Reggie Fils-Aimé, the COO and President of Nintendo America has been with the company since 2004. Starting as their vice-president of sales and marketing, Reggie decided to do things a bit differently than those before him and changed the stage for E3 as a whole.
Before Fils-Aimé, E3 was mostly a retailer/investor-focused event. presenters came with spreadsheets and sales projections in hand, ready for a dry and boring explanation of their games.
But when Reggie took the stage in 2004, his first words on stage shook the very foundation.
"My name is Reggie. I'm about kicking ass, I'm about taking names, and we're about making games."
Reggie Fils-Aimé was never a man in a suit, despite actually wearing a suit. He was a personality which understood that conferences were a performance, not an executive meeting.
It was thanks to Fils-Aimé's WWE-like entrance that E3 became the hype-fest it is today. He came from the marketing world of other companies such as VH1, Guinness and Pizza Hut, but Nintendo seems to the best fit for Reggie, and not just because he's been there the longest. His famous line, "My body is ready" from the reveal of the Wii Fit Board is memorialized in the imaginary Hall of Memes in many internet dweller's minds. Because of that, Reggie will always be associated with Nintendo.
On the memes created from his words, Fils-Aimé believes as though they have helped him with the image of being someone who loves Nintendo and their products.
"I think what our fans see is someone who loves the content, who loves the company. I'm passionate about what I do. I'm fortunate that some very creative things come out of my mouth, and then the fan base just takes it and runs with it."
In addition to that, he enjoys the fan base using his lines in the memes.
Beyond this funny line, Reggie is also loved for going off script and showing genuine excitement about games and ideas in the industry.
Since then, Nintendo has had its ups and downs, but lately, the Switch has proven to be a big up. Since its launch in March, the Switch has sold 2.74 million units worldwide. Of course, Reggie has weighed in on this success.
"We wanted to make sure that the consumer proposition was clear and easy to understand — console gaming that you could take with you anywhere and play with anyone. And consumers loved the concept."
Marketing terms aside, his point is that their direct messaging was crucial. The Wii U didn't have an obvious angle. With the name, the design of the console, and many other problems, some lesser informed consumers didn't even know the Wii U was a separate console to the Wii. Beyond that, the informed consumers never truly got to use the Wii U Game Pad to its fullest potential, as first-party games were relatively scarce and the Game Pad was otherwise hard to develop for outside of Nintendo.
"We wanted to make sure we had great new games launching on a regular basis," Fils-Aimé said about the Switch. So far, he's been correct. The console launched with a number of games at launch, including the wildly successful Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, then Mario Kart 8 Deluxe launched soon after. The year follows with ARMS and Splatoon 2 before it rounds out the year with Super Mario Odyssey in October.
There is also no signs of stopping, as Nintendo has also announced that they're working on a Metroid and Pokemon game for the Nintendo Switch.
With Reggie saying, "It's been a fantastic journey, now coming up on almost 14 years," It's probably safe to assume he'll be around for the foreseeable future.
