Hideki Konno, het hoofd van Nintendo’s EAD Software ontwikkelafdeling heeft gezegd dat de marketing voor de 3DS zeer lastig zal worden voor het bedrijf. In een interview vertelde hij dat er zelfs binnen Nintendo twijfels werden gezet bij het product en pas toen de technologie voorhanden was, men overtuigd werd. Ondanks echter het overwinnen van die twijfels, zag volgens Konno de grootste hindernis worden om het publiek te zien te overtuigen.
“We did hear doubtful voices. We weren’t completely successfully with Virtual Boy so there was a suspicious tone within the company.De aanwezigen op de E3 lijken echter in ieder geval wel overtuigd te zijn van de 3DS, getuige het feit dat de 3DS de award voor ‘Best of Show’ en ‘Best Hardware’ kreeg.First, I introduced the latest technology – the 3D panel – attached it to the Wii and showed a demo showing Mario Kart Wii and Animal Crossing. In Japan there’s a maxim: a glance is better than a hundred words. Even with words I wasn’t able to convince anyone. So I presented the demo to Miyamoto and Iwata and they were stunned and agreed to take it in that direction.
We are constantly discussing how to market the product. Our internal PR departments are saying that we should use cinema advertising, because cinemas are capable of showing 3D movies. But our key point with 3DS is that you don’t need glasses, which you obviously need to use in cinemas. So we think regular marketing and promotional activities will be very tricky for us. I think that a lot of awareness about 3DS will be spread by word of mouth.
Consumers can’t see the real surprise without the 3DS in front of them – cool footage isn’t enough – but [when] I went to our booth [at E3] and found consumers being surprised, saying ‘Wow!’, I was relieved to see those reactions.”