Iwata: Selling the Wii is Like "Trying to Sell Cosmetics to Men"

Nintendo,s strategy in marketing its Wii game console is to appeal to the non-gamer-a demographic which Mario and Friends believes will be the crucial factor in selling lots of their Wiis. In an interview given to Bloomberg News, Nintendo’s Satoru Iwata equated the difficulty in selling a game machine to non-gamers in a rather colorful, if not odd analogy. Iwata said, “We want to appeal to mothers who don’t want consoles in their living rooms, and to the elderly and to young women. It,s a challenge, like trying to sell cosmetics to men.’ Iwata stated that Nintendo,s battle for a successful game console was not based against his competitors, but the stronghold of consumers who are tepid to the idea of playing games. He said, “If we can do this, the Wii could break all the boundaries in terms of user rates for game consoles. We are not battling Sony or Microsoft. Our enemy is consumer indifference to games.” Hirokazu Hamamura, president of Famitsu magazine, the largest game publication in Japan said, “Wii definitely could become the most popular console of all time. Non-gamers can see how fun it is just by looking at people playing it, and that’s very different from the PS3 or Xbox 360.”
In an instance of reverse logic, Hamamura may have hit the nail on the head. Many non-gamers are distanced from the whole concept of playing games-it appears to either be too complicated or a waste of time. In the case of the Wii, spectators seem to be drawn to the actual physical aspect of playing games on the console as players become animated and use motion to control game action. This is what Nintendo is banking on.