Welcome to Coffee Talk! Let’s start off the day by discussing whatever is on your (nerd chic) mind. Every morning I’ll kick off a discussion and I’m counting on you to participate in it. If you’re not feelin’ my topic, feel free to start a chat with your fellow readers and see where it takes you. Whether you’re talking about videogames, getting a wisdom tooth removed without the benefits of laughing gas, getting a wisdom tooth removed without the benefits of vicodin, or the hazards of being a pedestrian in the Philippines, Coffee Talk is the place to do it.
Today’s column has been swimming in my head for a few weeks, but really came together after having coffee with my friend Joey this morning. For decades, mascots were a huge part of marketing videogame consoles. Nintendo has Mario. Sega, when it still made hardware, had Sonic. There have been so many changes to the nature of consoles and the nature of marketing, that many people believe that mascots are irrelevant…or at least not as important as they used to be. Let’s examine the issue together in today’s Coffee Talk (which was literally inspired by a talk I had over coffee).
When consoles were simply about games and boxes, iconic characters were hugely important in establishing a machine’s identity. With online gameplay, the emphasis on non-gaming services, and the rise of first-person perspective games, mascots aren’t as powerful as they used to be. Microsoft has Master Chief from Halo, who isn’t in the same league as Mario. Many people feel that Sony has been successful despite not having a mascot. It used to be that you played a game as a character, imagining that you were adventuring as him or her. There are many games where you are the character or you control the adventure in a way that’s far more personal than in older games.
Marketing and branding has also changed so that everything is about you. Social media — a huge part of…well, everything these days — has raised the bar of the brand of you. Some of the most wonderful changes to consoles in the last decade are related to personalization, both with the hardware and the games they run. It can be argued that videogame characters and sharing adventures with videogame characters have become less important than videogame experiences catered to you.
(On a side note, the whole “Brand Called You” thing had me thinking about this Fast Company article my Ziff-Davis friends and I were over the moon about back in 1997.)
So do you videogame console mascots still matter? I would understand arguments that they don’t mean much these days. I would even understand arguments that they don’t matter at all in 2013. Naturally, I want to hear your position on the topic. Fire away in the comments section (please!).
For my age group I would think that it doesn’t matter at all. It would be odd to see Nintendo abandon Mario in their advertising but I think Nintendo’s franchise characters are in a different league compared to whatever Sony and MS have. Sackboy? Really? Who cares.
The marketing that matters to me: consumer friendliness, price, and quality content.
I think Nintendo is the only one who needs a mascot, and that’s mostly because they can base so many games around that mascot. I don’t want to buy Sonic Cart, or Master Chief Cart…I want to buy Mario Kart. (However, I do want to buy Crash Team Racing, because that game was kick-ass). No one would buy Master Chief & Sack-Boy London Olympics 2012; but they will buy Mario & Sonic London Olympics 2012. I won’t buy MLB 2k13, or MLB The Show; but I would consider Mario Super Sluggers. There is also no way I would buy the Cortana spin-off game to go along with anything Master Chief is in; but I will buy Wario Land games, as well as Luigi’s Mansion.
I think that went on a little long, but my point is made in each instance. The reason I will do that for Nintendo’s mascot and not Sony or Microsoft’s is because Mario is versatile. Master Chief does not have this because he was created with a very specific purpose, kick Covenant ass and save Earth as a Spartan. Sonic does a little bit, and that is why he goes well with Mario now in the Mario & Sonic games, but he was never as approachable or popular as Mario. Crash Bandicoot is probably the other mascot that I would support in a variety of games outside of platformers, but Sony never really went that direction for whatever reason. At this point Mario has such a variety of game types he can be involved in that he can’t really be disposed of. Every other mascot is disposable because they lack versatility. For other consoles I don’t think a mascot matters at all, because they provide a different style of game that isn’t as dependent on overall brand recognition.
If you sell to kids, you need a mascot in my book.
The more intersting aspect of this coffee talk is getting teeth pulled without gas or vicodin. I’ve been there. I didn’t start getting good drugs that actually helped with the pain until I got out of the hood…wonder why?
It’s because they were being funneled to the Red Sox.
Zing!
-M
Like Big Blak said; mascots are only relevant when marketing to kids. It’s really not effective with adults.
Sony wanted to make Sackboy the new mascot for the Playstation for a new generation of gamers, but alas, I think they have failed. Why? Because of cognitive penetration. When you have a mascot, he/she/it has to be everywhere and in everything. They needed to saturate the market. That means that Sackboy would have had to make an appearance or star in A LOT of Sony’s most popular games. Further, it would have had to appeal to children. Just on that fact alone, the whole mascot thing for Sony wouldn’t work. The system’s most popular games are not meant for kids.
-M