Usually, when seemingly spectacular news breaks, the VG Ombudsman waits for the initial rampant speculation to die down before sorting out who's right, who's wrong, and whose just sloppy. With speculative reports leaking out of Japan about Nintendo's place in the next console wars, I've decided to forgo that schedule and try to make some sense of the conflicting reports American web sites are offering on the ordeal. We'll see how this works out in the end.
The first I heard of this important story was from a GamerFeed article that summarized a Nihon Keizai Shimbun story (copied by GameCube Europe) as saying that Nintendo "will not be releasing a brand-new video game console for the time being," and instead be "providing new peripherals for the system and a wider, more appealing variety of software." (Note: The VG Ombudsman writes a companion blog for GamerFeed) I was shocked. This news went counter to all the chatter I had been hearing about Nintendo's plans to get into the next console race first, not last. It also seemed strikingly similar to the historically bad decisions that forced Sega to exit the console race. A little cross-checking was in order.
I hopped over to Gamespot, where, sure enough, there was a similar headline staring at me from the newsbox: Nintendo postpones next-gen console?. The content was quite different, though, owing mostly to a boldfaced [UPDATE] at the top of the story quoting Nintendo of America's Beth Llewellyn as calling the Shimbun report "speculation." The article doesn't actually get to Llewelyn's quote until the fourth paragraph, where she adds that parts of the Shimbun article were taken out of context and that "we will launch at the same time as our competitors. Our status hasn't changed." (Minutes later, Gamerfeed updated their story with this same information, crediting GameSpot.) So either this is a case of some mangled journalism on the part of the Shimbun, or a case of some severely crossed wires between Nintendo and its American subsidiary.
A little message board surfing led me to a report from IGN proclaiming "New Console Delayed" in the headline. The rather sensationalistic initial article (whose text I found copied in a GameCritics.com forum thread) went farther than the others, saying Nintendo "has decided not to release a successor to the GameCube," a headline that seems to imply they are leaving the console race for good. Recall that the other stories said Nintendo would focus on the GameCube for the near future, and release its successor later than expected, in 2007 perhaps.
IGN gets bonus points for contrasting this surprising new information with recent quotes from Nintendo of America's George Harrison and Perrin Kaplan saying that Nintendo planned to stay in the console business. However, IGN loses these points by posting the story while still "waiting for an official statement" from Nintendo of America. Oh well, at least they made the effort this time. The updated story bears little resemblance to the initial one, dealing mostly with Nintendo of America's refutation of the charges.
Other outlets are slowly picking up on this story, but not with the speed and fervor I've come to expect form the internet. 1up has a story that analyzes the Shimbun's story for seven paragraphs before noting at the end that Nintendo of America has "scrambled to deny that the company had any plans other than to launch its next console alongside its competitors." So, they're basically saying "this story is pretty worthless, but we'll wait until the end to tell you that." A quick look at Google News shows that Forbes is reporting a refutation from Nintendo of Japan now, so it seems the truth may be able to get its pants on before this particular lie can get around the world. Then again, it is hard to compete with such an interesting lie with something as boring as the truth. How will the video game media handle this one? As video game news authors seem so fond of saying: Only time will tell!
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