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Speaker 1: Guess what, Mango?

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Speaker 2: What's that?

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Speaker 1: Well? All right, so I've had this fact waiting to

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Speaker 1: use it, and I think today's episode is the right one.

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Speaker 1: So did you know that Nintendo almost came out with

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Speaker 1: a knitting machine?

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Speaker 2: No? No, was that in its earliest days? Are like

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Speaker 2: with the Wei No?

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Speaker 1: No, Like in the nineteen eighties when they came out

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Speaker 1: with the original neees system. You remember this? Yeah? Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I found this old trade ad for it when they

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Speaker 1: were considering launching it. And here's how it reads. So

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Speaker 1: it says, now you're knitting with power. It's not a game,

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Speaker 1: not a toy, not something a young girl can outgrow

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Speaker 1: in three to six months or even a year. It

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Speaker 1: actually knits sweaters.

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Speaker 2: That's so weird and sexist.

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Speaker 1: Yeah kind of.

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Speaker 2: I mean the technology is kind of forward thinking, I guess.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: I mean you could fashion your own patterns, yarn it up,

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Speaker 1: and have it knit for you. I guess I think

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Speaker 1: that's how it works. And the guy who was asked

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Speaker 1: to demonstrate it for Toys r Us, called it one

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Speaker 1: of his least genuinely enthusiastic demos and it basically got

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Speaker 1: zero demand. But reading about the Nintendo knitting machine made me,

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Speaker 1: wonder you know how long has Nintendo been around, and

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Speaker 1: how they survived for this long and such an incredibly

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Speaker 1: competitive market, and just how much running and swimming is

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Speaker 1: Mario doing in Super Mario Brothers. So that's what we're

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Speaker 1: going to find out. Let's dive in. Hey their podcast listeners,

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Speaker 1: welcome to Part Time Genius. I'm Will Pearson and as

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Speaker 1: always I'm joined by my good friend man gesh Hot

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Speaker 1: Ticketer and on the other side of the soundproof glass

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Speaker 1: holding up a paper that says up down, up, down, left, right, left, right,

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Speaker 1: be a start. Wow, isn't that the Konami code from Nintendo.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the secret code that gave you all those

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Speaker 2: extra lives in contra.

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Speaker 1: That is just how thoughtful he is sharing a top

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Speaker 1: secret industry code on the airways. It's our friend and

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Speaker 1: producer Tristan mc so we're talking Nintendo. Now. Everybody's familiar

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Speaker 1: with Nintendo and its flagship characters Mario, Luigi, Zelda, the

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Speaker 1: list goes on, but video games are only half of

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Speaker 1: the company's one hundred and twenty eight year history, actually

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Speaker 1: less than that. So with the holiday season upon us

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Speaker 1: and the new Nintendo Switch console topping all kinds of

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Speaker 1: hot toy and tech lists. We thought it'd be fun

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Speaker 1: to shed some light on the lesser known history of

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Speaker 1: the world's most recognizable video game maker, the Nintendo.

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Speaker 2: You don't know, right, And I'll do the first admit

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Speaker 2: there's so much I didn't know about Nintendo. For example,

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Speaker 2: did you know the company actually won Emmy back in

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Speaker 2: two thousand and seven?

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Speaker 1: I thought Emmy's were just TV shows, So I had

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Speaker 1: a video game company wind up with an Emmy.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, so it was actually awarded in recognition of one

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Speaker 2: of Nintendo's most famous tech innovations, the D pad or

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Speaker 2: the directional pad. Uh huh, So I'm sure you know this,

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Speaker 2: but the dpad is the plus sign shape button that

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Speaker 2: you see on video game controllers nowadays. And Nintendo introduced

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Speaker 2: the new output method back in I think nineteen eighty two,

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Speaker 2: and it quickly became a standard in the industry over

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Speaker 2: the old joysticks, like you know, the ones where you

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Speaker 2: had to use your whole hand to move the controller

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Speaker 2: around instead of just a free thumb.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that makes sense. The deepad revolutionized gaming,

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Speaker 1: But that doesn't say how they got an Emmy. How

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Speaker 1: did they win an Emmy?

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Speaker 2: Well, most video games are played on TVs, so there's

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Speaker 2: one connection there. But the real reason is that the

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Speaker 2: dpad got utilized by most of the remotes in your house,

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Speaker 2: whether for your DVD player or streaming device or the

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Speaker 2: TV itself.

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Speaker 1: That's pretty crazy, all right. Well, it's clear Nintendo isn't

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Speaker 1: your typical video game company, and as I was saying earlier,

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Speaker 1: Nintendo actually predates video games themselves by almost one hundred years.

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Speaker 2: So I've read a little of this before that. Nintendo

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Speaker 2: started out as a playing card manufacturer, and this was

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Speaker 2: back in eighteen eighty nine when a twenty nine year

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Speaker 2: old businessman named Fuzlajiro Yamachi. He saw the chance to

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Speaker 2: jumpstart this dormant industry. And as you might know, Japan

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Speaker 2: had cut most of its ties with the Western world

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Speaker 2: during the seventeenth century. It was like this highly protected

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Speaker 2: society and the royalty didn't want invading cultures to the

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Speaker 2: country's values and traditions. But as part of this isolationist stance,

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Speaker 2: there was this ban on all foreign playing cards, and

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Speaker 2: this was to curb the rise in the legal gambling

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Speaker 2: and when the Japanese devised their own card games in

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Speaker 2: the ensuing centuries, those two became used for gambling, and

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Speaker 2: the government banned those as well.

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Speaker 1: Pretty interesting art. So it's a bit of a game

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Speaker 1: of kind of whack a mole, now right. I mean,

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Speaker 1: games pop up, they get extinguished, then they pop up

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Speaker 1: somewhere else, and then they get extinguished again, exactly.

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Speaker 2: And so this back and forth rise and fall of

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Speaker 2: Japanese card games goes on for more than two hundred

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Speaker 2: and fifty years, and then in eighteen eighty six, a

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Speaker 2: new game called hanafuda and I'm going to mispronounce every

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Speaker 2: single Japanese word of this, but it's finally permitted by

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Speaker 2: the government. And this game loosely translates as flower cards,

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Speaker 2: and they used flowers and animal pictures instead of numbers.

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Speaker 1: So it was a little harder to use for gambling, harder,

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Speaker 1: I'm guessing, but not impossible.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right. So wiley gamblers still found ways to

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Speaker 2: make money playing Hanafuda. And I mean, the general public

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Speaker 2: isn't that interested in playing card games since it's had

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Speaker 2: such a bad rep for so long, but this new

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Speaker 2: game did catch on quickly among this group of near

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Speaker 2: duells known as the yakuza.

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Speaker 1: Wait, so it's just like an organized crime syndicate, is

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Speaker 1: it there? The early customers of Nintendo were they actually

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Speaker 1: like Japanese gangster or.

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Speaker 2: Something sort of. So the term yakuza actually started as

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Speaker 2: this reference to a losing hand in this game that

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Speaker 2: wasn't worth any points. And since the game was popular

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Speaker 2: mostly with unsavory types, Yakuza game slang for like useless individuals,

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Speaker 2: And we should do a whole episode on the Yukuza

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Speaker 2: down the road, But at this point, these useless individuals

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Speaker 2: are just kind of outcasts in society. And the wider

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Speaker 2: connection to organized crime that comes later. But the moniker

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Speaker 2: itself does have a connection to Nintendo, and specifically they're

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Speaker 2: Hanafuda cards.

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Speaker 1: Huh. All right, well, let's talk a little bit about

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Speaker 1: how Ourmanyamachi rises above this shady designation, and basically it

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Speaker 1: all comes down to design. The cards of the company

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Speaker 1: Nintendo produced included hand painted images, you know, made from

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Speaker 1: the bark of mulberry trees, and because they were so

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Speaker 1: ornate and super high quality and frankly just eye catching,

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Speaker 1: it it actually helped free the cards from that back

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Speaker 1: alley stigma, and it wasn't long before Nintendo became the

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Speaker 1: top card game company in all of Japan.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely so. Over the years and generations, as the government

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Speaker 2: relaxed their rules, Nintendo started releasing new types of cards

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Speaker 2: and card games. But it's only in the nineteen fifties,

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Speaker 2: when Yamuchi's great grandson took over the reins, that Nintendo

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Speaker 2: started experimenting with some odd ball ideas.

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Speaker 1: So what did they do?

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Speaker 2: Well, there are a few smart things, like Hiroshi signed

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Speaker 2: this deal to feature Disney characters on the card decks,

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Speaker 2: specifically to market them to children and families. But he

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Speaker 2: also did a few super strange things as well, like

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Speaker 2: he dabbled in starting a taxi service and a line

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Speaker 2: of instant rice, and for a little while he even

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Speaker 2: invested in love hotels, where businessmen could rent rooms by

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Speaker 2: the hour, no questions.

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Speaker 1: Asked, Oh my gosh, card Shark, gangsters, CD motels. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I have to be honest, like this is not the

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Speaker 1: house mark.

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Speaker 2: Definitely not, definitely, not yet. And while none of those

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Speaker 2: ventures worked, they all went belly up quickly. Hiroshi knew

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Speaker 2: that playing cards and the playing card market had reached

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Speaker 2: the saturation, so if Nintendo was going to survive into

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Speaker 2: the nineteen seventies, they'd need to branch out well.

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Speaker 1: And also by this point they were already dabbling in

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Speaker 1: at least board games, right.

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Speaker 2: Mm hm, that's right. But toy companies like Tomy and Bandai,

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Speaker 2: Like do you even remember those?

