Nintendo will back up the Wii with a marketing budget that exceeds 200 million US Dollars, Bloomberg has learned.
The advertising campaign is the biggest ever for Kyoto-based Nintendo, which begins selling Wii in the U.S. on Nov. 19., two days after Sony releases the PlayStation. Television ads beginning tomorrow will focus on Wii's ease of use and library of family- friendly games.
This is twice as much as Microsoft spent on the Xbox360, according to Next-Gen. It should be noted, however, that it is unclear whether either figure encompasses all territories and whether it is limited to the launch window (though that is when companies spend the lion share of their marketing budget, obviously).
EDIT Nintendo have outlined their marketing campaign in detail. Here is the info from their press server (registration required):
A different kind of video game system demands a different kind of marketing effort. That's why Nintendo is moving to unprecedented lengths to let people see, feel and experience the unparalleled new Wii™ system, created to be easily used by anyone. Nintendo's multimillion-dollar marketing campaign spotlights that Wii is the only new video game system every member of a household can enjoy.
Gaming for the masses is seen in every element of the marketing campaign, from an online social-networking community and sampling events in average people's homes to urban "gaming" hours, retail midnight madness events, a multi-city music tour and extended hands-on opportunities in malls nationwide. Across the country, men and women, young and old, experienced and not, are getting their hands on Wii and helping usher in a new generation of video gamers.
Already Nintendo's viral efforts have paid off. In a 24-hour period in early November, Wii served as the centerpiece of a multipart South Park episode, appeared on the front page of The Wall Street Journal, made People magazine's Style Watch gift guide issue, was featured in an NPR report about hot holiday gifts and had a BusinessWeek feature note: "industry execs and analysts are already calling a winner: Nintendo's Wii." And all of this before the system has even launched.
"Our plan to market Wii broadly with hands-on experiences continues to pay off," says George Harrison, Nintendo of America's senior vice president of marketing and corporate communications. "Wii introduces new ways to play to expand both the appeal of games and the audience of gamers, and our marketing campaign is central to that."
Hands-on Sampling
* Wii Ambassador Program: The yearlong initiative identified ambassadors in markets throughout the country. These ambassadors are of three categories: multigenerational families, hard-core gamers and modern moms. During the initial phase, Nintendo hosted events for each ambassador and 30 of his or her closest friends and relatives. The events offered an opportunity for everyday people from all walks of life to play Wii for the first time and share their experiences with others.
* Wii Mall Experience: Starting Nov. 15, Nintendo will set up six interactive Wii kiosks for a two-month period in 25 Westfield shopping centers across the country. Trained representatives will show visitors new ways to play. For a complete list of the participating malls, visit wii.nintendo.com.
* Nintendo Fusion Tour: The annual showcase for music and video games visits cities across the country through Nov. 11. In addition to live music from headliner Hawthorne Heights and four other up-and-coming bands, concert attendees get to enjoy some hands-on time with Wii.
* Blender: Nintendo Fusion Tour headliner Hawthorne Heights shows off their slick Wii moves and talk about some of the upcoming games for Wii in the December issue.
* Urban Gaming Hours: Through Nov. 17, Nintendo is hosting a gaming take on "happy hour" at gatherings for urban influencers in fashion, music and media, such as Vice magazine and Def Jam Records. The on-site events let participants experience Wii with their colleagues.
* RISE: The December issue of this sports and lifestyle magazine for teens will feature thoughts from top teen athletes about their experiences sampling the Wii console.
Feeding the Buzz
* How Wii Play: Wii's MySpace page at www.MySpace.com/howwiiplay has attracted nearly 1 million page views from more than 200,000 unique visitors, largely by word-of-mouth. Members have created their own Wii videos and posted thousands of messages in the robust forums.
* Midnight Madness: Countdown events at Toys "R" Us in New York's Times Square and at GameStop at Universal CityWalk in Los Angeles will turn the last few hours before the launch of Wii into an entertainment frenzy. Nintendo fans of all stripes will line up to be the first to purchase the console at the stroke of midnight as they are entertained by acrobats, music, pyrotechnics, Wii interactives on Segway scooters and a general party atmosphere.
Brand Partnerships
* 7-Eleven: 7-Eleven is giving away 711 Wii consoles. Codes are printed on the sides of special Nintendo-branded Slurpee cups. Through Jan. 31, people go online to enter their codes to see if they have won. 7-Eleven also will introduce a new limited-time-only Nintendo-themed Slurpee flavor: StrawberrWii Banana. Print ads will run in Blender, Electronic Gaming Monthly and DC Comics. Print ads will also run in USA Today and The Onion. In addition, online banner ads will appear on Google, GameZone, IGN, Rotten Tomatoes and GameSpot.
* Pringles Snack Stacks: Pringles.com is giving away 100 Wii consoles. The program is supported by 7 million Wii-themed Pringles Snack Stacks packages and an additional 2 million Wii-themed Pringles canisters on display at Wal-Mart stores for the first three weeks of December. The sweepstakes runs now through April 16.
* Comedy Central: The comedy cable network will give away a Wii every hour Thursday through Sunday of Thanksgiving weekend. Wii will be featured in a series of vignettes spoofing reality TV shows. At the end of the weekend, the grand prize will be a Wii console and a Scion tricked out to look like a Wii.
