- Club Nintendo
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Official logo of the Club Nintendo program
Club Nintendo is the name of several publications and a more well-known customer loyalty program provided by Nintendo. The loyalty program is free to join and is committed to providing rewards in exchange for consumer feedback and loyalty to purchasing official Nintendo products. Members of Club Nintendo may earn credits or "coins" by submitting codes found on Nintendo products and systems, which may be traded in for special edition items only available on Club Nintendo. Rewards include objects such as playing cards, tote bags, downloadables, and warranty extensions on select Nintendo products.
Contents
Publications
Mexico and Latin America
Club Nintendo is the name of the official Nintendo magazine in Mexico and Latin America.
The magazine was founded in December 1990 by José "Pepe" Sierra and Gustavo "Gus" Rodríguez. It was the first magazine in Mexico about Nintendo made by fans of video games, and quickly became the leading game magazine in México and Latin America.[citation needed]
Europe
In Europe, Club Nintendo was the name of three magazines which started publishing in 1989. The European version was published in several languages, and there were separate publications for The Netherlands, Germany, Greece, Slovenia, Scandinavia and Finland. All were later discontinued and eventually replaced. The last German issue was published in August 2002.[1]
Australia
In Australia Club Nintendo was a magazine that started in 1991 & was released by Catalyst Publishing in Melbourne. A thin magazine that was roughly 31 pages it featured very few screenshots of games. Australia eventually received their own version of Nintendo Magazine System by which time this magazine had ceased. Catalyst Publishing later took over Nintendo Magazine System in 1996 from the previous publisher.
Loyalty program
The Club Nintendo loyalty program offers rewards to members who collect points (sometimes referred to as "Stars" or "Star Points", the program is also commonly known as the Stars Catalogue; the North American Club uses "Coins") which are gained primarily by purchasing and registering certain first-party hardware and software titles by Nintendo. Points are also awarded for the purchase of select third-party titles, and can also be obtained by participating in surveys, inviting others to become a Club Nintendo member or even simply visiting a web site.
Rewards range from digital content such as computer wallpaper, music and mobile phone ringtones, to physical items such as keyrings, calendars, t-shirts and other clothing items, to premium items such as soundtrack albums and game controllers. Some of the premium rewards are even Club Nintendo exclusive video games. These video games can be either digital content (WiiWare, DSiWare) or a physical item (Wii, DS) depending on how, on a game by game basis, they are offered. Many reward items are exclusive to particular Club Nintendo territories, and physical items are sometimes only available in limited quantities.
Japan
Club Nintendo (Japanese: クラブニンテンドー) is an official Nintendo club for Japanese fans. It launched on October 31, 2003[2] and was the second Nintendo reward program to be set (Coming after the European Nintendo VIP 24:7 program) but was the first to be called Club Nintendo.
The Japanese Club Nintendo offers rewards such as Wii Remotes with television remote control functionality, exclusive and unreleased games such as Tingle's Balloon Fight DS and Exclamation Warriors Sakeburein, game soundtrack CDs and exclusive accessories such as a Super Famicom style Classic Controller for the Wii.[3]
Europe
Club Nintendo in Europe was launched as Nintendo VIP 24:7 on May 3, 2002, to coincide with the European launch of the Nintendo GameCube. It promised exclusive news, reviews, previews and forums to members. However, because released titles are often delayed in European countries (usually due to localization), the exclusive features could be often found elsewhere on the internet.[4] To coincide with the release of the Wii, VIP 24:7 was renamed to Club Nintendo and adopted the Japanese Club Nintendo logo.
The Club Nintendo of Europe features a Star Points system where members can exchange stars earned by registering games and consoles for items in the Stars Catalogue, and for Wii Points to use in the Wii Shop Channel, which are available only in sets of 100, 300, 500 and 1000 Points.[5] Originally, a maximum of two Wii Points Cards per day per account was available for purchase; this later changed to one a day.[6] Since September 2008, stars can also be used to buy singles and albums at the music online store emusu.com. At the time of writing, June 2010, music download vouchers no longer appear in the Club Nintendo Stars Catalogue, and the actual download site www.emusu.com/backstage is unavailable[7]
Members enter PIN codes found on inserts included with certain games and hardware to earn stars. These can range from 100 to 1000 stars in value. Upon registering as a member on Nintendo of Europe's website, one is rewarded with 250 stars. Encouraging other people to register with Nintendo of Europe earns members 250 stars per sign-up.[8] After registering, members can choose to receive special emails from Nintendo, which can include surveys which also reward members with stars. Daily visits to the website also once earned members 5 stars per day, but this was later removed.
Criticism
Some criticism comes from the fact that the Nintendo of Europe Stars Catalogue is only available to members in the United Kingdom and Ireland, the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, France, Spain, Italy and later Portugal. In addition, Nintendo of Europe's website is notorious for becoming easily overwhelmed by traffic when quantities of the more valuable items are added, which often causes difficulty for customers who are attempting to make purchases.[citation needed] There was also some consternation that very few items were added to the site for an extended period of time, with the frequency of larger batches of non-digital items being added becoming quite rare.[citation needed]
In March 2007 during a test of the new Wii Points purchasing system, 1000 Wii Points accidentally appeared in the stars catalogue for a price of 789 stars. Nintendo of Europe offered anyone who purchased these either 1000 Wii Points or a refund of their stars.[9][10] In addition, upon the official launch of the Wii Points Cards offer, the website was swamped with traffic, meaning very few people could login and take advantage of the Wii Points trade on offer. The system has also been criticised because the Wii Points Card codes are only available in limited stock, and so it can be hard to get hold of them at times.[citation needed]
At the beginning of June 2007, Nintendo of Europe revealed that starting July 1, 2007, they will make drastic changes to their privacy policy. Any stars that members have earned before then will vanish from their accounts on July 1, 2008, and any stars earned after that date will disappear two years after earning them. Members who choose not to accept the new privacy policy will lose all their stars instantly and have their account locked. Members who registered after the Wii's European launch date, December 8, 2006, are not affected.