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Speaker 1: I mean only vaguely?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, me too, So it's worth googling Tomy and Bandai

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Speaker 2: games from the nineteen seventies because the titles and photos

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Speaker 2: are amazing, like they've got one called the Hamburger Game

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Speaker 2: and Run Yourself Ragged and NATSI Tennis like, honestly are

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Speaker 2: so intricate and plastic, but they really look fun. But

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Speaker 2: Nintendo needed an inn and this they needed some sort

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Speaker 2: of new product to catch people's attention and help establish

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Speaker 2: it as like a place for fun, not just like

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Speaker 2: card and board games.

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Speaker 1: I love those names, and I was like, what even

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Speaker 1: is like NATSI Tennis run Yourself Ragged? Well, this is

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Speaker 1: the part of the Nintendo story that I really love

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Speaker 1: because you know, at first, you think, okay, all right,

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Speaker 1: here's where video games come in, and the company we

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Speaker 1: know starts to take shape. But no, you know, instead,

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Speaker 1: the company's first foray into the untapped toy market. It's

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Speaker 1: this wacky extending arm thing called the ultra Hand, and

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Speaker 1: there's nothing electronic about it. Basically, it's the invention of

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Speaker 1: Gunpay Yokoi. He's this low level Nintendo factory worker. He's

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Speaker 1: got a little bit of a background in engineering, and

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Speaker 1: it's kind of an innovation on Ben Franklin's long arm grabber,

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Speaker 1: you know, which he invented in his old age that

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Speaker 1: would help him get books high off of shelves.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. So Ben Frank's version was obviously just this long

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Speaker 2: pull with the tiny gratty thing at the end of it, right.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's it. But Gunpay designed a prototype grabber claw

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Speaker 1: that frankly, you'd almost picture kind of like an inspector

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Speaker 1: gadget's hands or something like. It expanded out across the

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Speaker 1: room with sort of a metal crisscross pattern, but it

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Speaker 1: collapses to a tiny shape. And when Heirohi saw it,

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Speaker 1: he fell in love with the idea and got gun

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Speaker 1: Paid a mass produce a plastic version by the end

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Speaker 1: of that year, and the thing was dubbed the Ultra Hand,

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Speaker 1: as I mentioned, and the toy was a massive success

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Speaker 1: for Nintendo. They sold over a million of them between

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Speaker 1: nineteen sixty six and nineteen seventy and with that initial success,

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Speaker 1: Nintendo made the transition to toy manufacturer, and honestly, they

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Speaker 1: never looked back after that.

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Speaker 2: So I was just on my phone and I looked

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Speaker 2: up the box of the Ultra Hand and it is amazing.

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Speaker 2: There's like one version that's a cartoon box and it's

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Speaker 2: got two kids happily stealing some sort of money person

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Speaker 2: from businessman.

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Speaker 1: That's good marketing.

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Speaker 2: And there's this other that's like a real life pick

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Speaker 2: and it's got a boy in the background using this

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Speaker 2: ultrahnd to like maybe grab something off a top shelf,

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Speaker 2: while this girl in the foreground seems to be, I

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Speaker 2: don't know, passing a tomato across the room to her dad.

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Speaker 2: It's amazing. Also, why would you get this for your kids?

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Speaker 2: Like it only encourages like theft and mischief.

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Speaker 1: I mean, but it does look kind of fun. Those

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Speaker 1: pictures are ridiculous though, But thankfully Nintendo brought Gunpay along

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Speaker 1: for the ride as they developed more and he was

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Speaker 1: promoted from this maintenance engineer to the head of product development,

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Speaker 1: and that's where he helped create all these different unusual toys,

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Speaker 1: and that includes Nintendo's first feature electronics, and that first

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Speaker 1: one was called the.

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Speaker 2: Love Tester, so I thought we were past the more

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Speaker 2: questionable bits of Nintendo's history.

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Speaker 1: Well, you know, although this was aimed at a slightly

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Speaker 1: older crowd, the Love Tester was a whole lot tamer

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Speaker 1: than those pay by the hour hotels you mentioned earlier.

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Speaker 1: That's just so discussing. Was this small device that kind

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Speaker 1: of looked like a vault meter with two wires sticking

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Speaker 1: out of it, and there was this small silver disc

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Speaker 1: at the end of each wire, and the idea was

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Speaker 1: that a couple would hold hands while each person held

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Speaker 1: one of the discs, and so they had this resulting

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Speaker 1: level of love that would then be displayed on the screen.

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Speaker 1: And it used the scale from zero to one hundred.

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Speaker 2: So, I mean, it's clearly a cute, gimmicky item. But

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Speaker 2: when'd the love Tester actually test love Mango?

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Speaker 1: You don't believe this really worked. I mean, it was

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Speaker 1: most likely the electric conductivity of the couple. I don't know,

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Speaker 1: like if their palms were sweaty, it would affect it.

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Speaker 1: But you know, the specifics really didn't matter that much,

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Speaker 1: at least not to the target customers. There's this great

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Speaker 1: site I found as we were doing our research called

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Speaker 1: Before Mario, and it explains that dating culture in Japan

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Speaker 1: during the nineteen sixties was actually still pretty strict, so

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Speaker 1: really any excuse to hold hands and strike up conversation

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Speaker 1: was welcome.

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Speaker 2: That's interesting.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And so that's why the Love Tester was

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Speaker 1: such a success. It was a really smart idea for

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Speaker 1: that time, and because it made Nintendo so much money,

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Speaker 1: the company continued to dabble in electronic toys, you know,

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Speaker 1: when video games were just starting to make their debut.

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Speaker 2: Sure, so, I mean we're talking about the late seventies here,

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Speaker 2: when our kids just started to take off.

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Speaker 1: That's right. But you know, gun Pays an extraordinary thinker

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Speaker 1: because he actually had his sight set on a different market.

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Speaker 1: The one day, while riding a commuter train to work,

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Speaker 1: he noticed this other businessman playing with his calcul later

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Speaker 1: just to kind of keep himself busy, I guess, and

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Speaker 1: this gave Gunpay the idea for a new line of

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Speaker 1: handheld video games. You know that maybe would use the

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Speaker 1: same LCD screen and that display technology that a calculator

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Speaker 1: would use, except in this case the graphics would be

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Speaker 1: used to create characters and then maybe objects that could

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Speaker 1: be set against this pre printed background. Scene, and so

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Speaker 1: you'd have this built in controller buttons on either side

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Speaker 1: of the screen that would allow the player to move

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Speaker 1: a character around, you know, to complete basic task, I guess.

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Speaker 1: And so one early model of these Nintendo game and

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Speaker 1: watch systems had the player control this deep sea diver.

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Speaker 1: He just had to go from one side of the

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Speaker 1: screen to the other side of the screen and he

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Speaker 1: would claim a sunken treasure chest there and all the

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Speaker 1: while he was avoiding the moving tentacles of this grabby octopus.

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Speaker 1: How captivating is this game?

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Speaker 3: Though?

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Speaker 2: I mean, I actually vaguely remember those games as kids

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Speaker 2: and really wanting one, but they were so expensive. And

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Speaker 2: of course that actually brings us full circle because it's

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Speaker 2: actually these game and watch systems where the dpad was

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Speaker 2: used for the first time.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's right, although I just had a memory. Do

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Speaker 1: you remember when we took that computer science one oh

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Speaker 1: one class and we had to make a fish tank

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Speaker 1: where the fish would just go one side the other.

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Speaker 1: We're basically computer science geniuses, that's right. But back to

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Speaker 1: the D pad, you know, it was another little master

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Speaker 1: stroke from Gunpay, and he'd run into problems while trying

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Speaker 1: to adapt Nintendo's successful Donkey Kong arcade game for the

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Speaker 1: handheld market, and unlike most handheld games at the time,

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Speaker 1: which only had the player moving left to right, Donkey

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Speaker 1: Kong was pretty different because it had them moving along

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Speaker 1: both the X and the Y axis, which we both

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Speaker 1: understand what that means as computer science.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, it is funny, like you run along

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Speaker 2: the platforms, but you also have to climb the ladders

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Speaker 2: and reach the top where Donkey Kong's keeping your kidnapped girlfriend,

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Speaker 2: right right. But I went to a pizza place this

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Speaker 2: weekend with my kids in town here and they had

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Speaker 2: a few old school nesas setup while you're waiting, and

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Speaker 2: my four year old was actually trying to play Donkey

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Speaker 2: Kong and she had no idea what she was doing,

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Speaker 2: and she was really angry that this ape was like

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Speaker 2: tossing barrels.

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Speaker 1: That's pretty great, all right. Well, here's where I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: hand the baton off to you, because it sounds like

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Speaker 1: Gunpey was the guy at the forefront of electronic gaming,

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Speaker 1: but actually someone else came up with the games like

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Speaker 1: Donkey Kong and Mario and Zelda.

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Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, that's true. So credit for those goes to

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Speaker 2: Shigeru Miyamoto, also known as the father of modern video games.

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Speaker 2: Like his creativity and attention to detail was this massive

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Speaker 2: part of Nintendo's success when it transitioned into home consoles

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Speaker 2: in the eighties.

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Speaker 1: All right, well, we should definitely talk about what he

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Speaker 1: brought to the table and how it affected the video

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Speaker 1: game industry going forward from there. But before we do that,

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Speaker 1: why don't we take a quick break. You're listening to

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Speaker 1: Part Time Genius and we're talking about how Nintendo made

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Speaker 1: the transition from Playing card manifest to video game icon.

