Nintendo of America - Shootings in PS3 Queues Apparently Amusing

It appears that not engaging brain before opening gob at Nintendo is not the sole preserve of GameCube killer, Perrin Kaplan. Nintendo of America’s president and COO, the utterly American, Reggie Fils-Aime, opened wide and slammed foot onto larynx in a recent interview^† when talking about the queues for the PS3 launch in the United States.

Commenting on the people queuing for PS3 he said, “They had no lines, let’s be clear,” OK, so that’s an opinion, but then he ‘went Perrin’ on the interviewer who had pointed out that there were in fact some queuing, “Were those the people ducking to not get shot? I’m just not sure.”

Sure, this flippant comment might not be on a corporate par with actually murdering the GameCube, but it does indicate that maybe NOA’s top people are ever-so slightly out of touch with the real world where human beings don’t tend to find amusement in other human beings getting shot at.

It is also exactly the kind of comment that could be used against the industry.

Neither Phil Harrison, president of SCE worldwide studios, nor Shane Kim, vice president Microsoft Game Studios, were quite as arrogant as Reggie. Harrison, rather defensively, merely pointed out that 2007 is the, “year of software” and that “we have a big boat with hundreds of thousands of them (PS3s) on the way to Europe”. While Kim, amid a quagmire of corporate nonsense, which included being “super excited”, pointed out that, “We outsold Wii and PS3 in December”.

Harrison certainly does have a point. Whether you're bowled over by the early Wii offerings, or you're comfortable with waiting for Halo 3 or you're simply looking forward to Virtua Fighter 5 on PS3, sooner or later - and it's going to be this year - it will all come down to may the best games win.

Media-loving Reggie couldn’t resist a few more digs at the PS3 – obviously Xbox is not perceived as much of a threat to the rampant Nintendo – saying, “I believe that their (Sony) proposition was based on this being essentially a cheap Blu-ray player.” And guess what, “I have no motivation to play Blu-ray”, really Reg?

So, is Nintendo’s US wing letting smug get in the way of successful? Let’s hope that this kind of smugness doesn’t translate into extended slackness on producing decent Wii and DS games to follow on from the enormous wins of the last few months.

Reggie's parting comments were more considered, when (absurdly) asked if Nintendo has won the 'game war'. "We have won the first round... but this is a long game."

^{† Source: Gamehead}