Nintendo man sorry for "geeks" comment

By Robert Purchese Published 13 June, 2008

Fischer off to bed without any supper.

Nintendo Europe bigshot Laurent Fischer has apologised for saying only "geeks and otaku" would want a hard drive for their Wii.

"I have huge respect for those who, like me, share a common passion for Nintendo and want to make it clear that I would never use and I didn't use this terminology in such a context or way to cause offence," Fischer told Videogaming247.

"I regret that this misunderstanding has created such offence and disappointment within the community."

Fischer made the offending comment last weekend and has caused outcry among not only fans, but also God of War creator David Jaffe.

"This statement, especially coming from a marketing person, reeks of one of two things," said Jaffe on his blog.

"A) - Arrogance at a level that should make Nintendo - if this statement reflects the core of the company - very ashamed.

"B) - A marketing person who has no real clue about games and thinks she's being cute and coy by dissing the 'geeks' cause she thinks the mainstream loves them now. If this is the case, she really needs someone to sit her down and explain to her which side her f***ing toast has been buttered on for years and will eventually get back to being buttered on."

Perhaps someone needs to sit Mr Jaffe down and explain Laurent Fischer is a man.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (36) Latest comment 4 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • patchbox360 #1 4 years ago

    hahaha

    ''someone to sit her down and explain to her which side her f***ing toast has been buttered on for years and will eventually get back to being buttered on."

    fact is geeks/hardcore gamers are on the way out and the mainstream are on the way in, after this gen sony/microsoft would be fools to not follow the Wii in terms of image and games; thats if they want to make a profit
    Edited by 1 at 13/06/08 @ 17:27

  • cubbymoore #2 4 years ago

    Sony developer apologises for "sexist" comment.

    You heard it here first.

  • Xerx3s #3 4 years ago

    It's the nes era all over again.

  • Darren #4 4 years ago

    Well I don't want an HDD for my Wii but I do want some bloody means of saving VC games onto a memory card or something instead of having to f**k about moving files to and from an SD card everytime I want to play an old title. It just shows how little thought Nintendo have given to the Wii's limited storage capabilities. It's all very well having the Virtual Console and WiiWare, etc., but if people don't have any space to save them then they're not going to be buying many are they? I've actually emailed them about this issue twice and did they bother to reply...? Did they f**k!!! Nintendo can be so ignorant and stupid at times.

  • penhalion #5 4 years ago

    Wait...So what do we do when we have too many Wii VC and WiiWare games then...shove them up our arses?!

  • smelly #6 4 years ago

    >Nintendo can be so ignorant and stupid at times.

    What do you mean "at times"? They've always been like this..

    Look at stuff like online on the cube, or lack of cd on the n64, etc etc etc.

  • adamamosa #7 4 years ago

    The geeks/hardcore keps nintendo alive during the ps/n64 era

  • coojam #8 4 years ago

    No they didn't, Pokemon did.

  • polymorph #9 4 years ago

    @ Darren,

    AHMEN to that, ive just stopped downloading stuff now. Theyve launched wiiware i here, i wouldnt know i dont have any fing space to PAY THEM MONEY!

    ALL we really need is a "official nintendo usb stick" 1 that only works with the wii, and will only sync to 1 wii then its locked forever. Sure it would cost more money than a usuall usb stick, but as long as it stayed under £30 i'd buy one.
    Edited by 1 at 13/06/08 @ 18:17

  • Golgo #10 4 years ago

    This Laurent guy is a bell end. There was no misunderstanding, as he claims.
    His comments were simply offensive, not to mention stupid.

  • Xerx3s #11 4 years ago

    "The geeks/hardcore keps nintendo alive during the ps/n64 era"

    Fuck that, we kept them alive from the end of the nes to the wii. Not that they didn't have quality games.

  • malloc #12 4 years ago

    Are his comments really that offensive?

    Personally I would see calling a him a her, grat. swearing as being more offensive that calling someone a geek. Geek is hardly an offensive term nowadays, in fact it's pretty cool IMHO.

    Can't help thinking that Mr. Jaffe is desperately looking for something to attack N with and this is all he's found, and manages to make a dog's dinner of it.

  • Daryoon #13 4 years ago

    The funny thing is, the original comment about geeks being the only ones really interested in having lots of hard drive space... is pretty much spot on!

    And the resulting hilarity - geeks getting offened because... they've been called geeks... is fantastic!

  • Miths #14 4 years ago

    I didn't even think geek or nerd were derogatory words these days?

  • neilka #15 4 years ago

    Why would someone who hammers nails into their nose be interested in hard drives at all?

  • evilbert #16 4 years ago

    Patchbox360:"fact is geeks/hardcore gamers are on the way out and the mainstream are on the way in, after this gen sony/microsoft would be fools to not follow the Wii in terms of image and games; thats if they want to make a profit"

    Rubbish! Every interest has its hardcore followers and its mainstream followers. Music, gaming, fashion, even something like DIY! Just because gaming is the in thing at the moment and every granny in the world owns a DS, doesn't mean that there is no place for hardcore gaming anymore.

  • RazorObsession #17 4 years ago


    for the console manufacturers, they want to target the casual crowd, assuming they can make a profit on every console they sell.
    for the games designers, they want to target the hardcore crowd, for they are the ones actually buying any games.

    first party games should be casual, to reel in the punters, everything else should be the H in Hardcore.

    oh and life is too short to be offended by anything out of your sphere of influence, you megalomaniac pussies. So someone somewhere said something you don't like. boo hoo. grow a sack and deal with it.

  • Slipstream #18 4 years ago

    Ha! You got told, geeks.

  • paul_haine #19 4 years ago

    Laurent Fischer is a MAN?

    o/~ I know all there is to know, about the crying game...