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Speaker 1: All right, Mango, So, Shagero Miyamoto is the mastermind behind

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Speaker 1: Super Mario Brothers and that whole series and really kind

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Speaker 1: of a gaming legend. But how did he wind up

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Speaker 1: working at Nintendo in the first place?

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Speaker 2: So, I mean, to be honest, there might have been

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Speaker 2: a little nepotism involved, because Miyamoto's father was able to

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Speaker 2: line up an interview for him right out of college

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Speaker 2: and he had some connections with Nintendo. But once Miyamoto

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Speaker 2: had his foot in the door, the young designer impressed everyone,

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Speaker 2: like he had all these great toy ideas, and he

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Speaker 2: started out as kind of a staff artist for the

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Speaker 2: company's planning department. And this was in nineteen seventy seven,

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Speaker 2: and he's still with the company today. I mean, that's

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Speaker 2: forty years since Nintendo hired him, and he's never worked

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Speaker 2: a single day for any other company. It's pretty incredible.

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Speaker 2: That is pretty incredible.

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Speaker 1: And obviously he's an insane talent, and we'll find out

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Speaker 1: why the company wanted to keep him. But what kind

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Speaker 1: of stuff was he working on in those early days.

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Speaker 1: I mean, he couldn't have come up with Mario right

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Speaker 1: out of the gate.

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Speaker 2: Right well, I mean yes and no. So in the

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Speaker 2: early nineteen eighties, Nintendo tried to expand into the North

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Speaker 2: American arcade scene, but one of their earliest efforts, which

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Speaker 2: was this sci fi shooting game called Radarscope, it failed

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Speaker 2: to find an audience outside of Japan. So one of

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Speaker 2: Miyamoto's first assignments was to build a new, low cost

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Speaker 2: game using the existing tech and this engine of Radarscope.

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Speaker 2: And that way the company could you know, rejigger and

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Speaker 2: convert the thousands of arcade cabinets they already had into

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Speaker 2: something fresh. And Miyamoto was eager to prove himself, so

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Speaker 2: under the mentorship of gunpay. He came up with this

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Speaker 2: idea for Donkey Kong. Wow, and you should explain what

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Speaker 2: that has to do with Mario though, right, so nothing

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Speaker 2: at first. Originally the game was going to be based

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Speaker 2: on Popeye the Sailorman, but when the license for that

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Speaker 2: property fell through, Miamoto redesigned the game to include original characters.

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Speaker 2: So the British villain of Bluto became this gorilla named

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Speaker 2: Donkey Kong, their perpetual damsel in distress, Olive Oil, became

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Speaker 2: a woman named Pauline, and Popeye got turned into this

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Speaker 2: carpenter named Jumpman. And since Jumpman is the catchiest of

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Speaker 2: names today, he goes by Mario.

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Speaker 1: And so it's the same character definitely.

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Speaker 2: So according to the story, the president of Nintendo of

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Speaker 2: America noticed the similarity between the Italian landlord they had,

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Speaker 2: the one they'd been renting warehouse space from, and the

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Speaker 2: mustachio Jumpman, and the Nintendo crewe nicknamed the character Mario

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Speaker 2: in his honor, and by the time the carpenter turned

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Speaker 2: a plumber and was ready for his breakout role into

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Speaker 2: his own series, the nickname it stuck.

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Speaker 1: Oh that's pretty great, and it actually reminds me of

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Speaker 1: another story about early Nintendo, or at least the video

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Speaker 1: game phase. So apparently, Donkey Kong was a big hit

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Speaker 1: for the company, pulling in over one hundred and eighty

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Speaker 1: million dollars in just a year after its release. Eighty

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Speaker 1: million dollars then, I mean, that's a lot of money.

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Speaker 1: But with all that success came the attention of Universal Studios,

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Speaker 1: who now believed that the game was infringing on its

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Speaker 1: King Kong copyright, and the studio made some pretty tough demands,

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Speaker 1: insisting that Nintendo destroy all unsold copies of the game

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Speaker 1: and hand over every penny they had made along the way.

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Speaker 2: So I mean, I'm guessing Nintendo didn't go for any

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Speaker 2: of that.

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Speaker 1: No, not so much. Instead, they lawyered up and proved

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Speaker 1: that not only did the game have nothing to do

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Speaker 1: with the events of the movie, but Universal's copyright had

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Speaker 1: long since expired. Anything that actually meant King Kong was

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Speaker 1: now in the public domain. How crazy is That's amazing

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Speaker 1: which we had snapped it up, But that isn't the

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Speaker 1: craziest part. Actually, it turns out that Universal had allowed

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Speaker 1: Tiger Electronics to create this game based on King Kong,

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Speaker 1: and it was actually kind of a knockoff of Donkey Kong.

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Speaker 1: So in the end, the court ruled in Nintendo's favor

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Speaker 1: and Universal was made to pay the company millions in damage.

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Speaker 2: That's amazing.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. So, actually, Nintendo's lawyer, John Kirby, he was given

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Speaker 1: this brand new sailboat as a thank you gift, and

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Speaker 1: of course he christened it the Donkey Kong. But that

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Speaker 1: name may sound familiar, because the best part is he

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Speaker 1: also got a character named after him, and that is

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Speaker 1: the character Kirby.

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Speaker 2: Oh I love that. I like that. Not only did

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Speaker 2: he get this new boat, but he also got video

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Speaker 2: game immortality.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, no kidding.

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Speaker 2: So I'm glad you mentioned knockoff games because that speaks

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Speaker 2: to something I don't think a lot of people remember,

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Speaker 2: and that's that America's video game industry was in really

404
00:19:05,840 --> 00:19:08,399
Speaker 2: bad shape in the early eighties. In fact, it was

405
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Speaker 2: almost on the verge of total collapse. So companies like

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Speaker 2: Calico and Atari, they've made a killing in their early days,

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Speaker 2: but their lack of foresight left them with no way

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Speaker 2: to keep unlicensed games from being designed and released for

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Speaker 2: the systems. So as a result, there were tons of cheap,

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Speaker 2: low quality software and games out there, and frustrated buyers

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Speaker 2: and all these parents and kids who were disappointed in

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Speaker 2: the quality of the products.

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Speaker 1: Well, and that had to be a huge headache for Nintendo, right,

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Speaker 1: I mean, they released their first home game console in

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Speaker 1: Japan in nineteen eighty three, so of course the next

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Speaker 1: logical step was bringing it to the Western market. But

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Speaker 1: then all of a sudden, the rug gets pulled out

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Speaker 1: from under them and it starts to look like video

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Speaker 1: games will never make it out of the arcade in

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Speaker 1: the US exactly.

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Speaker 2: But the company couldn't afford to let a whole market

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Speaker 2: fall by the wayside, so they came up with this

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Speaker 2: new battle plan. So first Nintendo developed a lockout chip

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Speaker 2: to prevent companies from releasing unauthorized games, and then they

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Speaker 2: redesigned the system itself to avoid any bad connotations that,

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Speaker 2: you know, home video game systems might have developed among consumers.

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Speaker 1: Wait, but so how do you make a video game

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Speaker 1: system not look like a video game system.

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Speaker 2: By making it look more like a VCR Apparently? Oh okay, Yeah,

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Speaker 2: So in Japan, Nintendo's first system was known as the

431
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Speaker 2: Famicon or a family computer, and it loaded from the top,

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Speaker 2: so the games were inserted vertically. The way, you know,

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Speaker 2: you'd put a game in an old atari. But for

434
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Speaker 2: the US release, the system was given this like flip

435
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Speaker 2: up panel where cartridges would be inserted like a VHS tape.

436
00:20:36,320 --> 00:20:39,000
Speaker 1: That's pretty interesting. Actually, it reminds me this is kind

437
00:20:39,040 --> 00:20:41,359
Speaker 1: of unrelated, but it's a little bit like how Subway

438
00:20:41,400 --> 00:20:45,680
Speaker 1: realized if you compared their sandwiches to other sandwiches, you've

439
00:20:45,720 --> 00:20:49,520
Speaker 1: got this mediocre proposition. But when you compare a sandwich

440
00:20:49,560 --> 00:20:52,240
Speaker 1: to other fast foods, suddenly it seems like you know,

441
00:20:52,280 --> 00:20:54,280
Speaker 1: this helped the idea exactly.

442
00:20:54,359 --> 00:20:58,439
Speaker 2: So they reframed this as modern family entertainment, and it

443
00:20:58,520 --> 00:21:02,000
Speaker 2: was also renamed as the Nintendo Entertainment System or the NES,

444
00:21:02,040 --> 00:21:05,040
Speaker 2: to further obscure its role as a piece of gaming hardware.

445
00:21:05,480 --> 00:21:07,639
Speaker 2: And then they played with the color scheme, so instead

446
00:21:07,640 --> 00:21:10,040
Speaker 2: of being like bright red and white like the Japanese

447
00:21:10,119 --> 00:21:12,760
Speaker 2: version was, they muted it down to this two tone

448
00:21:12,840 --> 00:21:13,840
Speaker 2: gray color scheme.

449
00:21:14,600 --> 00:21:16,800
Speaker 1: So the strategy for the US was to kind of

450
00:21:16,800 --> 00:21:19,200
Speaker 1: make it duller. Did that end up working?

451
00:21:19,440 --> 00:21:21,840
Speaker 2: Yeah it did, but consumers were only part of the hurdle.

