Something's got to be done

Something has got to be done about the enemy of european Nintendo fans. An evil more insidious than a £425 PlayStation. More devious, subversive and misleading than a Redmond based Apple wannabe. I call this enemy: Nintendo of Europe.

It is a widely accepted fact that gamers in PAL territories typically get the royal screw job. However, hopes were high that a Nintendo looking to expand the games market and make it more approachable were finally going to do soemthing worthwile with NoE.

This set the scene for Nintendo's press conference at Leipzig Games Convention 2006. Excitingly, it was titled "Wii prove our promise". An hour after it started, European Nintendo fans were reeling from a mighty blow to the gut.

Wii prove our promise was a DS bonanza with two new Wii games (Neither of which wer eparticularly exciting) and a pink DSLite for Europe. No promises were proved, kept or taken back. But they ended it with "Wii prove our promise".

The exaggerated title led many hopeful gamers, European and otherwise, to believe launch details of some kind would be revealed. This did not happen. What did happen would have been lacklustre even with a more approriate title.

This rings of a greater problem facing european Nintendo fans. NoE is simply not very good at what it does. It's not the same Nintendo as they love. It's bad at marketting, it makes very few games, they are small and not ver exciting and they always screw their territory over.

Hardware and games are almost universally last in Europe. NoE is worse than simply late, they always seem out of touch with NoA and NoJ. Often, gamers will know things long before NoE seems to.

It's not on. Europe, hard as Hitler tried to change that fact, exists. We can't be fobbed off by a warehouse and reusing video from E3. One day soon Nintendo are going to ahve to pull the finger out in Europe. Microsoft have their X05/6 etc. events in Europe, Sony make some of their best games in Europe. Both companies give Europe a smoother ride than Nintendo do (Allbeit still lacklustre compared to Japan and the US).

Mr. Iwata is going to have to come over here and sort this mess out. NoE needs fixing and European gamers need cheering up. Morale is low after the Leipzig disaster. Details on Wii are now expected at an NoA event on September 14th.

And if Europe is getting Wii after a gap bigger than the one between Japan and the US (Assuming there is one. If not, they'll probably allow a week of delay until Europe), the European Nintendo fans might go berserk.

It is time, Nintendo, to look at your globe. Europe wants to be loved too.