Most dudes have a sports team that they root for. Usually it’s the team from their home town, or maybe their home state. I’m not sure what dudes in those big rectangular states do when their state doesn’t have a team. I guess they just latch onto the local high school football team? Maybe? Oh, and they drink. Right. Alcohol. Knew I was forgetting something.
Most dudes even have multiple teams they root for, one for football, one for baseball, one for basketball, one for something called “hockey” and so on.
Most dudes buy jerseys, go to games, have strange superstitions, post grammatically questionable comments on the internet about rival players’ mothers. And so on.
This is what most dudes do.
A couple days ago it occurred to me that the closest thing I have to a sports team is Nintendo. Yeah. Nintendo Nintendo. The video game people. With their Marios and their Warios and their Princesses and their Pokémon. That Nintendo.
That’s normal, right? For a grown man to obsess over the intricacies of a Japanese company that basically makes toys for children? Right? No? It’s not? Okay, I’m getting a “no” vibe here. Moving on.
I’ve got Nintendo on the brain because their new console, the “Wii U” comes out on Sunday.
The Wii U is the successor to the wildly-popular-but-terribly-named “Wii.” It’s compatible with all of the millions of Wii games and accessories out there and has all sorts of tricks of its own that utilize its iPad-like controller with its touch screen and its accelerometers and its GPS and its industrial juicer and and and.
I’d say the Wii U is about six years more advanced than the Wii. Which is good because the Wii launched almost six years ago to the day, on November 19th, 2006. It’s a date I remember well. Why? Because at the time I was standing in line outside Toys R Us in Times Square, supporting my team and waiting to buy a Wii, of course. Because I am a grown man. A grown man who waits outside toy stores for video games in Times Square.
Huh. Well, when you put it like that I can sort of understand the “no” vibe.
Like most dudes, I can’t explain my love for my team. It just is and it always will be. It was never a question.
People aren’t loyal to hometown sports teams because the teams are based in their hometown. They’re loyal because it’s what they grew up with. And I grew up with Nintendo. From that moment on my ninth birthday when I unwrapped that cardboard box containing that grey plastic box into which you inserted smaller, slightly darker grey plastic boxes to play games, I was on Team Nintendo.
I’ve stuck with Nintendo through the good times (the NES), the okay times (the Super NES), the dark times (the Nintendo 64), the even darker times (the GameCube), and back into the light (the Wii).
That’s what a fan does, right? They’re your team. They’re family. You stick with them no matter what. When they’re winning, you’re on top of the world. When they’re losing, you get in arguments with Paul Stanco during math class explaining why Super Nintendo is way better than Sega Genesis. It just is, okay Paul? It has Mode 7! “Blast Processing” is just something a bunch of marketing guys at Sega made up. Geez.
Unfortunately, it looks like the times are getting dark for Nintendo once again. They posted their first annual loss ever last year. Their new handheld, the Nintendo 3DS is getting its lunch eaten by cell phone games (read: iPhones). There’s a lot riding on the Wii U.
So, you’ll be getting a Wii U, right, Pat? Gotta support the team, right?
Here’s the thing, I’m going to level with you here. After all these years— decades, even— my Nintendo fandom is waning.
There was a time when I’d dutifully buy a new Zelda game whenever one came out, even if I still hadn’t even opened the last one I bought. I bought the Nintendo DS on launch day even though it was total shit at that point. I bought a Virtual Boy even though it was total shit forever. I waited in a line that literally wrapped around the block in freezing weather for a Wii. In Times Square, at that. (Which, Times Square being one of the nine circles of Hell, actually warmed things up a bit.)
I think the days of those launch day purchases have come to a close, though. Sure, the Wii U looks like fun. It looks way Uier than the Wii, I’ll give it that. And hell, me being me, I’ll probably buy one some day. But I’m certainly not going to wait in line encircling Toys R Us tomorrow night so I can buy one at midnight. What do I look like, some sort of grown man who waits outside toy stores for video games? What’s that? I do look like one of those? Okay, I’m getting a “yes” vibe here. Interesting.
Point is, my team needs me and I’m not supporting them.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m still on Nintendo’s side. I’m not about to jump ship to Microsoft or Sony, but I might just sit this one out for now. Maybe that makes me a bad fan. My company is in the red, its days are dark, and I’m not doing anything about it. Okay, yeah, that is actually the very definition of a bad fan.
Worse still, I think I’m okay with that.
I’m okay with it because Nintendo is going to be fine. They’ve been around since 1889, for Mario’s sake. The superstitious sports fan in me wants to believe that they need me, but they don’t, really. They’ve got enough yen to go around without me standing in the ninth circle overnight for a higher definition Wii. Industrial juicer be damned.
I’ll catch up with you in a bit Nintendo. You’ll still be there, right?
