Kirby’s Adventure Is Now On Sale – Nintendo’s 30th Anniversary Promotion
You have 24 hours days to meet their demands 1,558 Zambian Kwacha in unmarked bills, and we’ll release Kirby’s Adventure to you unharmed and on your WiiU. That’s right, for the price of less than a third of a dollar, you can own this Nintendo Classic, thanks to Nintendo’s ongoing 30th Anniversary of the Famicom. As a boon to the idea of Ninty being the current (yet it was not always so) good guys of the console market, they’re offering you a handful of some of the games you already own for basically free to anyone with enough expendable income to own a WiiU. Granted, most of the reason for this promotion, other than brownie points with the already die-hard Nintendo fans, is likely to get more people to try out the eShop.
With all of that said, how about a brief history lesson in Nintendo for the people who likely already know all of this information? Founded in 1889 by one Fusajiro Yamauchi, Nintendo was a manufacturer of Hanafuda Cards, which I will fairly horribly explain by calling them Eastern answer to our standard playing cards. Eventually expanding its empire, Nintendo at one point owned a taxi company, toymaking factory, and most infamously, a chain of “love hotels”, which are exactly what they sound like. Almost all of these ventures ended up failing, save for their toy manufacturing. Fast forward about 15 years and we see a man named Shigeru Miyamoto hired on to assist a man named Gunpei Yokoi in the creation of electronic games.
After seeing the great success video games were, Nintendo decided to try their hand. After securing the rights to distribute the Magnavox Odyssey, Nintendo got a feel for the process, and began developing their own games. Launching EVR Race in 1975 marks Nintendo’s first arcade title, with the more well-known Donkey Kong to follow, among other lesser known titles. Fast forward even further, and Mario Bros. came to be, followed shortly by the development and release of the Famicom, known over in the West as the NES. Aaaaaand that’s pretty much what we’re celebrating. I suppose. Have fun, kids.
