NOA VP George Harrison Interview
Gamespot has an nice little interview with George Harrison of NOA. While its mostly more of the same, as will probably be the case until they unviel the Revolution, there are a few tidbits that I found interesting:
Gamespot: So this is just kind of a remix of the Game Boy, a hipper Game Boy. Is this going to have a different price point?
Harrison: It may. We’re also looking at what the price and bundle combination might be for the fall. One of the things that they’ve launched in Japan that we’re considering is–it’s called the Play-Yan and it allows you to play MP3 music or MP4 video files in your Game Boy. We’re trying to see how that’s doing and if that makes sense to bring out as a companion to this.
and
Gamespot: So do you think that’s really going to ramp up more third-party support for Revolution? The fact that it’s going to be easier to make games for than the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3?
Harrison: Well, we hope it will and, in fact, it’s really important to us. There’s some games that we do extremely well, our game franchises obviously, but there are others that we don’t do. I think if we look at the GameCube and say, “OK, what’s one of the things we missed in this generation?” Well, we really didn’t have the Grand Turismos or the Grand Theft Autos, so those are the things that the publishers with their particular expertise can really fill in the gaps on, and that’s important to us.
Check out the whole interview here:
Nick - May 26th, 2005 - 
BOB on May 26, 2005 at 10:15 pm
COULD PLAY-YAN BE OFFICAL? OH MAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
hokku on May 26, 2005 at 10:25 pm
man, he’s talking about bundling the play-yan with the Micro? That would be awesome. Here’s to hoping that they incorporate it into the hardware.
Nick on May 26, 2005 at 10:26 pm
At this point there is no hope of incoporating it with the hardware, but bundling certainly could be a possibility. Now that would be much closer to an iPod killer than the PSP ever could be.
luigi7667 on May 27, 2005 at 12:22 am
Play-Yan??!! Yesss! Hopefully Harrison is not just saying that!!!
Dejital on May 27, 2005 at 12:27 am
He didn’t confirm anything, he just said that they will bundle in Japan. We’ll see how that goes here. Play-Yan is very likely to come out in the US, but maybe not in the same form
(An English title like Play with Yan can get made fun of very easily).
“Hey, check out my new Ipod!”
“Oh come on! I can play with yan~!”
“Ewwww!”
John on May 27, 2005 at 12:57 am
this is what i love about nintendo interviews. they love to talk about their hits, but they are also very honest about their misses.
fushi on May 27, 2005 at 6:41 am
John on: I think that’s a rather rare occasion, although Harrison did sound quite honest in this one.
btnheazy03 on May 27, 2005 at 8:13 am
If Play-Yan’s integrated, what about the DS and SP? One of the draws of Play-Yan was that it gave DS and SP the ability to play media files,so integrating Play-Yan to GameBoy Micro is a mistake.
I can see Nintendo going with 2 GBM packs: 1 with Play-Yan bundled and 1 without. But I can also see Nintendo making Play-Yan available ala carte (a name change is also welcome for the NA market)
Benny on May 27, 2005 at 8:52 am
Play Yan may equal V-Pocket in the US. (Video Pocket?) It was be amazingly smart to package this thing with the GB:M, and it would also being to acclimate Nintendo consumers to the SD card format (isnt there going to be an SD card slot on the Revolution)?
drGherbik on May 27, 2005 at 12:14 pm
I doubt play yan would be anymore of an ipod killer than the psp. Even if I assume the play yans user interface is friendlier, it still doesn’t have the all inclusive package of itunes/ipod that apple offers.
Benny on May 27, 2005 at 12:28 pm
Agreed Dr. Gherbik… GB:M combined with Play-Yan wouldn’t be an iPod killer by any means… but it WOULD be an iPod Shuffle killer. Especially it the Play-Yan/GB:M combo comes anywhere NEAR $129.
drGherbik on May 27, 2005 at 12:46 pm
I doubt it would be an ipod shuffle killer either.
I’d rather run with a shuffle around my neck than a gameboy on my belt, and since shuffle marketing is directed towards a less tech-savvy audience, they’re going to buy the known brand, not a game device with some add ons.
I think the Play Yan is a nice idea, but i’m also starting to think that it’s a waste of Nintendo’s time to try and compete with PSP this way. I mean, i don’t really think the PSP does it all that well. Stick to the games.
zigg on May 27, 2005 at 1:35 pm
I’m still reeling from the idea that Micro would be more expensive than SP… I mean, WTF?
drGherbik on May 27, 2005 at 1:52 pm
No price has been announced yet.
Matt on May 27, 2005 at 2:28 pm
At least the “play with yan~!” can play tracks in any order you want.
drGherbik on May 27, 2005 at 2:32 pm
We can only hope they decide to market it with such a tagline.