The NES Classic was one of the hottest holiday items of 2016, with plenty of gamers and non-gamers alike scrambling to get their hands on the device. Last week Nintendo announced they’re not going to produce the console anymore despite the seemingly overwhelming demand, which had led to prices skyrocketing on places like eBay.
With such a high demand for the classic console, it seems dumb that Nintendo would stop production on a clear money maker. In a new interview with Time, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime sheds some light on Nintendo’s baffling decision.
“From our perspective, it’s important to recognize where our future is and the key areas that we need to drive. We’ve got a lot going on right now and we don’t have unlimited resources.”
It’s clear from this statement that the NES Classic was a Hail Mary on Nintendo’s part to capitalize on those all-important holiday sales, since the Wii U was dead in the water with no new game releases for gamers to enjoy during the end of 2016. The Switch wasn’t ready to go, so Nintendo came up with the NES Classic. Fils-Aime admits in the interview that the NES Classic was only supposed to be a holiday item.
“We just didn’t anticipate how incredible the response would be.”
That’s the understatement of the year. Nintendo continued production of the device through 2017 until it announced the discontinuation last week. However, rumors have surfaced that an SNES Classic edition might be on the docket for this year’s holiday season. We’ll have to wait and see what comes of that.
[via Time]
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