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Nintendo
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Nintendo Co., Ltd.
Logo in white on red background used since 2016
Logo in white on red background used since 2016
Nintendo headquarters in Kyoto, Japan
Nintendo headquarters in Kyoto, Japan
Native name 任天堂株式会社
Romanized name Nintendō Kabushiki gaisha
Formerly
Nintendo Karuta
Other former names


Video game series
Services
Nintendo eShop
My Nintendo
Nintendo Switch Online

Divisions
Entertainment Planning & Development
Platform Technology Development
Business Development
Subsidiaries
List of subsidiaries
Website www.nintendo.com
Footnotes / references

Nintendo Co., Ltd. is a Japanese multinational consumer electronics and video game company headquartered in Kyoto. The company was founded in 1889 as Nintendo Karuta[c] by craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi and originally produced handmade hanafuda playing cards. After venturing into various lines of business during the 1960s and acquiring a legal status as a public company under the current company name, Nintendo distributed its first video game console, the Color TV-Game, in 1977. It gained international recognition with the release of the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985.

Since then, Nintendo has produced some of the most successful consoles in the video game industry, such as the Game Boy, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, the Nintendo DS, the Wii, and the Nintendo Switch. Nintendo has also released numerous influential franchises, including Mario, Donkey Kong, The Legend of Zelda, Kirby, Metroid, Fire Emblem, Animal Crossing, Splatoon, Star Fox, Super Smash Bros., and Pokémon.

Nintendo has multiple subsidiaries in Japan and abroad, in addition to business partners such as The Pokémon Company and HAL Laboratory. Both the company and its staff have received numerous awards for their achievements, including Emmy Awards for Technology & Engineering, Game Developers Choice Awards and British Academy Games Awards among others. Nintendo is one of the wealthiest and most valuable companies in the Japanese market.
History
Main article: History of Nintendo
1889–1969: Early history
1889–1929: Origin as a card company

Nintendo's original headquarters (1889–1950s) and workshop in Shimogyō-ku, Kyoto. The right section was eventually rebuilt (pictured below), while the left section was reportedly demolished in 2004.
Nintendo was founded as Nintendo Karuta[d] on 23 September 1889[7] by craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi in Shimogyō-ku, Kyoto, Japan, to produce and distribute hanafuda[e].[4][1][8]:14 The word Nintendo is commonly assumed to mean 'leave luck to heaven'[9][8]:14, but there are no historical records to validate this assumption. It can alternatively be translated as 'the temple of free hanafuda'.[10] With the increase of the cards' popularity, Yamauchi hired assistants to mass-produce in order to satisfy demand.[11] Despite a favorable start, however, the company faced financial difficulties due to the slow and expensive manufacturing process, high product price, coupled with operating in a niche market, as well as the long durability of the cards, which impacted sales due to the low replacement rate.[12] As a solution, Nintendo produced a cheaper and lower-quality line of playing cards, Tengu, while also seeking to offer his products in other cities such as Osaka, where considerable profits were found in card games. In addition, local merchants were interested in the prospect of a continuous renewal of decks, thus avoiding the suspicions that reusing cards would generate.[13]

According to data from the company itself, Nintendo's first western-style deck was put on the market in 1902,[3] although other documents postpone the date to 1907, shortly after the Russo-Japanese War.[14] The war created considerable difficulties for companies in the leisure sector, which were subject to new levies such as the Karuta Zei ('playing cards tax'.[15] Despite this, Nintendo subsisted and, in 1907, entered into an agreement with Nihon Senbai—later known as the Japan Tobacco—to market its cards to various cigarette stores throughout the country.[16] A promotional calendar distributed by Nintendo from the Taishō era dated to 1915 was found, indicating that the company was named Yamauchi Nintendo and used the Marufuku Nintendo Co. brand for its playing cards.[17]

Japanese culture stipulated that for Nintendo Koppai to continue as a family business after Yamauchi's retirement, Yamauchi had to adopt his son-in-law so that he may take over the business. As result, Sekiryo Kaneda adopted the Yamauchi surname in 1907 and became the second president of Nintendo Koppai in 1929. By that time, Nintendo Koppai was the largest card game company in Japan.[18]

