Camp Hyrule Interview: George Harrison

Camp Hyrule, an online virtual camp held by Nintendo every year, is under full swing. Every year, Nintendo invites people to take questions from the campers. Even Reggie Fils-Aime, who is now the president of Nintendo of America, has been a featured presenter! We had a transcript of the chat with the Nintendo Senior Online Producer earlier (check it out if you’re thinking of going into web design), Senior Vice President of Operations for Digipen (check it out if you’re thinking of going into game development). Now, we’ve got the transcript with one of the big guys at Nintendo: George Harrison, Vice President of Communications and Corporate Affairs at Nintendo of America.

This guy is one of the big three at Nintendo of America alongside Reggie Fils-Aime and Perrin Kaplan. As a PR guy, he knows how to get around questions with ease. He does so again in this chat, which is a bit disappointing, but you can still try and get something out of it. At least he didn’t beat around the bush in telling us that Zelda: Twilight Princess on the Wii would not use the GCN controller. We’re a li’l disappointed, but we guess that just underscores that nothing’s perfect. He was much faster at answering questions than previous chatters so more questions were answered, check them out.

Click “Full Story” for the transcript. Please excuse any grammar errors and typos as it is a transcript of a live chat.

NOA_ANDY: Chat with George Harrison, Nintendo’s Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications. The show stars in 14 minutes.
NOA_ANDY: Chat with George Harrison, Nintendo’s Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications. The show stars in 14 minutes.
NOA_ANDY: Chat with George Harrison, Nintendo’s Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications. The show stars in 8 minutes.
NOA_ANDY: Chat with George Harrison, Nintendo’s Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications. The show starts in 5 minutes.
NOA_ANDY: Chat with George Harrison, Nintendo’s Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications. The show starts in 1 minute.
NOA_ANDY: I’m very happy to introduce George Harrison, Nintendo’s Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Communications. Welcome, George!
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: Hi everybody … glad to be hear today.
NOA_ANDY: Welcome to Camp Hyrule!
NOA_ANDY: Before we begin, could you please explain what it means to be the Vice President of Marketing and Corp. Communications at Nintendo?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: Basically, I do all the advertising and promotions, as well as all the merchandising and PR activities and am responsible for the online and publications groups.
ZELDANATOR: So George whats a average day at Nintendo for you, what type of tasks you do on a daily basis?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: The average day is far too many meetings and not enough game play time.
RODRIGUEZJR: Hello, I wanted to know if there is any news about the Nintendo Wii, such as release date or price.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We’re not ready yet to announce the release date and price.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We’ll being doing that in the not too distant future.
MODESTMR.GREEN: Mr. Harrison, thanks so much for spending time talking to us. I was just curious, what has your personal experience with Wii been like thus far?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: I am not a really experienced game player and like many people the games have become too complicated for me recently.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: So, when I experiened Wii for the first time, it was instantaneous fun!
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: You may have seen me on the stage at E3 playing with Mr. Miyamoto.
GRETZKEYR99: How is Nintendo’s status with third party developers changing with the Wii?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We made an effort to begin working with the 3rd party publishers much earlier on Wii than we did on GameCube.\
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: After E3, many of them were so excited they initiated additional projects for titles that will launch in 2007.
GAMEHUNTER101: Do you think nintendo can meet the demand for the Wii?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: It’s hard to know what the total demand for Wii will be.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We’ll do our best to supply as much as possible, but there are many consumers around the world who are also hoping to get a Wii this holiday.
JSR: Hi Mr. Harrison! There are a lot of cool looking DS games coming out later this year, but I think that many of them will be lost in the Wii’s hype. How does Nintendo plan to keep the DS on gamers’ minds?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We have very aggressive marketing plans for DS hardware and software.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We know that we will probably sell many more DS units this holiday and have a lot of great titles to tell the consumers about.
TSA: Hi. What is up with the release status of Twilight Princess – is it coming out on GCN everywhere, or just here? Also, will we be able to use the GCN controller for the Wii version?”
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: Zelda TP will be releasing on both GCN and Wii on the same day as the launch of Wii.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: The GCN controller will be able to play the GCN version on the Wii console, but will not be able to play the Wii version.
SUPERHYPERMARIO128III: How do you decide on a marketing campaign, like “Who are you?” or “Touching is good”?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We provide creative direction to our advertising agency and they typically give us several alternatives. In the case of Wii, we are now testing some of those concepts before we decide on our direction.
RAYQUARIAN: Have you made plans for a Wii commercial yet?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We are developing several TV concepts and, once we select a direction, we will produce 3 to 5 different spots. While TV is important, we are increasingly looking to online and other advertising outlets to reach the game fans and the expanded audience.
