*WARNING: This is a GRAPHIC and TEXT HEAVY blog*

So, with the announcement of Club Nintendo finally coming to North America in Winter of 2008 after a very long overdue wait, I have decided to try to help inform those who are unfamiliar about it, as well as ranting about how they hopefully don’t screw us over. I’ll begin with the guide . . .


The official Club Nintendo logo.

Club Nintendo is mainly known in Japan as a “loyalty program” that rewards consumers who buy primarily Nintendo products and registers them on their website. You register an account on their main website and get points by inputting a code on these little slips of paper that come in particular games, and depending on how expensive the game was, determines how many points you receive. There are also a number of exclusives you can get (albeit in extremely limited quantity) just by being a member or having registered a certain number of games.


Here we have 3 extremely exclusive items that Club Nintendo Japan gave away to their members, like the Mario etched DS, authentic Mario Hat, and Famicon GBA. Below that is what a typical registration slip looks like.

Now, with those points, you can redeem them for some of the COOLEST swag and such in general! They change what’s available roughly every year, and items you can redeem your points for are things such as: exclusive DS games, homage items/toys about Nintendo’s heritage, soundtracks, various carrying cases, and various other little trinkets and doodads.


Some of the current lineup of Club Nintendo swag we’re missing out on.


Even more cool stuff we in North America have to pay an arm and a leg for . . . at the moment.

Yearly, depending on how many points you manage to accumulate in a year, Club Nintendo gives a special “status” to their members, and allows them to choose an extra FREE gift for them to receive. I’m not well versed in Japanese, but all I know is that you need to register 400 points in a year to attain a “Platinum” member status, while there is also a “Gold” member status.


Here is an explanation of possible gifts you could’ve received as a member. The 2005 Platinum gift was a Wii Remote that works as a universal TV remote control. In 2006, the Platinum gift was Tingle’s Balloon Fight, and in 2006 the Gold gift was a Club Nintendo calendar.

As the years continue to fly by, it also seems that Club Nintendo Japan is listening to their consumers and members, and has been rewarding their most loyal members with rewards they have been asking for. Now keep this in mind, NOT ALL Nintendo games have the registration slips and whatnot, as they’re found only in Nintendo produced/published titles such as the Ouendan series, the Jump Super Stars series, and even Tales of the Tempest. Still, for the majority of Nintendo fans, it’s not particularly hard to get points, and most people would be able to get one or two of the “normal” gifts a year, and for the hardcore collectors like myself, you could probably throw in a Platinum member gift as well.


This year’s super awesome freebies for registering enough points. Platinum members in 2008 had the choice between the Super Famicon Classic Controller for the Wii, or the exclusive 2 disc Platinum edition of the Super Mario Galaxy Original Sound Track. Gold members were allowed to choose a 2008 Club Nintendo Calendar.

For those of you who are wondering roughly how many points you’d have and such if you were to register games in Club Nintendo Japan, I got my friend who is decent at reading Japanese to help me convert their points chart.

Game costing more than 5250 Yen = 30 Points
Game costing between 3150 Yen and 5250 Yen = 20 Points
Game costing less than 3150 Yen = 10 Points
DS Lite = 50 Points
GBA Micro = 40 Points
Playan (the GBA movie player thing) = 20 Points
Wi-Fi USB Adapter = 15 Points
DS Plausa (not too sure about this one) = 20 Points
DS <something> = 10 Points
DS <something> = 10 Points
Wii = 80 Points
Wii Remote = 20 Points
Nunchuk = 10 Points
Classic Controller = 10 Points
Wii Lan Adapter = 15 Points
DS TV Adapter = 30 Points
Nintendo Wi-Fi = 20 Points

Now, with Nintendo Japan obviously showing how awesome it is to its loyal buyers, Europe decided to follow suit. It’s still called Club Nintendo, but their rewards program stems from what they call a Stars Catalogue. As with Club Nintendo in Japan, a user basically signs up for an account and can enter in registration codes from Nintendo produced/published games for stars and can eventually redeem those stars for awesome gifts.


Basically the homepage for Club Nintendo Europe telling visitors the features of being a member, and how many points one can expect from registering particular products of various prices.

The Stars Catalogue offers a much larger variety of items to purchase with accumulated stars, although a large number of members have been disappointed with the selection, as there are mainly screensavers and wallpapers. After much criticism, Club Nintendo Europe in the past couple of years began to release items that members actually wanted, such as games, game themed clothing and everyday items, and Wii Points cards!


Here we have some wallpapers you can exchange for your hard earned stars, as well as a 300 Wii Points Card, and some Wii Fit themed items.


More Wii Fit themed items, some Pokémon Iron-Ons, a Super Smash Bros. Brawl jigsaw puzzle, and freaking Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising!

Club Nintendo Europe also had one of the SWEETEST items they had for members, which was the 15000 Star . . . The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess Statue! It’s all gold plated and stuff, and I’ve yet to see one on eBay. (Yes, that means I’d pay money to get my hands on one of those bad boys.)


Epic statue is epic! This is the kind of stuff that Nintendo of America SHOULD be rewarding its loyal customers!

Now, let’s move onto Nintendo of America’s current extremely half-assed attempt at a somewhat “equivalent” Club Nintendo. So basically, Nintendo of America provides us living in North America, with none other than membership service known as My Nintendo, which in turn “rewards” us with free e-mail newsletters, order and repair status/history, and the ability to register Nintendo products! Yippee! Whoopity doo! Super dee duper! I know that made me super excited! The only reason I ever signed up was to register my Nintendo products, mainly due to the fact that I felt compelled to (must be a collector’s feeling or something), and to keep updated on how many issues of Nintendo Power I had left before I had to renew (this feature was eliminated after publishing went to Future US). Otherwise, aside from checking your status if you sent Nintendo of America anything to repair or if you ordered anything from them, and getting the couple of emails a week stating old news, promoting games that have been out for more than a week, etc. there is really no incentive to sign-up.