1929–1968: Expansion and diversification
In 1933, Sekiryo Kaneda established the company as a general partnership titled Yamauchi Nintendo & Co. Ltd.,[3] investing in the construction of a new corporate headquarters located next to the original building,[19] near the Toba-kaidō train station.[20] Because Sekiryo's marriage to Yamauchi's daughter produced no male heirs, he planned to adopt his son-in-law Shikanojo Inaba, an artist in the company's employ and the father of his grandson Hiroshi, born in 1927. However, Inaba abandoned his family and the company, so Hiroshi was made Sekiryo's eventual successor.[21]


1949 New Year staff commemoration
World War II negatively impacted the company as Japanese authorities prohibited the diffusion of foreign card games, and as the priorities of Japanese society shifted, its interest in recreational activities waned. During this time, Nintendo was partly supported by a financial injection from Hiroshi's wife Michiko Inaba, who came from a wealthy family.[22] In 1947, Sekiryo founded the distribution company Marufuku Co. Ltd.[3]


Former headquarters of Nintendo Playing Card Co.[23]

Information plate
In 1950, due to Sekiryo's deteriorating health,[24] Hiroshi assumed the presidency of Nintendo. His first actions involved several important changes in the operation of the company: in 1951, he changed the company name to Nintendo Playing Card Co. Ltd.,[3] while the Marufuku Company adopted the name Nintendo Karuta Co. Ltd.[25] In 1952, he centralized the production of cards in the Kyoto factories,[3] which led to the expansion of the offices.[26] The company's new line of plastic cards enjoyed considerable success in Japan.[3] Some of the company's employees, accustomed to a more cautious and conservative leadership, viewed the new measures with concern, and the rising tension led to a call for a strike. However, the measure had no major impact, as Hiroshi resorted to the dismissal of several dissatisfied workers.[27]

In 1959, Nintendo entered into an agreement with Walt Disney to incorporate his company's animated characters into the cards.[25] Nintendo also developed a distribution system that allowed it to offer its products in toy stores.[19] By 1961, the company had sold more than 1.5 million card packs and held a high market share, for which it relied on televised advertising campaigns.[28] The need for diversification led the company to list stock on the second section of the Osaka and Kyoto stock exchanges, in addition to becoming a public company and changing its name to Nintendo Co., Ltd. in 1963.[3] In 1964, Nintendo earned an income of ¥150 million.[29]

Although the company was experiencing a period of economic prosperity, the Disney cards and derived products made it dependent on the children's market. The situation was exacerbated by the falling sales of its adult-oriented hanafuda cards caused by Japanese society gravitating toward other hobbies such as pachinko, bowling and nightly outings.[28] When Disney card sales began to show signs of exhaustion, Nintendo realized that it had no real alternative with which to alleviate the situation.[29] After the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, Nintendo's stock price plummeted to its lowest recorded level of ¥60.[30][31]

Between 1963 and 1968, Yamauchi invested in several business lines for Nintendo that were far from its traditional market and, for the most part, were unsuccessful.[32] Among these ventures were packages of instant rice, a chain of love hotels, and a taxi service named Daiya. Although the taxi service was better received than the previous efforts, Yamauchi rejected this initiative after a series of disagreements with local unions.[33]

1969–1972: Classic and electronic toys
Yamauchi's experience with the previous initiatives led him to increase Nintendo's investment in a research and development department directed by Hiroshi Imanishi, an employee with a long history in other areas of the company. In 1969, Gunpei Yokoi joined the department and was responsible for coordinating various projects.[19] Yokoi's experience in manufacturing electronic devices led Yamauchi to put him in charge of the company's games department, and his products would be mass-produced.[34] During this period, Nintendo built a new production plant in Uji City, just outside of Kyoto,[3] and distributed classic tabletop games such as chess, shogi, go, and mahjong, as well as other foreign games under the Nippon Game brand.[35] The company's restructuring preserved a couple of areas dedicated to hanafuda card manufacturing.[36]

The early 1970s represented a watershed moment in Nintendo's history as it released Japan's first electronic toy—the Nintendo Beam Gun, an optoelectronic pistol designed by Masayuki Uemura.[3] In total, more than a million units were sold.[19] During that period, Nintendo began trading on the main section of the Osaka stock exchange and opened a new headquarters.[3] Other popular toys released at the time include the Ultra Hand, the Ultra Machine, the Ultra Scope, and the Love Tester, all designed by Yokoi. The Ultra Hand sold more than 1.2 million units in Japan.[11]