MARIOISAWSOME3233: In your opinion, what has been the most successfull marketing campaign in Nintendo history?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: I’ve been with Nintendo for almost 15 years, and we have had many successes. I think certainly the launch of Nintendo 64 was a phenomenal experience that we hope to replicate with Wii.
SHADOWLINK19: Hello. With the DS going strong, and the Wii coming out very soon, will the GBA still be receiving anymore games? I can understand third party games will probably come for it, but will Nintendo be focusing on producing anymore first party games for the GBA handheld?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: GameBoy is still a very exciting and appealing product, but developers have limited resources and increasingly are focusing their attention on the DS, so the number of new GameBoy games will begin to shrink in 2007.
W34V3R: When it comes to advertising Nintendo-style, what do you think makes Nintendo stand out? What do you look for when it comes to advertising, oh, say, a Mario game? Do you look for a certain feature to make that advertisement shine in a certain light? Thank you very much for your time, and I look forward to hearing from a true pro.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: In the video game industry, it’s easy for all commercials to look the same. We certainly use our characters to help us stand out, but we also try to find an advertising approach that is unique. If you think about the GameBoy advertising which we referred to as FreeBoy, it was a unique way to present the player and the game experience.
VIDGAMEPLAYA: Hello, Mr. Harrison! I live in an area where most kids play shoot em up games, and buy consoles based on graphics. I was wondering how you might plan to advertise to this group of consumers.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: First, the Wii will be able to deliver dramatically improved graphics over the GameCube. But, if all the player is concerned about is graphics, we may not win them over. Our best chance is to show them the sheer fun of our games.
LOGIEDAN7: Do you think that many people will utilize the Virtual Console to buy their old favorites?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: Certainly, we hope many people will take advantage of the virtual console games that they love from the past., but we also hope that people who have never experienced these games will enjoy them for the first time. Remember, there are other secrets of the virtual console that we won’t reveal until we get closer to launch.
SMASHMANIAC: Since I am currently interested in creating a new small software company, I was wondering how much Nintendo is ready to help new third-party developers to create videogames with innovative ideas. Thank you very much.
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: By showing examples of products like Nintendogs and Brain Age, we hope that developers will recognize that there is an opportunity for unique types of software. The virtual console also offeres the possibility of introducing a new game idea without having to develop the entire game before finding out what its appeal might be.
ENCELADUS: Hello, I have a lot of friends who refuse to buy Nintendo consoles due to the “kiddy” games and image Nintendo has according to them. Will this image change a lot with Wii in comparison with the Gamecube?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: I would say the “kiddy” image is in the eye of the beholder. These same people probably don’t hesitate to watch the Cartoon Network and enjoy a good laugh, so all we can do is make the games as fun as possible and hope that consumers don’t worry so much about what other people think. We need all the Nintendo fans to stand up and support us and lead the way.
NPC: If the Wii becomes a huge sucsess is there a chance we could see more Nintendo stores like the one in New York?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: NWS is a one-of -a-kind store that is really designed to help us communicate marketing messages. It is in an exciting location where we have had Mr. Miyamoto and other guest appearances that we probably couldn’t replicate if we opened several stores.
ZYKE_HYBRIX3: Were you glad to see that there was a 5+ hour wait to use the Wii at E3?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: I was surprised and excited, but I felt for the people who had to spend their whole day just to spend a few minutes with Wii. This Fall, when Wii goes on sale, hopefully everyone will have at least one friend who finds one and can play it at their home.
.SHY: Are they any plan for new (non-classic) Virtual Console games from Nintendo?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: Virtual console offers the possibility for us to create new games, but our focus right now is in getting the Wii hardware launched and new games from Nintendo on the virtual console will be coming sometime after the launch.
NINTENDO_GAL: Why is the marketing decision made for certain games to make it over here to this market (the US) while other games are left in the dust? Will there be a shift towards bringing more Japanese titles over as the popularity of quirky fun games rises due to the DS and quite possibily Wii?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: Basically, we have an internal product review team that screens all the software produced in Japan and makes a recommendation on if there is a market opportunity here. Some games are liked by a small core of people and are difficult to introduce them broadly to all the retailers. We are always open to considering software from Japan if we believe there is enough consumer interest.
NOA_ANDY: We have time for a couple more questions.
0GLASS: What’s the stance on going to public gaming conventions like the penny arcade expo to promote the Wii?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: We are actually planning to attend the Penny Arcade Expo and recently were at the Comicon convention.
NOA_ANDY: … and one final question …
KIRKINOUT: What is the hardest or most stressful part of your job?
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: During any hardware launch, there are thousands of details that need to be managed and also a close coordination with other territories around the world. But, in the end, the successful launch wipes away any of the stress.
NOA_ANDY: Awesome! Thank you very much for taking the time to visit Camp Hyrule 2006!
NOA_GEORGE_HARRISON: Goodbye … great to be with you today. Hopes everybody gets the product of their dreams this holiday!
NOA_ANDY: Bye bye.

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