Ringing the death knell? Try another path.

Think about personal gaming and what defines the space. Think about Nintendo. How long do you think they've been around? Since the 80's, maybe? Make that the 1880's and you'll be right. Nintendo was formed as a personal gaming company in 1889. They sold:

... playing cards. (Image: ShinyShiny)

The company struggled a bit in the 1960's, branching into love hotels, taxis, TV networks, and noodles, prior to stumbling upon light guns and developing their first home gaming console in the 70's.

Now, I originally meant to post this last night, before news of poor performance/ weak results came out today. Still, I like the transformation/ refocus story. (and apparently I like "/", too) The company was faced with a shift in the definition of personal gaming and found another path to success.

So often, we see posts nowadays exhorting readers to "just get going", and I so agree. It's easy to see obstacles. But instead of spending a bulk of time talking about the existence of the wall, let's find a way around it. X is an issue, get over it, figure out how to move on - something I'd like to think is a mantra of mine.

Another spin on this is covered in The Art of Possibility.

Downward spiral talk is based on the fear that we will be stopped in our tracks and fall short in the race, and it is wholly reactive to circumstances, circumstances that appear to be wrong, problematic, and in need of fixing. [...] Focusing on the abstraction of scarcity, downward spiral talk creates an unassailable story about the limits to what is possible and tells us compellingly how things are going from bad to worse.

Gloom and doom. It's pretty easy to get mired in it and the misery just becomes exponential.

Shine attention on obstacles and problems and they multiply lavishly.

The solution? Step back and look at the facts of the situation. They'll show the problem area, but they'll also show other paths and opportunities. Think different. And go!

It's a challenge. But I'd like to think that some really cool possibilities can come out of this.