Nintendo Wii and the customer experience

This fascinating interview with Genyo Takeda, who developed the Wii, shows Nintendo's commitment to the customer experience. From Wii.Nintendo.com:

[The Wii] has turned out to be something completely different from what was predicted in the mainstream technology Roadmaps.

This may sound paradoxical, but if we had followed the existing Roadmaps we would have aimed to make it "faster and flashier." In other words, we would have tried to improve the speed at which it displays stunning graphics.

But we could not help but ask ourselves, "How big an impact would that direction really have on our customers?" During development, we came to realise the sheer inefficiency of this path when we compared the hardships and costs of development against any new experiences that might be had by our customers.

See also: Video games and the user experience and part 1 of the same thread.

(thanks, kottke)

• Feb 22, 2007
• IN: Customer Experience
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