Nintendo's David Yarnton
On the company's E3 showing, the threat from new motion technology and the launch of Wii Motion Plus
During Nintendo's E3 conference in Los Angeles, Nintendo revealed a number of new titles for the hardcore audience, as well as more casual focused product and a continued push for Wii Motion Plus.
Here, in an exclusive interview with GamesIndustry.biz, UK general manager David Yarnton discusses the show, the looming threat of motion control technology from rival manufacturers, and the sales expectations for the upcoming Wii Motion Plus launch.
I think the number of different products that we announced, enhanced with existing franchises that people know about, I think were really well received. The best thing about it is that a lot of our product is here and now. New Super Mario Bros Wii has gone down really well.
In comparison to where we've been criticised in the past I think we had a really good showing and a wide range of product. What people look at from Nintendo is things such as innovation and things that are a little bit different. With Metroid and Mario Galaxy 2, they may be what people would consider to be more traditional games, but taken to another level. Plus the Vitality Sensor is another way you can look at Nintendo being innovative compared to others. People are expecting new things all the time, something different or big, but it doesn't always happen that way.
The product we showed was covering a wide variety. Something else you could see was the third party product coming through. I'm blown away with some of the stuff Electronic Arts is doing, or Resident Evil for example. In the past we've been criticised for not having enough content out there but today we covered all the bases.
What really surprised me is that when you look at people playing, those traditional gamers are queueing to play Wii Sports Resort. They're looking at it because it's just great fun. I suppose you could say we're a much more visible company when people are playing our product. People are smiling with a big grin on their faces and moving around a lot more.
No, I don't think it was that. If you look at ongoing development a lot of these products are being developed but you can't necessarily announce them every year or every six months just because it's what people want. They want to know that you've got something new coming all the time. These products have been in development for a long time and it was the appropriate time to show them.
We've had the Wii out for some time now and developers have had the chance to work with dev kits and try and use all the features that we offer. We've got a big installed base, we've got a diversity of people playing our consoles so we need to reflect that with diverse product. Third parties are offering something different on the system now too, EA for example has gone from one extreme to another.
We can't really make a comment because we've not actually seen anything running here and now. We've got our product out there and we've had that out for a while. We haven't seen anything current from those guys to comment on it.
We're looking at innovation all the time, as you saw with the Vitality Sensor that was shown briefly today. There are always things coming through that enable us to keep two steps ahead. On top of that we've got one or two other areas to compete with in other forms of entertainment.
One of the reasons why we have a lot of different products and offerings for different people is because we're competing for free time and entertainment time. Not just with videogames but movies and other entertainment. That's more what we're concerned with.
We've got lots of exclusive content and obviously we have our own franchises and IP - you're not going to see Mario on any other console. Even on third party there's a lot of exclusive content so we're not worried about that.
Our sales of hardware are steady and we're enjoying a really strong installed base of over 50 million Wiis at the moment. When we do release new product what it does is give a bit of a new focus. There are people out there who might be surprised, who haven't thought of buying a Wii, but when they see something like this and the way it can enhance a golf game to bring it so close to the real thing, hopefully they'll buy the hardware. And with Wii Sports Resort using the Wii Motion Plus and looking at the types of games in that there's something there for everyone.
To some extent if you look at the installed base – I wouldn't say that every owner has four remotes – but potentially everyone who has a Wii should have a Wii Motion Plus, and potentially more than one. But we're not looking at it like that so much. When we work with an accessory like that we're not looking at the product itself so much as enabling the player to have a much better enhanced gaming experience. And that opens up more doors for developers to make the products so much better. We expect really good sales on it, but it's not the Wii Motion Plus that's the driving force, it's the software that goes with it.
What we want consumers to do is experience the difference, and they won't get that if they don't have the Wii Motion Plus. And hopefully consumers will come back to buy some more Wii Motion Plus to go with the rest of their Wiimotes.
No, it just happens that their products are out on the market before ours so we had to make sure the Wii Motion Plus is out there on the market. And we're selling it solus as well so we can make sure as many people as possible can experience it. And actually third party success on our platforms has been really good.
David Yarnton is general manager of Nintendo UK. Interview by Matt Martin.