard," which was essentially a 90-minute Nintendo commercial. It remains the bestselling non-bundled game for the NES.
1990/91: After a strong showing by rival gamemaker SEGA's Genesis and MegaDrive, Nintendo rolls out the Super Famicom in Japan in 1990. It appears in America in 1991 as the Super NES. The pack-in game Super Mario World receives universal praise. SEGA's momentum in the 16-bit generation carves out a significant portion of the videogame market but Nintendo eventually reclaims the crown on the back of the landmark Donkey Kong Country series of videogames in the back half of the hardware cycle.
1992: Nintendo and Sony are quietly working on an arrangement for the Japanese electronics giant to produce a CD add-on for the Super NES but the deal was publicly canned at CES in 1991. However, a Sony-Nintendo deal still existed to create a console with a Super NES cartridge slot in 1992. This deal never came to fruition but Sony never let go of the technology for a CD-based system or the public humiliation. This is the birth of the PlayStation, although that machine would not debut until 1995.
1996: Nintendo releases the Nintendo 64 worldwide, a console that uses cartridges instead of CDs due to concerns over piracy issues. The Nintendo 64 utilizes technology from Silicon Graphics, one of the world's leading CG powerhouses at the time. It launches with Super Mario 64, a game that lays down all of the basic tenets for 3D gaming and is a worldwide smash. However, infrequent game releases, expensive cartridges, the loss of key franchises like Final Fantasy, and the worldwide success of Sony's PlayStation console eat into Nintendo's dominance of the videogame market. By the end of the generation, Nintendo is in second-place behind the PlayStation, a console that eventually goes on to globally sell over 100 million units.
The same year, though, Pokemon is introduced in Japan. It is a national phenomenon and is responsible for a resurgence of interest in the Game Boy.
1997: Yokoi dies in a car accident. By this point, though, his influence at Nintendo has been severely minimized due to the 1995 failure of the Virtual Boy.
1998: Nintendo releases the Game Boy Color, the next iteration of the Game Boy. A far bigger boost to the Game Boy line, though, is the American release of Pokemon. Pokemon fever captures the planet and earns Nintendo billions. The same year, Nintendo also releases Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the N64, which is regarded as the best game for the Nintendo 64.
2001: Nintendo embraces the disc medium with the release of the GameCube. It is the first Nintendo console to launch without a Mario game. Instead, the GameCube is flanked by Luigi's Mansion. The system trails the release of the PlayStation 2 by a year and must also share shelf space with Microsoft's new Xbox. The GameCube goes on to be Nintendo's worst-selling console, selling just under 22 million units.
The Game Boy Advance is released and does significantly better than the GameCube thanks to wide support by publishers around the world and legacy success from the still-popular Pokemon franchise.
2002: Hiroshi Yamauchi retires as president of Nintendo, a position he has held since 1949. His career at Nintendo saw its transformation from a playing card company to a videogame powerhouse. Satoru Iwata – only the fourth president of Nintendo in 113 years – is named the new president and CEO. Iwata was previously a videogame maker at HAL Laboratory before moving to Nintendo in 2000 as head of its planning division.
2004: Nintendo introduces the Nintendo DS, a dual-screen handheld that uses touch screen input. The handheld is initially planned as a "third pillar" for Nintendo, but it is such a success that eventually the Game Boy lines fades. The success of the DS is largely credited to Nintendo's drive to expand the audience for videogames by releasing games like Nintendogs and Brain Age that appeal to people that did not consider themselves gamers.
2005: Nintendo unveils its successor to the GameCube, the Wii. The console – and company -- goes in a completely different direction from rivals Sony and Microsoft with the introduction of the Wii Remote's motion controls. Nintendo catches the entire industry by surprise as it represents a major risk for the company.
2006: Following his successful debut on-stage at E3 in 2005, Reggie Fils-Aime is promoted to president of Nintendo of America. Nintendo launches the first DS revision, the slimmed-down DS Lite. The biggest release, though, is the November launch of the Wii, which is bundled with Wii Sports. Curiosity over the console causes immediate shortages. Over the next year, Nintendo leapfrogs the Xbox 360 to become the best-selling console in the world.
2009: Nintendo launches the third revision of the Nintendo DS, the DSi. The Nintendo Wii continues its worldwide dominance.
You may not like them anymore, but there's no denying what they have done or achieved...
Anyway...
What are your wishes and comments regarding Nintendo's 120th Borthday?
SOURCE: IGN
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