Another highly controversial subject is the quality of the rewards, which tend to be far higher in Japan than the other regions.
Australia/New Zealand
Club Nintendo in Australia was launched on April 24, 2008 to coincide with the release of Mario Kart Wii, with the website, catalogue and product registration going live on March 11, 2009 using the same system offered by Nintendo of Europe.[11] Nintendo Australia has asserted that the Australian Club Nintendo reward catalogue will be unique from that of Club Nintendo Europe and Club Nintendo Japan, and was developed in conjunction with Nintendo of America. However, unlike its North American counterpart, the Australian service uses Stars instead of Coins - the same as its European counterpart.
All games either distributed or published by Nintendo Australia after Mario Kart Wii will contain a card that allows buyers to register their games for Club Nintendo points.
Club Nintendo Australia is for both and New Zealanders, as there is no Nintendo of New Zealand.
South Africa
Club Nintendo launched in South Africa in June 2008.[12]
North America
Club Nintendo for North America was announced on October 2, 2008,[13] and launched on December 15, 2008, retiring the My Nintendo registration program.[14][15] The site experienced high traffic at its initial launch, resulting in login problems and slow load times for users.[16] It was taken offline on December 24, 2008, reopening almost a week later on December 30 with noticeable infrastructure improvements. The North American catalogue was developed in conjunction with Nintendo Australia, and the Club uses Coins instead of Stars for points.[17]
The program's rewards feature a combination of Nintendo character-themed items like Japanese sensu fans and hand towels, exclusive Club Nintendo branded accessories, and games that celebrate the company's history.[18] The first such game to be made available for the North American Club Nintendo was the Game & Watch Collection for the Nintendo DS, and Game & Watch Collection 2 is also available. The original WiiWare title Grill Off! with Ultra Hand, which pays homage to the Ultra Hand, one of the company's most successful pre-video game products, was made available to program participants on March 31, 2010.
Program participants who meet 300-Coin "Gold" or 600-Coin "Platinum" benchmarks within the Club Nintendo year also receive exclusive items. In 2009, a special standalone WiiWare version of Punch-Out!!, called Doc Louis's Punch-Out!!, was made available as one of two possible rewards for Platinum members, along with a red plush "Mario" hat.[19] In 2010, Platinum members were given a plastic statuette featuring characters from the Mario games.[20] In 2011, Platinum members were given a selection of 25 Mario themed collector buttons. Between 2009 and 2011, Gold members were sent a calendar featuring characters from a variety of Nintendo games.
Previously, questions were raised over Club Nintendo's conspicuous absence in the region. In 2007, then-vice president of Marketing and Corporate Affairs for Nintendo of America Inc. Perrin Kaplan stated that the inclusion area of the US is much larger than all the other Club Nintendo countries, and that the program was considered prohibitively expensive to set up. Kaplan also said that the company considered the pre-order bonuses and game registration promos it offered were an alternative to Club Nintendo.[21] Nintendo of America ultimately relented due to customer demand.[22]
References
- ^ The NES Fountain
- ^ "Club Nintendo Kicks Off This Month In Japan". http://www.cube.ign.com/articles/455/455458p1.html. Retrieved 2009-11-19.
- ^ http://wii.ign.com/articles/835/835801p1.html
- ^ Gaming World - X Clusive Across the Pond: European Gamecube Launch Special
- ^ Nintendo Europe Wii Points Card Shop (2007-12-07). "Wii Points Card Shop". Nintendo. https://wiipointscard.nintendo-europe.com.
- ^ Wii Points Card Shop FAQ
- ^ Europe: stars for music - full details
- ^ http://www.nintendo-europe.com/NOE/en/GB/register/index.jsp
- ^ Go Nintendo » Blog Archive » Nintendo makes good on Euro points/stars mistake- What are you waiting for?
- ^ http://ms.nintendo-europe.com/wiipointtransfer/php/index.php
- ^ Club Nintendo Australia goes live (we're not kidding)
- ^ Nintendo News
- ^ Liveblog: Nintendo's U.S. Press Conference
- ^ Club Nintendo is up and running…brings Game & Watch Collection for the Nintendo DS and other goodies along for the ride
- ^ Nintendo's Home Page as of February 13, 2005
- ^ Kotaku:Club Nintendo Is Live, Slow & Buggy
- ^ Club Nintendo coming soon - we deal with coins, not stars
- ^ [1]
- ^ Take on Doc Louis in a Club Nintendo Exclusive Punch-Out!! Game
- ^ Super Mario collector figurine
- ^ [2]
- ^ [3]
External links
Categories:- Nintendo
- Video game magazines
- Customer loyalty programs
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