PIKACHU 64
June 13, 2000

With the PSone having been announced last week, most people were expecting today's new system unveiling by Nintendo to be a smaller, redesigned version. It was somewhat redesigned, but a much more unexpected turn of events occurred than we were anticipating.

Today in Japan, Nintendo revealed a new version of its N64 featuring Pikachu. The system will not include any technoligical differences, as the changes are solely cosmetic in nature.

A Japanese release is slated for July 21 at a price of 14,000 yen ($130), and there will be two colors (orange and blue). Given the popularity of Pokemon in North America and its recent entry into Europe, a worldwide launch should be expected eventually, and based on the pricing structure in Japan, it should sell for the same price as existing N64 systems.

Unfortunately for Nintendo, while this is likely to spur a lot of interest in the system given the phenomenal success of Pokemon worldwide, it does not give the company an easy way to lower the price to $79 (Sony's most likely PSone target for some time within the next year) without simply losing the money, nor does it give the system more features.

However, with Pokemon Stadium having been as big a success as it was, those losses - and then some - will foreseeably be recovered by sales of future N64 Pokemon games, and the Pokefans who will be grabbing these systems by the truckfuls will not care about it not having new features.

Of course, this is likely to bring up the whole "Pikachu for mascot" issue again, but only time will tell what will happen with that situation.

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