We haven’t been huge fans of Nintendo el Presidente Satoru Iwata over the past year. The Wii U has been struggling and Iwata is not without fault. But that’s not to say that we don’t respect the man — we certainly do.
And we respect him even more now after his quote / stance on social media and gaming integration. Nintendo famously didn’t get too much into social media with the Wii U, opting to create its own network, Miiverse.
And now we understand why. According to Iwata, Nintendo believes that there isn’t much need to integrate gaming consoles into social media like Twitter and Facebook. While next gen systems from Sony and Microsoft will focus heavily on social media (especially the PS4), Iwata believes this is wrong. He puts it frankly in an interview:
“The primary use of Twitter and Facebook is not gaming, but a means of communication. Although I don’t use either of them, if I did, I imagine I’d use it to talk about my outings and vacations to people who aren’t exactly video game enthusiasts. I don’t think my former classmates would care to hear about my new Mario Kart record and so on.”
Iwata added some more comments about the Wii U social network, Miiverse, which will soon expand to the 3DS. Iwata said that when it hits the 3DS, “Miiverse will explode”.
We definitely agree with Iwata when it comes to social media and gaming. How many of your Facebook friends care that you just beat a level or earned a new achievement? About as many as care about your new Farmville pig…