Iwata says change coming for Nintendo, hints at 'quality of life' product

Nintendo President Satoru Iwata
Nintendo head honcho Satoru Iwata has been doing a lot of thinking lately

It's not new news: Nintendo isn't doing so great.

The company had a rough year with lackluster Wii U sales. It shut down production on last-gen's best selling system. Heck, even President and CEO Satoru Iwata took a 50% pay cut. The "year of Luigi" was not one of the best for the big N.

This year, however, is going to be different. At least it will be after Iwata takes some parting advice from former head honcho and NES evangelist, Hiroshi Yamauchi.

So, not games?

"Yamauchi was one to always say, 'Nintendo is a company for entertainment, and it shouldn't be for anything else,' and he didn't necessarily think that 'entertainment [equals] video games,'" Iwata said in a recent interview with Diamond.jp, a business information site.

"I've been wondering how to express Yamauchi's feelings, and I've been thinking about it non-stop, even during the New Year's holiday break."

Entertainment outside of games? That's an interesting standpoint for Nintendo.

"Lately, the words 'QOL' [quality of life] have come up," Iwata said. "Entertainment is there to improve people's quality of life. After your basic needs, there's entertainment. At the start of this year, I finally figured that improving people's quality of life with fun - with emphasis to the 'fun' - would be perfect for Nintendo. And that's when I decided to use this as a focus during the financial results meeting in January and wrote the manuscript for the presentation."

Putting the DO back in Nintendo

So what exactly are these plans for quality of life improvement we keep hearing about? That's where it gets a little murky. It could be anything from more programs like Wii Fit U, to Nintendo's official entry into wearable technology that leverages the 3DS.

While the latter sounds unlikely given the company's track record, it's not out of the question for Iwata to unveil a new technology at this year's E3 digital show.

Via Siliconera

Nick Pino

Nick Pino is Managing Editor, TV and AV for TechRadar's sister site, Tom's Guide. Previously, he was the Senior Editor of Home Entertainment at TechRadar, covering TVs, headphones, speakers, video games, VR and streaming devices. He's also written for GamesRadar+, Official Xbox Magazine, PC Gamer and other outlets over the last decade, and he has a degree in computer science he's not using if anyone wants it.