Dear Nintendo: Consoles Are Not Nikes

The SNES Classic launch is already a disaster. But you knew that was coming and I knew that was coming and honestly I don't see much reason to get too mad about it. I'm still mad anyway because I've always wanted to play games like "Donkey Kong Country" and "Super Metroid" and this was a fantastic affordable way to play. But I was asleep last night and ate lunch at 1 PM today, so I couldn't order one. My Walmart pre-order was cancelled and Walmart did nothing to give me a chance to order again, I just missed my chance at Amazon at 5 AM this morning.

So in the SNES Classic department: I'm fucked.

I don't see why it has to be like this. I don't get why Nintendo has to be so utterly stupid. At least with companies like Walmart you can see the psychopathic corporate logic at play. Walmart has never pretended to be anything other scumfucking evil since the start and when they actually are scumfucking evil, you can't really blame them for it. Nintendo meanwhile acts like this dumb little puppy that is only peeing on your leg because it loves you that much. I've had quite enough of the family-friendly rounded-corners nostalgia hug routine. There's charmingly foolish and then there's the medieval nightmare that is "Splatoon 2"'s voice chat system. Don't call this anything but what it is: stupidity.

The SNES Classic pre-orders are, to nobody's surprise, hopelessly inadequate for the demand of the console. This is either due to gross incompetence on Nintendo's part or some kind of brilliant scheme to drum up interest by limiting supply as all the armchair economists on /r/nintendo claim. Either way, this is supposed to be a nostalgia piece. Now I don't know about your childhood, but I don't recall mine being filled with frustration, failure, and utter confusion. (Unless we're talking Wet-Dry World in "Mario 64".)

I thought Nintendo was a company for everybody. Instead they're trying to be Nike - badly.

What's really disgusting about the SNES Classic is that we've done this all before. In fact, we just did this last year with the absolute failure of a launch that was the NES Classic. A year later I don't know a single person that owns an NES Classic or even anybody that's ever seen an NES Classic. There are more steps of separation between me and an NES Classic owner than between me and Kevin Bacon (four*). I'm not sure that the NES Classic is even a real thing. It might all have been an urban legend or some kind of bizarre meme like Harambe or that stupid alt-right frog. Plus we go through this same awful dance every time Nintendo releases a new Amiibo and fails to meet even half the demand.

It is in fact, many times more difficult to obtain these new versions of the NES and the SNES then the originals. Because Nintendo made millions and millions of the first NES, but made something in the ballpark of roughly six NES Classics. Recognizing the problems with that, this year they have upped production of the SNES Classic to a mighty figure of nine. The first eight of those nine were all bought by a scalper bot in the first .0000013 milliseconds of release and now they're all being resold on eBay with a markup of a hundred trillion dollars. This is madness.

The SNES Classic is 2017's answer to "Hamilton" tickets in 2016 or cronuts in 2013. The difference there being that cronuts were only made in one bakery and "Hamilton" was only playing in one theater. The scarcity made some sense but was still disgusting.

But the point is that "Hamilton" tickets or cronuts or whatever other boujee fashion item that's only sold in one store for a few minutes are ultimately all snobby bullshit. The appeal is in the elitism you get out of owning it. People wait on line for special Nike shoes because they're collectors and out of their minds. I'm not judging them. Go have fun with your ultra limited-edition guitar that "can't be played". I guess there's something fun in buying something that nobody else has. I don't quite understand the emotion itself.

Nintendo, however, was never elitist. It wasn't Nike until a few years ago. Everybody in America either had a Nintendo or knew a cool kid up the street that had one. (Ownership of a Nintendo automatically makes the kid up the street cool, by the way.) We all have memories of sharing Pokemon over our Gameboys like they were middle school STDs. We all have memories of staying up late beating each over the face in "Smash Bros" until somebody's mom made us go to bed. "Super Mario World" was not a fashion statement - was pure fun. The consoles are made out of plastic, not gold, frankincense, and myrrh. They're toys, not dick-wagging contests.

How did Nintendo fuck this up so badly?

They've turned what were probably some of the most open and universal gaming platforms into private empires to horde over. This was a brand that once was about joy that's now about hatred and ruthless competition. In 1997 we were screaming about how great the Nintendo 64 was. Twenty years later we're screaming in August about how shitty scalpers are.

I could rant about Walmart and Gamestop and the evil pricks who buy eighty consoles at once just to make a buck, but they're not the problem: Nintendo is. And before the armchair economists chime in, here's some economics for you: every unit you don't make is a unit you don't sell. Nintendo could sell 50 million SNES Classics this year. Instead they'll sell a fraction of that. It's utter incompetence. This company can barely stock the shelves with Switches this year. What on Earth are they doing trying to sell SNES Classics too?

I'm really tired of being the victim to some Japanese executive's math error.

This should be Nintendo's moment to reintroduce classic gaming to a new generation. I'd love to show my little brother "A Link to the Past" and "Final Fantasy VI". The NES Classic could have been the Christmas toy of last year. Nintendo could have fixed the problems and done it right with the SNES Classic.

Instead Nintendo took this moment to only service the most obsessed of the obsessed ultra-fans. The real wackos and lunatics got a SNES Classic. The kind of people who still defend "Metroid: Other M" and think the WiiU was underrated got a SNES Classic. It was them and the scummy back-alley bootleggers who can use Nintendo's idiocy to make a fortune, who will sell only to the wackos. Even nerds like me couldn't even get close to owning one.

You can go into a Nike store and buy one of a thousand different pairs of shoes. I've been to Nike stores, I didn't get the most exclusive shoe, but I bought a shoe. The basic consumer need was met. Today I bought fuck-all. All I'm left with is an unpleasantly full wallet that I guess I'll spend on a Sony product instead.

I don't really want Nintendo to "love" me anymore. Nintendo's kind of love is neglectful, abusive, and selfish.

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* I know Eric Kohn from Indiewire who has interviewed Martin Scorsese recently who directed "Taxi Driver" starring Robert De Niro who was in 1996's "Sleepers" with Kevin Bacon. Thus my Bacon Number is 4. Meanwhile I would have to burn half of North Jersey to the ground in a Mongol rain of terror before I could even find where the NES Classic owners are hiding.