452
00:21:21,960 --> 00:21:24,680
Speaker 2: Like Nintendo also had to deal with retailers, and when

453
00:21:24,680 --> 00:21:27,000
Speaker 2: it was time to launch the NES, in nineteen eighty five,

454
00:21:27,359 --> 00:21:30,640
Speaker 2: most stores were hesitant to devote any shelf space to another,

455
00:21:30,720 --> 00:21:34,359
Speaker 2: you know, slow selling video game system. So to solve

456
00:21:34,359 --> 00:21:37,840
Speaker 2: that problem, Nintendo came up with this robotic accessory that

457
00:21:37,920 --> 00:21:42,560
Speaker 2: they dubbed ROB. It was the Robotic Operating Buddy, and

458
00:21:42,720 --> 00:21:45,199
Speaker 2: when the marketing push for the NES began, Rob the

459
00:21:45,280 --> 00:21:47,800
Speaker 2: Robot was front and center, helping to assure parents and

460
00:21:47,840 --> 00:21:50,520
Speaker 2: store owners that the NES was this worthy investment.

461
00:21:51,160 --> 00:21:52,719
Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of funny to think that this

462
00:21:52,840 --> 00:21:57,240
Speaker 1: physical toy robot being a selling point for a video game.

463
00:21:57,280 --> 00:21:59,640
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just the opposite. Now, most kids would

464
00:21:59,640 --> 00:22:02,280
Speaker 1: pick an eye iPad over an action figure any day.

465
00:22:02,280 --> 00:22:04,920
Speaker 2: I would think, Yeah, I mean, that's definitely true. And honestly,

466
00:22:05,080 --> 00:22:07,879
Speaker 2: ROB was never a hot item, like the robot was

467
00:22:07,920 --> 00:22:11,280
Speaker 2: this last minute edition solely designed to move units, so

468
00:22:11,320 --> 00:22:13,560
Speaker 2: his interaction with the system was limited to a few

469
00:22:13,560 --> 00:22:17,000
Speaker 2: week titles that you know, hardly anyone remembers today, but

470
00:22:17,440 --> 00:22:20,199
Speaker 2: none of that really mattered. Like ROB was basically this

471
00:22:20,400 --> 00:22:22,840
Speaker 2: trojan horse. It was a way of sneaking a quality

472
00:22:22,920 --> 00:22:26,640
Speaker 2: video game system into American society without much notice, and

473
00:22:26,840 --> 00:22:28,720
Speaker 2: once he was there, people were able to play like

474
00:22:28,800 --> 00:22:32,600
Speaker 2: Super Mario Brothers and Duck Hunt and kid Icarus or whatever.

475
00:22:33,160 --> 00:22:36,120
Speaker 2: At that point, like nobody was complaining, and in fact,

476
00:22:36,119 --> 00:22:38,840
Speaker 2: the rules worked so well that by nineteen eighty eight,

477
00:22:38,960 --> 00:22:42,200
Speaker 2: over six million NES consoles and more than thirty three

478
00:22:42,200 --> 00:22:44,359
Speaker 2: million games had been sold in the US. And the

479
00:22:44,400 --> 00:22:45,879
Speaker 2: systems weren't cheap either.

480
00:22:46,080 --> 00:22:48,720
Speaker 1: Oh that's pretty crazy. Yeah, when you're talking about Duck Hunt,

481
00:22:48,840 --> 00:22:51,120
Speaker 1: these additions to the games. I remember playing that game

482
00:22:51,160 --> 00:22:53,359
Speaker 1: and just how close the gun would be to the

483
00:22:53,440 --> 00:22:57,199
Speaker 1: TV screen, like it was basically touching the screens. Cheating,

484
00:22:57,200 --> 00:22:58,920
Speaker 1: but it felt good, you know, to win. That was

485
00:22:59,080 --> 00:23:01,000
Speaker 1: That's the most experience I had with Hunting, but I

486
00:23:01,000 --> 00:23:05,080
Speaker 1: was pretty good. And when it gets out, but this

487
00:23:05,240 --> 00:23:08,199
Speaker 1: was definitely some smart strategy. And I guess robots were

488
00:23:08,240 --> 00:23:10,480
Speaker 1: super popular back then. I mean that's right around the

489
00:23:10,520 --> 00:23:15,000
Speaker 1: time when you know, Transformers and Voltron and short Circuit

490
00:23:15,000 --> 00:23:15,560
Speaker 1: we're popular.

491
00:23:15,600 --> 00:23:16,360
Speaker 2: Short Circuit two.

492
00:23:16,400 --> 00:23:18,800
Speaker 1: Short Circuit two was so good. But you know, I

493
00:23:18,840 --> 00:23:21,520
Speaker 1: do like how the story kind of shows Nintendo drawing

494
00:23:21,560 --> 00:23:23,920
Speaker 1: on its experience as a toy company, you know, because

495
00:23:24,240 --> 00:23:26,280
Speaker 1: I actually think there's a case to be made for

496
00:23:26,440 --> 00:23:29,640
Speaker 1: still thinking of Nintendo as a toy maker first, rather

497
00:23:29,720 --> 00:23:31,560
Speaker 1: than maybe it's a video game company.

498
00:23:31,920 --> 00:23:33,800
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I think that's an interesting line of

499
00:23:33,840 --> 00:23:35,520
Speaker 2: thinking and I definitely want to hear more about what

500
00:23:35,560 --> 00:23:37,440
Speaker 2: you want to say about that. But uh, why don't

501
00:23:37,480 --> 00:23:46,040
Speaker 2: we take a little break first?

502
00:23:47,080 --> 00:23:48,440
Speaker 1: Okay, Mango, it's quiz time.

503
00:23:48,560 --> 00:23:49,119
Speaker 3: Are you ready?

504
00:23:49,240 --> 00:23:50,679
Speaker 1: Mm hm? Well, I guess we're not the ones that

505
00:23:50,760 --> 00:23:52,640
Speaker 1: really have to be ready. We're gonna we're gonna play

506
00:23:52,640 --> 00:23:55,359
Speaker 1: a quiz because we're talking Nintendo today, and we decided

507
00:23:55,400 --> 00:23:56,800
Speaker 1: to bring on one of our friends from here and

508
00:23:56,880 --> 00:24:00,000
Speaker 1: How Stuff Works, also the producer of the always brilliant

509
00:24:00,119 --> 00:24:02,879
Speaker 1: Tech Stuff Ramsey. You welcome to part time genius. Glad

510
00:24:02,880 --> 00:24:05,240
Speaker 1: to be here, all right, are you nervous about this quiz?

511
00:24:05,480 --> 00:24:06,000
Speaker 3: Very nervous?

512
00:24:06,160 --> 00:24:06,880
Speaker 2: Okay?

513
00:24:07,359 --> 00:24:09,920
Speaker 1: But before we do the quiz, you are a big

514
00:24:10,080 --> 00:24:12,720
Speaker 1: video game fan. So, so what's your go to console

515
00:24:12,840 --> 00:24:14,000
Speaker 1: and video game now?

516
00:24:14,119 --> 00:24:17,800
Speaker 3: It is actually a PlayStation four? Okay, but I grew

517
00:24:17,880 --> 00:24:20,200
Speaker 3: up playing pretty much most of the consoles. I still

518
00:24:20,200 --> 00:24:22,760
Speaker 3: have my Atari twenty six hundred console that still works

519
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:26,120
Speaker 3: nice and collection of games for that. But it's definitely

520
00:24:26,160 --> 00:24:28,200
Speaker 3: not attached to television because it's a process.

521
00:24:28,320 --> 00:24:31,320
Speaker 4: Okay, but you had an original Nintendo as well?

522
00:24:31,680 --> 00:24:32,560
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, I did.

523
00:24:32,600 --> 00:24:34,680
Speaker 4: All right, well that qualifies you to play this.

524
00:24:34,680 --> 00:24:36,119
Speaker 2: Game, right, Okay, all right, that's right.

525
00:24:36,200 --> 00:24:38,040
Speaker 4: So mengo, what game are we playing with Ramsey today?

526
00:24:38,119 --> 00:24:42,399
Speaker 2: It's called real unpopular Nintendo game or something we just

527
00:24:42,440 --> 00:24:42,840
Speaker 2: made up.

528
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:46,040
Speaker 1: Okay, you're right. So we're going to give you the

529
00:24:46,119 --> 00:24:49,000
Speaker 1: name of a game and a quick description and you

530
00:24:49,160 --> 00:24:50,920
Speaker 1: just have to tell if it's real or if it's

531
00:24:50,920 --> 00:24:51,880
Speaker 1: something that we made up.

532
00:24:52,040 --> 00:24:53,600
Speaker 2: And some of them are a Nintendo game, some of

533
00:24:53,640 --> 00:24:55,000
Speaker 2: them are Super Nintendo games.

534
00:24:55,080 --> 00:24:58,920
Speaker 4: Oh oh, before we get hate mail, all right.

535
00:24:59,080 --> 00:25:03,199
Speaker 1: Question number one baby Boomer, And here's the description. A

536
00:25:03,280 --> 00:25:05,879
Speaker 1: game where a baby escapes his crib and you have

537
00:25:05,920 --> 00:25:09,000
Speaker 1: to use the duck hunt gun to shoot birds, cobras,

538
00:25:09,040 --> 00:25:12,199
Speaker 1: and other annoyances out of the way. Is this a

539
00:25:12,240 --> 00:25:14,120
Speaker 1: real game or something we made up?

540
00:25:14,800 --> 00:25:17,359
Speaker 3: I'm gonna say it is a real game.

