Satoru Iwata Becomes New NoA President, Cuts Up E3 Presentation

LIKE A...uh...erm...boss.

Well, you read that right. The CEO of Nintendo, Satoru Iwata, has taken up work as the new President of Nintendo of America. The former President, Tatsumi Kimishima, has been promoted to company shareholder. The news was revealed in the most recent financial support from the company, which is also seeing a sizable increase in downloadable game sales. Iwata, who also hosts Nintendo Direct, will ship over to Redmond, Washington for his new post. The current face of NoA, Reggie Fils-Aime, still has his job (if you're wondering), and will work under Iwata as the President and COO.

In addition to his new job, Iwata also revealed in an investor presentation that the company will skip a big presentation at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) this year. Instead, the focus will be on, "...a few smaller events that are specifically focused on our software lineup for the U.S. market." Of those events, one will be a media-focused event at the Nintendo booth inside the convention, where a small group of writers will be allowed to check out new games. A larger event is set for the Nokia theater, which will be more industry focused. Japanese fans won't be left out in the cold though, as the company will ship information on new games to them through he current Nintendo Direct format.

I'm okay with this, to be honest. The separation from business and software should make for a more direct (no pun intended) showoff from Nintendo, and should get the news out faster about new content. The only issue is, you'll have a much bigger audience with E3 than with the Nintendo Directs, as they seem to announce those mere hours before they're streamed. This should be interesting.

And at the very least, grab a tub of popcorn to watch Sony and Microsoft tear each other up.

Sources - [Destructoid, Joystiq]