Nintendo wants the Switch to appeal to more people, regardless of age or gender, but that desire also represents the device’s biggest obstacle.
Speaking during its quarterly investor Q&A, a number of Nintendo heads weighed in on the risks facing the Switch now that it’s approaching the end of its first year on the market.
One way Nintendo is looking to expand the age range the Switch appeals to is through products like Nintendo Labo. While the cardboard-creation kit is, on the surface, geared at children, Nintendo director and managing executive officer Shinya Takahashi says that Labo serves to introduce the Switch to parents as well.
“We introduced Nintendo Labo the other day as one way of addressing that issue,” says Takahashi. “By creating an environment where parents and children can play together, and where children can play under adult supervision, we hope to gain even the interest of people like mothers.”
The key to expanding the Switch’s appeal lays with finding more ways to leverage the unique features of the Switch and introduce new forms of play, explains the panel.
Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto says that the idea is to popularize the Nintendo Switch to the point where the device can exist between smart devices and other video game systems all on its own. That ideal situation would eliminate the bulk of the risk surrounding the hardware in its current state and open the company up to creating “new and very Nintendo genres of play.”