541
00:25:17,680 --> 00:25:19,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a real game, just like real life. Or

542
00:25:19,920 --> 00:25:21,800
Speaker 2: use a gun to shoot things out of your baby's way.

543
00:25:22,119 --> 00:25:23,399
Speaker 1: I forgot that was your style.

544
00:25:24,119 --> 00:25:24,560
Speaker 2: Okay.

545
00:25:25,359 --> 00:25:29,080
Speaker 1: Number two, TV Tag the game and here's the description.

546
00:25:29,480 --> 00:25:32,200
Speaker 1: This trivia slash skill game was set in a retirement

547
00:25:32,280 --> 00:25:35,160
Speaker 1: community where you wheeled around your grandfather in a game

548
00:25:35,200 --> 00:25:38,560
Speaker 1: of TV tag Whenever you got tagged, You answer TV

549
00:25:38,680 --> 00:25:42,680
Speaker 1: trivia to unfreeze yourself with the occasional help of your

550
00:25:42,760 --> 00:25:46,800
Speaker 1: daughtering grandfather. Is this real or something we made up?

551
00:25:47,359 --> 00:25:50,080
Speaker 3: I'm gonna say that is something you made up?

552
00:25:50,720 --> 00:25:51,520
Speaker 2: It sounds real.

553
00:25:53,359 --> 00:25:53,680
Speaker 3: Is real?

554
00:25:53,760 --> 00:25:57,440
Speaker 1: Is shooting the things in the way of your baby?

555
00:25:57,960 --> 00:26:01,560
Speaker 4: Yeah? All right?

556
00:26:02,480 --> 00:26:06,480
Speaker 1: Number three? Oh this is good? All right? Bill Lambier's

557
00:26:06,520 --> 00:26:10,240
Speaker 1: Combat Basket Mango is La Lakers fans as kids like,

558
00:26:10,280 --> 00:26:15,040
Speaker 1: we couldn't stand okay, Bill Lambier's Combat Basketball. And here's

559
00:26:15,080 --> 00:26:18,360
Speaker 1: the description. This game is set in a dystopian future

560
00:26:18,640 --> 00:26:21,760
Speaker 1: where the Pistons player runs an ultra violet b ball

561
00:26:21,840 --> 00:26:26,199
Speaker 1: league where players use armor mines and spinning blades to

562
00:26:26,359 --> 00:26:29,159
Speaker 1: get to the hoop. Is this real or something we

563
00:26:29,280 --> 00:26:29,720
Speaker 1: made up?

564
00:26:30,640 --> 00:26:33,280
Speaker 3: I'm gonna say yes. I think I remember seeing some

565
00:26:33,400 --> 00:26:37,359
Speaker 3: reat style basketball game, like you could pick weapons and

566
00:26:37,400 --> 00:26:38,960
Speaker 3: then go out and play basketball.

567
00:26:42,560 --> 00:26:44,680
Speaker 2: It's curious why this wasn't a big seller, but it

568
00:26:44,760 --> 00:26:46,240
Speaker 2: might have something to do with the fact that Bill

569
00:26:46,320 --> 00:26:47,320
Speaker 2: Lambier was the start.

570
00:26:49,119 --> 00:26:51,959
Speaker 1: I couldn't stand Bill Lambier. Number four he is what

571
00:26:52,040 --> 00:26:52,680
Speaker 1: three out of three?

572
00:26:53,160 --> 00:26:53,640
Speaker 3: Three? Three?

573
00:26:53,880 --> 00:26:57,240
Speaker 1: He got two left? Stuart the goat Herder And the

574
00:26:57,359 --> 00:27:00,400
Speaker 1: description In this game, Stuart, the terrible goat herder, tries

575
00:27:00,440 --> 00:27:02,960
Speaker 1: to prove his family wrong by hurting a flock of

576
00:27:03,000 --> 00:27:07,640
Speaker 1: goats through increasingly difficult challenges, from walking them one by

577
00:27:07,640 --> 00:27:10,439
Speaker 1: one across the river to trying to use various skills

578
00:27:10,480 --> 00:27:14,119
Speaker 1: to lure them away from a Pebo Bryson concert. Is

579
00:27:14,160 --> 00:27:16,320
Speaker 1: this real or something we made up?

580
00:27:16,640 --> 00:27:19,320
Speaker 3: This sounds like the worst game ever. I'm going to

581
00:27:19,359 --> 00:27:26,040
Speaker 3: say it's something you made up because I'm hoping nor

582
00:27:26,600 --> 00:27:27,120
Speaker 3: last one.

583
00:27:27,200 --> 00:27:28,679
Speaker 4: You got to get this for the big prize?

584
00:27:28,680 --> 00:27:33,440
Speaker 1: Okay, all right? Number five Home Improvement Power Tool Pursuit

585
00:27:34,000 --> 00:27:37,520
Speaker 1: and the description in this super nes game you shoot

586
00:27:37,520 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 1: dinosaurs and mummies with a nail gun while trying to

587
00:27:40,640 --> 00:27:44,359
Speaker 1: get through a giant TV studio? Is this real or

588
00:27:44,440 --> 00:27:45,520
Speaker 1: something we made up?

589
00:27:46,359 --> 00:27:48,920
Speaker 3: I mean, if ten Allen's name was attached to it,

590
00:27:48,960 --> 00:27:51,040
Speaker 3: I imagine, yeah, totally.

591
00:27:51,520 --> 00:27:52,880
Speaker 2: It's true. It's a real game.

592
00:27:53,000 --> 00:27:54,040
Speaker 1: No way, is this really?

593
00:27:54,480 --> 00:27:57,400
Speaker 2: And the confusing game came with no instructions because real

594
00:27:57,440 --> 00:27:58,840
Speaker 2: men don't need instructions.

595
00:27:58,880 --> 00:28:02,920
Speaker 1: Are you serious? This is a super game?

596
00:28:03,000 --> 00:28:04,840
Speaker 3: Was it based off the TV show? Or I mean?

597
00:28:05,040 --> 00:28:05,200
Speaker 2: Ish?

598
00:28:05,480 --> 00:28:06,440
Speaker 3: Yeah?

599
00:28:06,640 --> 00:28:08,840
Speaker 1: All right, so Ramsey went what five for five?

600
00:28:09,000 --> 00:28:09,160
Speaker 3: Right?

601
00:28:09,720 --> 00:28:10,960
Speaker 1: So what does that entitle him to.

602
00:28:11,400 --> 00:28:14,280
Speaker 2: So Ramsey's going to get a part time genius official

603
00:28:14,320 --> 00:28:17,480
Speaker 2: Certificate of Genius, and we'll be delivering it along with

604
00:28:17,520 --> 00:28:22,119
Speaker 2: a hearty congratulations. Congratulations sounds great, Thank you, thanks so

605
00:28:22,200 --> 00:28:22,840
Speaker 2: much for joining us.

606
00:28:22,920 --> 00:28:23,520
Speaker 3: Appreciate it.

607
00:28:36,280 --> 00:28:38,760
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, so clue me in, why should we think

608
00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:41,080
Speaker 2: of Nintendo as a toy company instead of a video

609
00:28:41,160 --> 00:28:43,800
Speaker 2: game company? And if we do, why is that a

610
00:28:43,800 --> 00:28:44,200
Speaker 2: good thing?

611
00:28:44,680 --> 00:28:47,680
Speaker 1: Well, the second part depends on who you ask. So

612
00:28:47,720 --> 00:28:50,880
Speaker 1: the gaming industry has gone through major changes since Nintendo's

613
00:28:50,920 --> 00:28:54,360
Speaker 1: heyday and the eighties and the early nineties, and adult

614
00:28:54,360 --> 00:28:56,720
Speaker 1: gamers make up a much larger portion of the market

615
00:28:56,760 --> 00:28:59,480
Speaker 1: than they once did, and both the types of games

616
00:28:59,520 --> 00:29:01,840
Speaker 1: being made and the gaming culture as a whole have

617
00:29:01,960 --> 00:29:05,720
Speaker 1: changed really to reflect that new demographic. So, for example,

618
00:29:05,760 --> 00:29:08,080
Speaker 1: a gamer in their early twenties who mostly plays these

619
00:29:08,120 --> 00:29:11,360
Speaker 1: realistic and third person shooter games like Call of Duty,

620
00:29:11,640 --> 00:29:14,320
Speaker 1: they might not think that Nintendo being a toy company

621
00:29:14,440 --> 00:29:15,560
Speaker 1: is such a positive thing.

622
00:29:16,040 --> 00:29:18,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's one thing I noticed a lot while researching.

623
00:29:18,440 --> 00:29:21,200
Speaker 2: Like the other big names and video games I'm talking about,

624
00:29:21,240 --> 00:29:24,560
Speaker 2: like Microsoft and Sony, they're largely known for their computing

625
00:29:24,680 --> 00:29:29,520
Speaker 2: power and that makes them really intense immersive gaming experiences,

626
00:29:29,560 --> 00:29:33,120
Speaker 2: but Nintendo is seen is almost like this quirkier, more playful,

627
00:29:33,680 --> 00:29:35,160
Speaker 2: almost this underpowered option.

628
00:29:35,560 --> 00:29:37,200
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the interesting thing to me is that the

629
00:29:37,240 --> 00:29:39,800
Speaker 1: difference you're noting is completely intentional.

630
00:29:40,200 --> 00:29:40,320
Speaker 3: You know.

