Nintendo + You

Like many of you, I was in elementary school when I started playing video games. I remember that grey box, by today’s standards an unwieldy hunk of retro plastic…the cartridges were more than double the size of my tiny hands. I’d slide Duck Hunt in with a click and shoot ducks with a plastic gun to my heart’s content.

Flash forward twenty years. Two years ago I stood in line at Yodobashi near Yokohama station with hundreds of beskirted Japanese schoolgirls…all of us awaiting the release of the highly anticipated Nintendo DS Lite. We were standing in line because there was a good chance they were going to sell out within the day. We didn’t want any ol’ DS. We wanted the bubble gum pink one. And it was worth waking up at 5:30 in the morning to queue up and get one.

When someone contacted me last month on behalf of Nintendo, my inner skeptic kicked in and thought, “it’s probably a joke.” A few follow up emails revealed it wasn’t a joke at all. Would I like to be a Brand Enthusiast for Nintendo? Absolutely. To kick off my year as a Brand Enthusiast, we had our Nintendo Party this weekend and it was an absolute blast.

Nintendo + Brand Enthusiasm

I’ve been a Brand Enthusiast for many companies through the years, I just didn’t know what to call it at the time. When I went to the UK to study abroad I bought a pair of earrings to celebrate my departure. They were from a (at the time) tiny company called Holly Yashi. Very early in my trip I went to a movie theatre and emerged minus an earring. I mourned the loss briefly—I had loved those earrings. Got back to the States many months later. Went to Light Years in Chapel Hill, where I’d bought the earrings. They said they’d contact Holly Yashi and see if they had a replacement pair for me. Not only did Holly Yashi replace the missing earring free of charge, they gave me another pair to compensate me for my loss. They created a proud, loyal Brand Enthusiast immediately…I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve recommended them since.

There isn’t one thing or another that makes you an Enthusiast (or Evangelist for that matter)…but I will tell you this, women are awesome at it. We remember brand names, we remember stories. Nintendo is the first company to approach me using the words “brand enthusiast.” There’s no catch. I don’t have to blog about it, but I want to because all of this intrigues me. I don’t have to post photos, but I am because the venue was stunning, the girls had a great time and it shows…I loved that they got a chance to let their guards down, learn something and have a good time doing it. I don’t have to fake enthusiasm for my DS (ok, I have two…my DSs) because I actually enjoy playing it (them).

Nintendo + Parties

The party was a lot of fun. The venue was in Denver at a place call the Strategy Loft. We went inside to be greeted by the four seriously hard-core gamer girls that would help out during the night (I momentarily stumped them on one of the puzzles I was working on). We got charm bracelets and found out how the party would work. Then we got a glass of champagne and got to “work” playing games. More than three hours passed and it felt like it had only been half an hour…it was time to go home already!?!?

I felt like a six year old playing Guitar Hero for the first time…you couldn’t have pried it out of my hands if you’d tried (apparently there’s vid floating around out there to prove it). You have to use an extension pack which does slide around a bit (presumably they’re working on that aspect of it) but playing on the dual screen was more fun than the full screen version. Mostly because no guy could come up and try to force me to give up the guitar so he could play it on Expert (you know who you are and yes, you should feel guilty). I felt like the assistants in black went out of their way to show the girls they could do it on their own.

An empowering introduction to gaming for the girls that never had. A happy reminder that it’s ok to loosen up, let our guards down and have fun for the girls that already play. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a puzzle to get back to…

*Get it?!? Next level? Ok, nm…