Nintendo President Explains Why The Company Does Not Provide Cash Prizes For Smash Bros. Tournaments

More translations from Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa’s interview with Nikkei have surfaced online, this time revealing insight into the company’s stance towards esports tournaments featuring its games.

During the interview, Nikkei questioned Furukawa about Nintendo’s reluctance to support Super Smash Bros. tournaments with prize money. According to Furukawa, their reluctance is because they want their games to be “enjoyed by anyone regardless of experience”, and that offering prize money is in a way at odds with this goal.

You can read Furukawa’s response below, as translated by Kotaku.

“Esports, in which players compete on stage for prize money as an audience watches, demonstrates one of the wonderful charms of video games. It’s not that we’re opposed to it. So that our games can be widely enjoyed by anyone regardless of experience, gender, or age, we want to be able to participate in a wide range of different events. Our strength, what differentiates us from other companies, is this different worldview, not an amount of prize money.”

Although not explicit, Furukawa seems to be implying that while Nintendo isn’t against providing prize money, they believe that rewarding top competitive players may give their audience the impression that Nintendo games can only be enjoyed by “competitive players” or something to that effect. As this is at odds with their goal of making games “enjoyable by everyone”, they’ve opted to avoid providing prizes altogether.

What do you think? Do you agree with this interpretation? Let us know in the comments.