631
00:29:40,400 --> 00:29:42,760
Speaker 1: Thanks to the video game bust in the mid eighties,

632
00:29:42,840 --> 00:29:45,680
Speaker 1: Nintendo had a clear playing field when they arrived on

633
00:29:45,720 --> 00:29:49,480
Speaker 1: the scene, but when Sega began releasing their own rival consoles,

634
00:29:49,560 --> 00:29:53,560
Speaker 1: soon to be followed by Sony and Microsoft, Nintendo quickly

635
00:29:53,600 --> 00:29:56,440
Speaker 1: found itself locked into a graphical arms race.

636
00:29:56,520 --> 00:29:59,600
Speaker 2: Really sure, so this is when the so called console

637
00:29:59,640 --> 00:30:02,480
Speaker 2: wars raging, and each company tried to outdo the other

638
00:30:02,560 --> 00:30:05,600
Speaker 2: with a faster, more powerful hardware that promised to like

639
00:30:05,720 --> 00:30:08,720
Speaker 2: redefine gaming. And after the Game Boys, something's like the

640
00:30:08,720 --> 00:30:12,280
Speaker 2: Super Nintendo, the N sixty four, more buttons on the controllers,

641
00:30:12,320 --> 00:30:15,440
Speaker 2: more immersive graphics. I mean, it seems like Nintendo kept

642
00:30:15,440 --> 00:30:17,640
Speaker 2: pace for a while, but in the end it was

643
00:30:17,680 --> 00:30:19,200
Speaker 2: just like a battle they couldn't win.

644
00:30:19,440 --> 00:30:21,400
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, that's kind of the thing. I don't

645
00:30:21,400 --> 00:30:24,160
Speaker 1: think Nintendo lost so much as it just bowed out.

646
00:30:24,200 --> 00:30:26,040
Speaker 1: I mean, it's almost like the company woke up one

647
00:30:26,080 --> 00:30:28,240
Speaker 1: day and remembered that it would just much rather be

648
00:30:28,360 --> 00:30:30,600
Speaker 1: playing games than fighting wars.

649
00:30:30,880 --> 00:30:34,080
Speaker 2: So what prompted that epiphany, Well, the company was.

650
00:30:34,040 --> 00:30:36,480
Speaker 1: Forced to face some harsh truths back in the early

651
00:30:36,560 --> 00:30:39,960
Speaker 1: two thousands. Its latest console was the GameCube.

652
00:30:39,960 --> 00:30:42,480
Speaker 2: If you remember, I had forgotten about the cube. I mean,

653
00:30:42,560 --> 00:30:44,640
Speaker 2: why were cubes so popularly? Like Apple came out with

654
00:30:44,640 --> 00:30:46,440
Speaker 2: the cube computer too, right, just.

655
00:30:46,400 --> 00:30:49,640
Speaker 1: The shape I guess nobody had ever recognized before. I

656
00:30:49,720 --> 00:30:54,360
Speaker 1: really have no idea, but the Nintendo's GameCube definitely underperformed.

657
00:30:54,560 --> 00:30:56,960
Speaker 1: I mean, it had to compete with Sony's PlayStation two

658
00:30:57,160 --> 00:31:00,480
Speaker 1: and Microsoft's Xbox. And it was during this time that

659
00:31:00,560 --> 00:31:03,960
Speaker 1: new leadership came to Nintendo in the form of Saturo Iwata,

660
00:31:04,400 --> 00:31:06,880
Speaker 1: and he was the first Nintendo president who actually wasn't

661
00:31:06,920 --> 00:31:10,440
Speaker 1: a member of the founding Yamachi family. So a lot

662
00:31:10,440 --> 00:31:12,920
Speaker 1: of shook things up by placing the focus on software

663
00:31:13,040 --> 00:31:16,720
Speaker 1: rather than hardware. Instead of building the most powerful console

664
00:31:16,800 --> 00:31:18,960
Speaker 1: they could and then working backwards to figure out what

665
00:31:19,040 --> 00:31:21,760
Speaker 1: kind of games would take advantage of that power. A

666
00:31:21,760 --> 00:31:24,360
Speaker 1: lot of encourage designers to think up fun and unique

667
00:31:24,400 --> 00:31:27,520
Speaker 1: game concepts first and then create the console to run them,

668
00:31:27,520 --> 00:31:30,520
Speaker 1: which is just a very different way of thinking about it. Yeah,

669
00:31:30,560 --> 00:31:33,200
Speaker 1: so that shift in perspective led to brand new toys

670
00:31:33,400 --> 00:31:36,080
Speaker 1: and to the way video games were played. You think

671
00:31:36,080 --> 00:31:39,240
Speaker 1: about things like the Nintendo DS, which really was built

672
00:31:39,280 --> 00:31:42,680
Speaker 1: off the Game Boy but had this dual touch screen system,

673
00:31:42,960 --> 00:31:46,320
Speaker 1: or maybe the motion controlled home console, the Nintendo Wii,

674
00:31:46,440 --> 00:31:48,720
Speaker 1: and then you have the WE fit so several new

675
00:31:48,800 --> 00:31:50,000
Speaker 1: ideas well.

676
00:31:50,040 --> 00:31:51,840
Speaker 2: I mean, we all know how that worked out for them,

677
00:31:51,880 --> 00:31:53,880
Speaker 2: right like that. We was such a smash hit with

678
00:31:54,000 --> 00:31:57,480
Speaker 2: just about everybody. And I remember seeing all these Weimbledon

679
00:31:57,880 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 2: tournaments at retirement homes and folding tournaments too. It was

680
00:32:01,680 --> 00:32:02,880
Speaker 2: really built for everybody.

681
00:32:03,120 --> 00:32:06,520
Speaker 1: Yeah, we made video games accessible to this wider audience,

682
00:32:06,560 --> 00:32:09,040
Speaker 1: and much wider than it had ever been before. And

683
00:32:09,160 --> 00:32:12,120
Speaker 1: it did so by returning the focus to these simple

684
00:32:12,240 --> 00:32:15,240
Speaker 1: joys of play. So suddenly you've got families gathering in

685
00:32:15,280 --> 00:32:17,880
Speaker 1: their living rooms to play video games together, and not

686
00:32:17,960 --> 00:32:21,240
Speaker 1: just kids, but parents and grandparents. Like you mentioned, this

687
00:32:21,320 --> 00:32:24,040
Speaker 1: is what Awata described as a blue ocean, which was

688
00:32:24,080 --> 00:32:27,760
Speaker 1: this new market free of rivals. The idea was that

689
00:32:27,800 --> 00:32:30,200
Speaker 1: if the offerings were innovative enough, it could spark the

690
00:32:30,240 --> 00:32:33,800
Speaker 1: interest and enthusiasm of anyone looking to have fun. Yeah.

691
00:32:33,800 --> 00:32:36,280
Speaker 1: I actually love that me too. And apparently there were

692
00:32:36,280 --> 00:32:38,520
Speaker 1: a lot of people looking to have fun because the

693
00:32:38,600 --> 00:32:42,600
Speaker 1: We became Nintendo's best selling home console to date actually

694
00:32:42,640 --> 00:32:45,560
Speaker 1: sold over one hundred million units in its lifespan.

695
00:32:45,720 --> 00:32:49,200
Speaker 2: That's pretty incredible. Okay, so clearly Nintendo went its own

696
00:32:49,200 --> 00:32:52,360
Speaker 2: way in terms of creative and business models. But how

697
00:32:52,360 --> 00:32:54,239
Speaker 2: does that make them more of a toy company than

698
00:32:54,240 --> 00:32:56,560
Speaker 2: a video company? And how do you see the difference?

699
00:32:56,880 --> 00:32:59,320
Speaker 1: Well, I really think it comes down to the intention

700
00:32:59,560 --> 00:33:03,280
Speaker 1: behind the product. I mean, when Nintendo changed direction and

701
00:33:03,320 --> 00:33:06,240
Speaker 1: became a toy company in the sixties and seventies, there

702
00:33:06,280 --> 00:33:09,080
Speaker 1: was this sense of freedom and discovery to their products,

703
00:33:09,120 --> 00:33:11,440
Speaker 1: and I think it's because they were experimenting. You know,

704
00:33:11,480 --> 00:33:14,280
Speaker 1: they were dreaming up weird ideas and turning them into

705
00:33:14,320 --> 00:33:17,400
Speaker 1: silly gadgets that were appealing not just because they were

706
00:33:17,480 --> 00:33:20,120
Speaker 1: using the latest and greatest technology, but because they were

707
00:33:20,160 --> 00:33:22,480
Speaker 1: just fun to play with a lot to help the

708
00:33:22,560 --> 00:33:25,640
Speaker 1: return the company to that mindset and the one they

709
00:33:25,680 --> 00:33:27,400
Speaker 1: had when they were just a toy company.

710
00:33:27,920 --> 00:33:30,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's interesting, and it makes sense that a company

711
00:33:30,800 --> 00:33:32,959
Speaker 2: with that kind of history would have a completely different

712
00:33:32,960 --> 00:33:36,640
Speaker 2: culture and ethos than other video game giants. I mean,

713
00:33:37,000 --> 00:33:40,719
Speaker 2: Sony is really a consumer electronics company first, and it's

714
00:33:40,760 --> 00:33:44,000
Speaker 2: a video games as a new revenue stream. And Microsoft

715
00:33:44,120 --> 00:33:47,400
Speaker 2: is this like, you know, digital PC and electronics company first,

716
00:33:47,480 --> 00:33:50,440
Speaker 2: and they figured, we already made computers. What's a game

717
00:33:50,480 --> 00:33:53,680
Speaker 2: console if not a specialized computer. But what's cool is

718
00:33:53,720 --> 00:33:56,760
Speaker 2: that it sounds like Nintendo is leaning into those differences now.

