Nintendo & Neal Stephenson’s Diamond Age?
I just read an older post on Engadet theorizing about a Nintendo Communication Revolution: Nintendo DS wireless hub trick up its sleeve? – Engadget – www.engadget.com
The notion in a nutshell – the Nintendo DS has 802.11b wireless, but what if it acted as both a device and a hub? Allowing you to lilypad DS systems – creating organic gaming network? All wifi geek obstacles aside, I loved this idea for one reason…
What if you wanted to do something really visionary…
What if you…
- created a system that appealled to little girls and young women in a way that no other system had, just through it’s form factor.
[Nintendo DS doesn't simply have 2 screens - it has a whole new interaction dynamic.] - launched a killer app that was ‘best of breed’ (forgive the pun’ of all the artificial companion, virtual pet apps. [Nintendogs is selling out in the UK and you can't buy the Best Friends Bundles in retail stores in the US.]
- bundled the app and device into hot Christmas sellers right before parents are most likely to shell out the ~$150 price point.
Suddenly you have a high density of some of the most agile communicators on the planet. A substrate for something particularly fantastic. A entrance point to a highly lucrative and as yet, virutally untapped market.
Maybe the DS isn’t Nintendo’s trojan horse into a brave new world of girl gamers. But man…what if it was?
BTW, if this post was at all interesting and you haven’t read , “Diamond Age” by Neal Stephenson, maybe you should.