1973–present: History in electronics
1973–1978: Early video games, and Color TV-Game
Further information: History of Color TV-Game
The growing demand for Nintendo's products led Yamauchi to further expand the offices, for which he acquired the surrounding land and assigned the production of cards to the original Nintendo building. Meanwhile, Yokoi, Uemura, and new employees such as Genyo Takeda, continued to develop innovative products for the company.[19] The Laser Clay Shooting System was released in 1973 and managed to surpass bowling in popularity. Though Nintendo's toys continue to gain popularity, the 1973 oil crisis caused both a spike in the cost of plastics as well as a change in consumer priorities that put essential products over pastimes, and Nintendo had several billion yen in losses.[37]

In 1974, Nintendo released Wild Gunman, a skeet shooting simulator consisting of a 16 mm image projector with a sensor that detects a beam from the player's light gun. Both the Laser Clay Shooting System and Wild Gunman were successfully exported to Europe and North America.[3] Despite this, Nintendo's production speeds were still slow compared to rival companies such as Bandai and Tomy, and their prices were high, which led to the discontinuation of some of their light gun products.[38] The subsidiary Nintendo Leisure System Co., Ltd., which developed these products, was closed as a result of the economic impact dealt by the oil crisis.[39]


Color TV-Game
Yamauchi, motivated by the successes of Atari and Magnavox with their video game consoles,[19] acquired the Japanese distribution rights for the Magnavox Odyssey in 1974,[34] and reached an agreement with Mitsubishi Electric to develop similar products between 1975 and 1978, including the first microprocessor for video games systems, the Color TV-Game series, and an arcade game inspired by Othello.[3] During this period, Takeda developed the video game EVR Race,[40] and Shigeru Miyamoto joined Yokoi's team with the responsibility of designing the casing for the Color TV-Game consoles.[41] In 1978, Nintendo's research and development department was split into two facilities, Nintendo Research & Development 1 and Nintendo Research & Development 2, respectively managed by Yokoi and Uemura.[42][43]

1979–1987: Game & Watch, arcade games, and Nintendo Entertainment System
Further information: History of Game & Watch and History of Nintendo Entertainment System

Game & Watch
Two key events in Nintendo's history occurred in 1979: its American subsidiary was opened in New York City, and a new department focused on arcade game development was created. In 1980, one of the first handheld video game system, the Game & Watch, was created by Yokoi from the technology used in portable calculators.[3][37] It became one of Nintendo's most successful products, with over 43.4 million units sold worldwide during its production period, and for which 59 games were made in total.[44]


Donkey Kong miniature arcade cabinet
Nintendo's success in arcade games grew in 1981 with the release of Donkey Kong, which was developed by Miyamoto and one of the first video games that allowed the player character to jump.[45] The character, Jumpman, would later become Mario and Nintendo's official mascot. Mario was named after Mario Segale, the landlord of Nintendo's offices in Tukwila, Washington.[46]

In 1983, Nintendo opened a new production facility in Uji and was listed on the first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange.[3] Uemura, taking inspiration from the ColecoVision,[47] began creating a new video game console that would incorporate a ROM cartridge format for video games as well as both a central processing unit and a physics processing unit.[3][48][49] The Family Computer, or Famicom, was released in Japan in July 1983 along with three games adapted from their original arcade versions: Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr. and Popeye.[50] Its success was such that in 1984, it surpassed the market share held by Sega's SG-1000.[51] At this time, Nintendo adopted a series of guidelines that involved the validation of each game produced for the Famicom before its distribution on the market, agreements with developers to ensure that no Famicom game would be adapted to other consoles within two years of its release, and restricting developers from producing more than five games a year for the Famicom.[52]


Nintendo Entertainment System
In the early 1980s, several video game consoles proliferated in the United States, as well as low-quality games produced by third-party developers,[53] which oversaturated the market and led to the video game crash of 1983.[54] Consequently, a recession hit the American video game industry, whose revenues went from over $3 billion to $100 million between 1983 and 1985.[55] Nintendo's initiative to launch the Famicom in America was also impacted. To differentiate the Famicom from its competitors in America, Nintendo opted to redesign the Famicom as an "entertainment system" compatible with "Game Paks", a euphemism for cartridges, and with a design reminiscent of a VCR.[49] Nintendo implemented a lockout chip in the Game Paks that gave it control on what games were published for the console to avoid the market saturation that occurred in the United States' market.[56] The resulting product was the Nintendo Entertainment System, or NES, which was re

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