719
00:33:57,000 --> 00:33:59,680
Speaker 1: Oh, definitely. So I found this speech that Miamoto and

720
00:34:00,200 --> 00:34:02,880
Speaker 1: say we should devote an episode to just Miamoto because

721
00:34:02,920 --> 00:34:05,480
Speaker 1: he's such a genius and how he came up with

722
00:34:05,560 --> 00:34:09,120
Speaker 1: Mario and Zelda and so many other games over Nintendo's

723
00:34:09,120 --> 00:34:12,359
Speaker 1: lifespan is definitely worth exploring. But back to the talk.

724
00:34:12,400 --> 00:34:14,440
Speaker 1: He was giving a talk to a group of investors

725
00:34:14,480 --> 00:34:17,160
Speaker 1: a few years back, and there's one that really shows

726
00:34:17,160 --> 00:34:20,240
Speaker 1: how the company is playing to its strengths. So he said,

727
00:34:20,560 --> 00:34:23,359
Speaker 1: Nintendo is known as a video game company, but in

728
00:34:23,400 --> 00:34:27,280
Speaker 1: fact it's also a toy company. Toys make consumers feel

729
00:34:27,280 --> 00:34:30,520
Speaker 1: a sense of wonder. When it comes to video game hardware,

730
00:34:30,800 --> 00:34:33,600
Speaker 1: companies tend to take the similar and rather unified course

731
00:34:33,600 --> 00:34:37,399
Speaker 1: of aiming to beef up the machines functionalities in our

732
00:34:37,440 --> 00:34:40,480
Speaker 1: efforts to differentiate our hardware from others. I believe it's

733
00:34:40,520 --> 00:34:43,280
Speaker 1: important that users experience that feeling that they have played

734
00:34:43,400 --> 00:34:44,400
Speaker 1: with a new toy.

735
00:34:45,440 --> 00:34:47,879
Speaker 2: Well, speaking of that sense of wonder that comes from

736
00:34:47,920 --> 00:34:50,280
Speaker 2: a new toy, have you heard about the secret tribute

737
00:34:50,280 --> 00:34:52,280
Speaker 2: to Iwata that Nintendo hid in its.

738
00:34:52,080 --> 00:34:54,960
Speaker 1: New console in the Switch or what is it?

739
00:34:55,280 --> 00:34:57,920
Speaker 2: Yeah? So, unfortunately, the man who helped Nintendo return to

740
00:34:57,960 --> 00:35:01,799
Speaker 2: its roots passed away in twenty fifteen. He had complications

741
00:35:01,840 --> 00:35:05,560
Speaker 2: from her tumor. But it was especially tough because Iwata

742
00:35:05,640 --> 00:35:08,480
Speaker 2: helped shepherd the new Switch console through its development, and

743
00:35:08,520 --> 00:35:11,080
Speaker 2: suddenly the company was faced with this grim prospect of

744
00:35:11,160 --> 00:35:14,040
Speaker 2: launching it without him. But earlier this year, it was

745
00:35:14,080 --> 00:35:16,320
Speaker 2: discovered that the Nintendo team had actually done something a

746
00:35:16,320 --> 00:35:20,120
Speaker 2: little sneaky. They secretly embedded this digital copy of an

747
00:35:20,160 --> 00:35:23,800
Speaker 2: old nes Golf game within the firmware of every Switch console,

748
00:35:24,280 --> 00:35:26,000
Speaker 2: and the only way to access the game is by

749
00:35:26,040 --> 00:35:29,160
Speaker 2: holding a controller in each hand and replicating a signature

750
00:35:29,239 --> 00:35:31,720
Speaker 2: hand gesture that Iwata used to use in his promotional

751
00:35:31,880 --> 00:35:32,920
Speaker 2: videos for the company.

752
00:35:33,080 --> 00:35:35,560
Speaker 1: Oh that's pretty sweet and a little bit odd. I

753
00:35:35,560 --> 00:35:37,919
Speaker 1: guess why did they choose a golf game?

754
00:35:38,200 --> 00:35:40,560
Speaker 2: Well, the nes Golf was one of the first games

755
00:35:40,560 --> 00:35:43,080
Speaker 2: a Wata program for Nintendo, so it kind of held

756
00:35:43,080 --> 00:35:46,640
Speaker 2: a special significance. And more broadly, it's possible the game

757
00:35:46,719 --> 00:35:50,759
Speaker 2: was meant as this omamori, which is it's kind of

758
00:35:50,800 --> 00:35:53,960
Speaker 2: like the special charm that's traditionally left that Japanese shrines

759
00:35:54,000 --> 00:35:57,280
Speaker 2: to offer protection to departed spirits. So, as one gamer

760
00:35:57,320 --> 00:36:00,640
Speaker 2: put it, Nintendo embedded Iwata's game. I did to watch

761
00:36:00,680 --> 00:36:01,520
Speaker 2: over every unit.

762
00:36:02,560 --> 00:36:04,680
Speaker 1: Are you trying to make me tear up over a video.

763
00:36:04,480 --> 00:36:07,239
Speaker 2: Game right now? But it really does go back to

764
00:36:07,239 --> 00:36:09,799
Speaker 2: what we've been saying about Nintendo, right It's not your

765
00:36:09,840 --> 00:36:13,960
Speaker 2: typical company. It's got this long and weird and complicated history,

766
00:36:14,040 --> 00:36:17,120
Speaker 2: and the childlike approach to game design that it's adopted

767
00:36:17,200 --> 00:36:20,000
Speaker 2: has made sure of that. And the result of it

768
00:36:20,040 --> 00:36:22,240
Speaker 2: is that you end up, whether you call them toys

769
00:36:22,360 --> 00:36:25,279
Speaker 2: or video games, Nintendo products have a level of sincerity

770
00:36:25,320 --> 00:36:27,320
Speaker 2: and heart that separates them from everything else.

771
00:36:27,920 --> 00:36:30,120
Speaker 1: Well. I don't know about you, but all this talk

772
00:36:30,120 --> 00:36:33,000
Speaker 1: of gaming has made me feel kind of competitive, honestly,

773
00:36:33,080 --> 00:36:35,080
Speaker 1: So what do you say we go head to head

774
00:36:35,120 --> 00:36:36,879
Speaker 1: and a little two player backed up?

775
00:36:37,200 --> 00:36:37,480
Speaker 3: I'm in.

776
00:36:47,200 --> 00:36:47,520
Speaker 2: Okay?

777
00:36:47,560 --> 00:36:50,839
Speaker 1: Well, for all the talk of Nintendo's sweetness and sincerity,

778
00:36:50,960 --> 00:36:54,920
Speaker 1: they didn't always abandon their gambling or yakuza rude. So

779
00:36:55,200 --> 00:36:57,400
Speaker 1: did you know that in nineteen ninety one, they tried

780
00:36:57,440 --> 00:37:01,480
Speaker 1: to bring online gambling into homes. According to Kataku, they

781
00:37:01,560 --> 00:37:04,279
Speaker 1: teamed up with the state of Minnesota to create this

782
00:37:04,360 --> 00:37:06,879
Speaker 1: gaming system and a cartridge that you could spend ten

783
00:37:06,960 --> 00:37:11,160
Speaker 1: dollars a month for this subscription gambling service. They sort

784
00:37:11,160 --> 00:37:14,720
Speaker 1: of gamified the lottery with the system. But Nintendo quickly

785
00:37:14,760 --> 00:37:17,560
Speaker 1: realized that maybe creating this gambling game that kids might

786
00:37:17,640 --> 00:37:20,160
Speaker 1: access it wasn't a great idea for their brand, and

787
00:37:20,560 --> 00:37:23,520
Speaker 1: they decided to kill the project before political and religious

788
00:37:23,560 --> 00:37:25,719
Speaker 1: groups could voice their opinions about it.

789
00:37:25,960 --> 00:37:29,719
Speaker 2: That's pretty wild. Did you know that Shigeru Miyamoto is

790
00:37:29,760 --> 00:37:32,520
Speaker 2: considered so valuable to the company that it's in his

791
00:37:32,560 --> 00:37:35,279
Speaker 2: contract that he's not allowed to bike to work. I mean,

792
00:37:35,320 --> 00:37:38,080
Speaker 2: the sixty something designer used to love Viking, but as

793
00:37:38,120 --> 00:37:40,839
Speaker 2: Business Insider put it, the company's too afraid he might

794
00:37:40,880 --> 00:37:41,840
Speaker 2: go the way of Frogger.

795
00:37:44,120 --> 00:37:45,880
Speaker 1: I did not know that. Well, do you know that

796
00:37:45,960 --> 00:37:50,200
Speaker 1: Nintendo used to own the Seattle Mariners. Apparently Nintendo's Japanese

797
00:37:50,280 --> 00:37:53,440
Speaker 1: CEO didn't really care about baseball, but when the team

798
00:37:53,520 --> 00:37:57,040
Speaker 1: was going to move to Saint Petersburg, Florida. Yumochi decided

799
00:37:57,040 --> 00:37:59,239
Speaker 1: to buy the team as a goodwill gesture to the

800
00:37:59,280 --> 00:38:03,239
Speaker 1: city of Seat. Nintendo's American operation is located not far

801
00:38:03,320 --> 00:38:04,880
Speaker 1: from there in the city of Redmond.