  • mogplayer #20 4 years ago

    Who found the term "geek" offensive? A nerd pretending to be one? AFAIK, geeks love tech *and* have social skills.

    /ducks

  • Agent_Llama #21 4 years ago

    It's not necessarily that geek or nerd are offensive, it's more that the comment made is inappropriate and an insult to gamers who've bought Nintendo products over the years.

  • The-Bodybuilder #22 4 years ago

    Just goes to show, everyone is arrogant. So those ninty fanboys that try to cloack nintendo in ropes of light and glory need to realise this too.

    If mainstream is the future, then I doubt I'm going to join the next generation.

  • Retroid #23 4 years ago

    "Only saddos would want more space so they could give us more money!" a Nintendo exec almost says.

    /Really, really, REALLY regrets buying an NoE Wii

  • Ryze #24 4 years ago

    Fucking Nintendo - they've just pushed back my Wii purchase again.

    Dicks. My 360 Falcon Elite is over here providing me with more gaming than I have time for in my life. New skool, old skool, current gen / next gen, last gen. Back compat, etc.

    120Gb HDD is JUST half filled, but with 20-30Gb of already watched video or old demos of stuff that I could delete in a second to free up several Gb.

    Now Ninty expect me to settle for downloading Neo Geo games with only 512Mb to play with, afterwhich I have to start copying stuff back and forth from an up-to-4Gb SD card.

    Fuck off Nintendo.

    See you later in the year, next year or whenever you star respecting your solid hardcore base.

    IDIOTAS!

  • drunkymonkey #25 4 years ago

    It's not really about whether the word "geek" is offensive, but rather the context it's used in. It was condescending, and really, as an excuse to why it ain't gonna have a hard-drive, insulting as well.

  • drumbaby #26 4 years ago

    Well, rather a geek than a dizzy twat who buys a Wii then realises they're not actually a gamer, just a lover of silly fads. If Nintendo continue to assume all their customers are of that ilk then they're digging their own grave in the long term.

  • Bluetribe #27 4 years ago

    owned...... by geeks and otaku's

  • muftak #28 4 years ago

    "See you later in the year, next year or whenever you star respecting your solid hardcore base. "

    what you mean when , they never have respected anyone , elitist company with no care for anyone apart themselves there just lucky they didnt go tits up like sega did , nintendo fans always get fucked over but they keep the surport strong dont know why

  • makeamazing #29 4 years ago

    Calm down calm down, they only called someone a geek....lol

    Ive never been that offended by the term, and lets be honest who cares. Of course its still a pretty stupid comment to make from a marketing person. But whats with this GOW guy getting so upset... wow! Is it me or is the games industry getting worse... I mean yes its pretty stupid for a Nin marketing person to say geeks, and no hard disks.. blah blah blah, but these so called Moral outrages from other industry people is just getting tedious, and alittle bit strange.

    I suspect the reason why they say no hard disks in the future is because they are probably edging their bets on SD card type memory or whatever its called, and by the time a new Wii is out, it will have a big internal drive of memory. I suspect as the market makes them faster and larger, why use hard disks at all.

  • L42yB #30 4 years ago

    Hmmm... seems a foolish and short sighted move by Ninty to not have bigger hard disks...

    As far as calling their fans geeks, meh. Geeks make all the money these days... so being a geek is not so bad :)

    (except that you can't by a HDD for you Wii even tho u could afford to)

  • Tehren #31 4 years ago

    Nah, the casual market is a bubble just like oil prices aren't.

  • david78 #32 4 years ago

    I didn't really care about that comment, I didn't find it offensive because I am a geek, and I want a hard drive, or at least better storage.

  • Mashum #33 4 years ago

    Faux outrage, the blogger's best freind.

    I see on David Jaffe's blog that he has finally cottoned on to the fact that Laurent is a man's name, he says...

    "How pathetic some folks thought I was trying to diss him by 'changing' his gender. Says more about them than me, I think."

    Yeah! Another score for the Davomiester.. oh and your Mum called and she said you were ace... ace!!

  • thesombrerokid #34 4 years ago

    i think nintendos vision is microsofts vision, you're supposed to download the one you want to play of the servers like steam except i keep most of my steam games on a drive but in the future maybe not, and this idea kept the cost of the console down btw.

    i just wish the transfer speeds to the sd card weren't about a tenth of my pc's and the interface for managing files wasn't bollocks then i wouldn't mind switching stuff between a back up, you know if you could shift click the files and then the transfer took about 10 seconds no one would be complaining i think, but the current system your usually faster transfering them off the internet! :o

  • kangarootoo #35 4 years ago

    "If this is the case, she really needs someone to sit her down and explain to her which side her f***ing toast has been buttered on for years and will eventually get back to being buttered on."

    Wow. That is some sentence (or it would be, if it were a sentence).

    The most interesting thing about this news item for me is Jaffe getting all high and mighty about it.

  • InsoFox #36 4 years ago

    I've just had to use my SD card for the first time. Downloading Mario 64 pushed me over the limit. But the thing is, it wasn't a hassle. I wasn't playing Paper Mario, couldn't imagine playing it for some time, so I copied it over for safekeeping. Hardly any more difficult than putting a game back on the shelf that you're not playing any more. Admittedly it takes longer, but are people seriously claiming that either:

    a) They're playing so many games at once that they can't afford to stow a few away? or
    b) They can't bear to drag themselves away from the console for the few minutes it takes to copy a file over?

    or perhaps secret option c) They can afford to buy all these VC/Wiiware games but can't afford a cheap SD card on which to store the ones they aren't playing at the moment?

    I'm not saying the system is perfect, I'm just saying that it's really the least of the Wii's problems compared to, say, its poor online infrastructure or even the freakin' annoying background music in the main menu and other channels that there's no way of turning off except to mute the TV.