As Seen on TV
* Wii Would Like to Play: Wii's central ad campaign follows two friendly Japanese men who bring Wii to people's homes to demonstrate how easy and fun it is for everyone to play. Stephen Gaghan, who wrote the screenplay for and directed Syriana and won a best screenplay Oscar for writing Traffic, directed the four spots. The director of photography is John Seale, who won an Oscar for best cinematography on The English Patient and was nominated for Oscars for Rain Man, Cold Mountain and Witness. The spots begin airing the week of Nov. 13.
* Nick @ Nite: Wii will be featured on the Nov. 24 Nick@Nite episode of Road Crew. The spots feature a family from Long Island that finally finds something they can all enjoy together - playing Wii.
* Nickelodeon: A Wii ad begins Nov. 20. The 60-second spot shows a dad mistaking the Wii Remote for his television remote control. Dad becomes immersed in the fun, and soon the whole family joins in.
* TeleFutura: Nintendo will be at November auditions in New York for the highly successful international singing competition show Objetivo Fama (Objective: Fame) to allow contestants to sample the Wii console and calm their pre-audition jitters.
* Discovery Channel, Animal Planet and Discovery Kids Network: A feature scheduled to air in December showcases kids, parents and teachers sampling Wii at a school event and sharing their experiences.
Sources: Bloomberg, Next-Gen, Nintendo press server (registration required)
Thanks to: Joystiq, Joystiq
11 comments:
The problem with Zeldas graphics :
Eventhough I haven't played Zelda as of yet, I have seen lots of footage of it that conveys a proper impression of its visuals.
To make a long story short, I think that Zelda fails at what it is trying to express visually.
Simply put, the technology is not sophisticated enough to make justice to what its striving for as far as graphics are concerned.
Wind Waker in comparison succeeded in what it tried to express.
The graphical style was pulled off as it was envisioned by them without technological hurdles detaining them since it stayed within the bounds of possibility.
Wind Wakers style was believable for what it was, since it wisely circumvented hardware limits by taking a non conventional direction in style.
Zelda Twilight on the other hand is struggiling with its high aims.
The sheer scope and high aspirations alone overexpend the capabilities of the Gamecube hardware to the fullest.
All this translates into a overall tempered visual fidelity, bland ground textures and a general lack of detail and sophisticated lightning on architecture and characters.
The gorgeous art style makes up for it and helps a lot granted, but I still can't help but feel like it leaves something to be desired.
I think if they had built it from the ground up on Wii it may had looked the way its supposed to look namely more in the vein of Oblivion.
The technical back up on Gamecube is simply not available for such an undertaking I'm afraid to say.
(The engine is not as robust as it should be)
In my opinion, it would have been sawier had they sticked with the Wind Waker style for a second Zelda game running on Gamecube hardware, instead of the realistic style.
Don't get me wrong it's still Zelda nonetheless, granted.
However, if you take into account what wonders a more powerful system like Wii could have worked for a realistic Zelda, it's still deplorable to some extent.
It would have done Zelda good.
Simple as that.
-IALS
i.a.l.s your talking utter nonsence there clearly the best ever and most imursive and massive world visuals on a current gen machine ITS A GAMECUBE ENGINE and it kicks 90% of 360 visuals into touch are you insane
theres nothing remotly on par with these visuals on xbox and in terms of art direction and polish its way above oblivion etc i think your a sony zealot or a fool judging on low res streams go watch hd cam footage its UTTERLY GOURGOUS
There seems to be a key problem here; none of the advertising starts until after the launch of the console. It just doesn’t seem to make sense to me; Nintendo doesn’t seem to be putting much effort into their advertising. For the past two or so weeks there have been tons of PS3 ads and that is all people are talking about right now. Wii kiosks have been sitting at GameStops empty for hours at a time because casual gamers don’t know anything about Wii.
My guess is that they (Nintendo) feel that there is no need to put much into advertising in the beginning since all of the Wii units will sell out at launch anyway. I think this could be a dangerous move on Nintendo’s behalf. By the end of this year there will be over 2 million units in North America and it will not look good if there are units left on the shelf (this happened with the GameCube).
The truth is Resident Evil 4 has away better graphics than Zelda TP, and that's a shame, since it's a GCN game released 2 years ago, really sad.
"The truth is Resident Evil 4 has away better graphics than Zelda TP, and that's a shame, since it's a GCN game released 2 years ago, really sad."
TOOOOOOO TRUEEEEEEEE.
-IALS
"The truth is Resident Evil 4 has away better graphics than Zelda TP, and that's a shame, since it's a GCN game released 2 years ago, really sad."
You are not considering that TP is way bigger than RE4
910do is at it again!
:)
-IALS
910do:
Twilight Princess trumps RE4 in many technical regards, not least of which is the size and scale of the game environments. This is not determined by disc size alone (In fact, the disc size is the same on the GCN version).
RE4 actually has incredible amounts of pop-up and draw-in, especially in the village areas. The graphic design compensates for this by making every attempt to focus your attention on the immediate foreground. It works pretty well, but it's technically inferior to TP's engine in this regard.
In addition, RE4 runs at a resolution of 640x360 and a framerate of 24fps on GameCube. Twilight Princess runs at a resolution of 854x480 and a framerate of 30fps. It's pushing more than twice as many pixels as RE4 and looking good doing it. That's a difference almost on the same scale as moving from 480p to 720p.
While you might make a very convincing argument that RE4 has superior art design to Twilight Princess, in virtually every technical regard TP is the clear winner.
I too agree. TP is the winner
www.onlineuniversalwork.com
This will not have effect as a matter of fact, that's what I suppose.
nice post love it
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