802
00:38:05,360 --> 00:38:07,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, that's kind of amazing. And it was

803
00:38:07,200 --> 00:38:09,919
Speaker 2: apparently super controversial at the time because people were worried

804
00:38:09,960 --> 00:38:13,200
Speaker 2: about a foreign entity owning an American baseball team, which

805
00:38:13,239 --> 00:38:13,680
Speaker 2: is crazy.

806
00:38:13,800 --> 00:38:14,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is.

807
00:38:14,560 --> 00:38:16,759
Speaker 2: Did you know the original Super Mario Brothers was all

808
00:38:16,840 --> 00:38:19,680
Speaker 2: drawn on graph paper and it was all colored in

809
00:38:19,719 --> 00:38:22,240
Speaker 2: and when the designers were happy with a certain level,

810
00:38:22,560 --> 00:38:25,120
Speaker 2: that's when they'd send it off to code. Eventually, the

811
00:38:25,120 --> 00:38:27,880
Speaker 2: team started using this internal software to design the games,

812
00:38:27,880 --> 00:38:30,879
Speaker 2: but their tool became so fun to play with that

813
00:38:30,880 --> 00:38:32,959
Speaker 2: that's actually what they released to the public as Super

814
00:38:33,000 --> 00:38:33,640
Speaker 2: Mario Maker.

815
00:38:33,880 --> 00:38:36,680
Speaker 1: Well, speaking of Mario, rpal Nick Green figured this out

816
00:38:36,680 --> 00:38:39,040
Speaker 1: and I love this so much, so he wanted to

817
00:38:39,040 --> 00:38:42,240
Speaker 1: figure out how much Mario runs and swims in Super

818
00:38:42,280 --> 00:38:45,840
Speaker 1: Mario Brothers. If you take out all the bonuses and shortcuts,

819
00:38:46,440 --> 00:38:48,359
Speaker 1: and if you run from the start all the way

820
00:38:48,400 --> 00:38:52,040
Speaker 1: to the castle, he only does about three point four miles.

821
00:38:52,080 --> 00:38:54,920
Speaker 1: And as for the swimming, if you isolate that he

822
00:38:55,000 --> 00:38:57,320
Speaker 1: only actually does about seven and a half laps and

823
00:38:57,400 --> 00:38:58,960
Speaker 1: an Olympic sized pool.

824
00:39:00,000 --> 00:39:02,040
Speaker 2: I mean, Nickorean's a genius, but I do think he's

825
00:39:02,080 --> 00:39:04,600
Speaker 2: discounting how many turtles he's jumping over and how much

826
00:39:04,680 --> 00:39:06,520
Speaker 2: parkore he basically has to do along the way.

827
00:39:06,640 --> 00:39:07,759
Speaker 1: So he's got that six pack.

828
00:39:09,160 --> 00:39:12,000
Speaker 2: So Tristan held up the Konami code in the beginning

829
00:39:12,000 --> 00:39:14,400
Speaker 2: of the show, and I've been waiting to talk about this.

830
00:39:14,719 --> 00:39:16,839
Speaker 2: It's obviously used in pop culture. I mean you find

831
00:39:16,880 --> 00:39:19,520
Speaker 2: it on Archer The Family Guy as an inside joke,

832
00:39:19,600 --> 00:39:21,680
Speaker 2: but from time to time you find it as an

833
00:39:21,680 --> 00:39:24,040
Speaker 2: easter egg on various sites. So a while back, when

834
00:39:24,080 --> 00:39:26,600
Speaker 2: you fired up the code into Google Reader, a bunch

835
00:39:26,640 --> 00:39:29,000
Speaker 2: of cartoon ninjas would pop out onto your screen. I

836
00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:30,680
Speaker 2: don't know if you remember this. It was really fun

837
00:39:30,719 --> 00:39:33,240
Speaker 2: to watch. And when the code was used on ESPN

838
00:39:33,320 --> 00:39:36,279
Speaker 2: dot com, it would bring up all these sparkly unicorns.

839
00:39:36,640 --> 00:39:40,040
Speaker 2: Basically it was a unicorn infestation, and whenever you clicked

840
00:39:40,080 --> 00:39:42,680
Speaker 2: a new sparkle pony would pop up up. That's pretty great,

841
00:39:42,719 --> 00:39:44,759
Speaker 2: But the craziest to me was when Newsweek got in

842
00:39:44,840 --> 00:39:46,800
Speaker 2: on the action, because if you typed in the code.

843
00:39:46,960 --> 00:39:49,560
Speaker 2: The lead article was about zombies attacking parts of the

844
00:39:49,600 --> 00:39:51,759
Speaker 2: East Coast, but I also had these tips for the

845
00:39:51,800 --> 00:39:55,759
Speaker 2: zombie apocalypse, like aim for their heads. And Newsweek only

846
00:39:55,800 --> 00:39:59,680
Speaker 2: partially owned the correction, like a spokesperson said, now we've

847
00:39:59,680 --> 00:40:03,480
Speaker 2: all had laugh, we will be removing it right own

848
00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:04,400
Speaker 2: up to that one.

849
00:40:04,920 --> 00:40:07,200
Speaker 1: All right, well, I feel like we can't finish an

850
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:10,760
Speaker 1: episode without talking about Nintendo Power. You know, the magazine

851
00:40:10,760 --> 00:40:13,000
Speaker 1: and all the tips about games and hyped up the

852
00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:15,839
Speaker 1: new games. And I know we were both subscribers at

853
00:40:15,840 --> 00:40:19,280
Speaker 1: one point, but they also published high scores, and apparently

854
00:40:19,320 --> 00:40:22,160
Speaker 1: Steve Wozniak, you know, the co founder of Apple.

855
00:40:22,239 --> 00:40:23,239
Speaker 2: Was a huge fan.

856
00:40:23,719 --> 00:40:26,440
Speaker 1: He used to keep submitting his scores for Tetris month

857
00:40:26,560 --> 00:40:29,719
Speaker 1: after month, and eventually the magazine had to ask him

858
00:40:29,760 --> 00:40:33,000
Speaker 1: to stop submitting because they couldn't keep printing his name.

859
00:40:33,719 --> 00:40:36,520
Speaker 1: So he finally agreed to it, but not before sending

860
00:40:36,560 --> 00:40:41,800
Speaker 1: in one last entry, Avet's canezo w or his name backwards.

861
00:40:42,520 --> 00:40:45,880
Speaker 2: That's pretty great. I mean that the WAWS was like

862
00:40:46,400 --> 00:40:50,839
Speaker 2: and subscriber to Nintendo Power is just so insane. Yeah,

863
00:40:50,880 --> 00:40:51,960
Speaker 2: you've got to take the crown for that.

864
00:40:52,120 --> 00:40:53,840
Speaker 1: All right, Well, thank you so much, and thank you

865
00:40:53,880 --> 00:40:56,680
Speaker 1: guys for listening. That's it for today's episode. If we

866
00:40:56,800 --> 00:40:59,880
Speaker 1: forgot any of your favorite facts about Nintendo or anything

867
00:41:00,000 --> 00:41:02,799
Speaker 1: related to video games, feel free to send those to us.

868
00:41:02,840 --> 00:41:04,960
Speaker 1: We'd love to hear those facts. You can always email

869
00:41:05,040 --> 00:41:07,960
Speaker 1: us part Time Genius at HowStuffWorks dot com or call

870
00:41:08,000 --> 00:41:10,920
Speaker 1: our twenty four to seven fact hotline. That's one eight

871
00:41:11,000 --> 00:41:13,320
Speaker 1: four four pt Genius. It is still twenty four to

872
00:41:13,320 --> 00:41:16,640
Speaker 1: seven mangos That right, Yes, Okay, that's excellent news. You

873
00:41:16,680 --> 00:41:19,600
Speaker 1: can also hit us up on Facebook or Twitter. Thanks

874
00:41:19,600 --> 00:41:34,440
Speaker 1: so much for listening, Thanks again for listening. Part Time

875
00:41:34,480 --> 00:41:36,680
Speaker 1: Genius is a production of How Stuff Works and wouldn't

876
00:41:36,680 --> 00:41:39,480
Speaker 1: be possible without several brilliant people who do the important

877
00:41:39,480 --> 00:41:41,440
Speaker 1: things we couldn't even begin to understand.

878
00:41:41,560 --> 00:41:43,200
Speaker 2: Tristan McNeil does the editing thing.

879
00:41:43,520 --> 00:41:45,520
Speaker 1: Noel Brown made the theme song and does the mixy

880
00:41:45,560 --> 00:41:46,319
Speaker 1: mixy sound thing.

881
00:41:46,760 --> 00:41:48,879
Speaker 2: Jerry Roland does the exact producer thing.

882
00:41:49,200 --> 00:41:51,600
Speaker 1: Gabe Luzier is our lead researcher, with support from the

883
00:41:51,640 --> 00:41:55,000
Speaker 1: research Army including Austin Thompson, Nolan Brown and Lucas Adams

884
00:41:55,000 --> 00:41:55,279
Speaker 1: and Eve.

885
00:41:55,360 --> 00:41:57,359
Speaker 2: Jeff Cook gets the show to your ears. Good job,

886
00:41:57,440 --> 00:41:58,280
Speaker 2: Eves if.

887
00:41:58,120 --> 00:42:00,160
Speaker 1: You like what you heard, we hope you'll subscribe. If

888
00:42:00,160 --> 00:42:02,359
Speaker 1: you really really like what you've heard, maybe you could leave.

889
00:42:02,280 --> 00:42:04,640
Speaker 2: A good review for us. Do we forget Jason?

890
00:42:05,000 --> 00:42:05,560
Speaker 1: Jason who