The super awesome home page to sign-up or login to your My Nintendo account! So much glorious effort put into it, eh?


This is an example of what one of the Nintendo of America registration slips for their games looks like. Hehehe! Someone had a field day in Photoshop with this one. =D

So, before the recent announcement a couple of weeks ago, in regards to how we in North America are FINALLY getting a Club Nintendo, former Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Affairs for Nintendo of America, Perrin Kaplan, stated that North America didn’t have a Club Nintendo, because we were “too big” of a market compared to Japan and Europe. She also claimed it wouldn’t be cost effective for the company as well. Another reason (or should we say excuse?) she said we didn’t have a Club Nintendo, was because apparently only in North America do you get pre-order bonuses and little trinkets from companies if you register their games, which you know, totally is the equivalent to a Club Nintendo. *Incase you guys haven’t noticed, I’ve integrated my mini-rants into the information now!* Now let’s see how many Nintendo games a serious collector has, how many of them he’s been able to register, and what he’s gotten from the oh so glorious My Nintendo . . .

*SIDE NOTE: These pictures were taken back on October 28th, so some sections (primarily my DS one) have grown a fair bit more from then*









So, basically those are all the games that I own that are for systems/handhelds that had My Nintendo registration slips in them. Doing a quick rough estimate from my latest “Collection File” update, that’s roughly 250 NINTENDO games you’re looking at. That’s not even including my retro collection that existed before My Nintendo. Now onto the My Nintendo registration process . . .


Oh look! It’s a loyal Nintendo fan registering his games . . .


My oh my! It’s still going?


Jesus . . . it’s STILL going . . . he must really think My Nintendo will reward him . . .


Wow! That only took 4 full screens to show everything he’s registered . . . I hope he’s got something for doing all that . . .

Yes, I have OVER 100 Nintendo games and consoles registered on that goddamn site! Now before we get to what I’ve gotten for doing all of that, IF (keyword: IF) Nintendo of America DOES NOT reward, accredit points, etc. to all previous games ALREADY ENTERED into My Nintendo for their Club Nintendo program . . . I sure as goddamn hope they all fucking burn in hell! There is ABSOLUTELY NO EXCUSE for them to ignore those who have enrolled, followed, and used their previous program, and not take notice and somehow reward or acknowledge their contribution. Due to the fact they’ve been very vague on details about the program for us so far, I’m still very skeptical about it, as they can royally do this half-ass and screw a lot of us over with very fake promises. Now, with over 100 things registered, let’s see what I’ve gotten as “rewards” . . .


Nintendo of America’s paltry offering to its members.

WOOHOO! So, I’ve gotten a Metroid Prime 2: Echoes Bonus Disc that was later included with the game, by registering 3 games with My Nintendo, The Legend of Zelda Collector’s Edition, which was in turn super sweet and something I think should have been expected, and a The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass Feather Stylus, which was also sweet, but was only rewarded for registering the game and filling out a survey. Hmmm . . . So, technically by registering like 5 games and completing a survey, I got 2 exclusive items and a Bonus Disc they bundled with said game . . . AWESOME! -_-‘ Now let’s take a look at the stuff I’ve had to import/had given to me as gifts/managed to find from the super awesome, properly done Club Nintendo Japan.


Three exclusive games! Zekkyou Senshi: Sakeburein (just call it the Power Rangers yelling game), Game & Watch Collection, and Tingle’s Balloon Fight (Platinum Gift).


Rainbow Colored DS Stylus Set, 2006 Animal Crossing Calendar, 2008 Club Nintendo Calendar (Gold Gift).


2004 Preview Disc of upcoming releases, Super Mario Galaxy Original Sound Track Platinum Version (Platinum Gift), Club Nintendo Star Tenbillion (basically a puzzle game of matching up colors that was one of Nintendo’s first toys), Mario Hat DS Carrying Case.


Club Nintendo Gamecube Controller, Club Nintendo Wii Super Famicom Classic Controller (Platinum Gift), Club Nintendo Mock Wii-Mote TV Remote (Platinum Gift).

So, that is all the awesome sweet stuff from Club Nintendo Japan I currently have. Doing a quick calculation again, if I were to register all the games, systems, handhelds, controllers, etc. that I have on Club Nintendo Japan’s site, I would actually pretty much have gotten EVERYTHING I just showed you guys, minus maybe the Mario Hat DS Carrying Case. Screwed over much? Just a little . . . As another quick representation to show how Nintendo of America totally freaking owes us, have a glimpse at my super collection file I keep up-to-date in Excel. Also, keep in mind, due to school and work, I’ve been working on this article for like a month so you can have a quick look into how much I collect.


My collection file as of October 21st, 2008. 682 games, 402 of which are Nintendo, making up damn near 60% of my gaming collection.


My collection file as of November 30th, 2008. 719 games, 423 of which are Nintendo (so basically 21 more Nintendo games bought in a month), still making up damn near 60% of my gaming collection.

Anyone who has made it this far, I applaud you. That Excel file is over 100 hours of work in terms of macros, programming, etc. About 95% of it was done by my other friend who is a big collector as well (1000 games), who’ll be joining Destructoid soon. It has automatic sorting, data entry, swag, soundtrack, guide lists, etc. That’ll be for another blog though.

Still, that’s my spiel about Club Nintendo and all. Hopefully it has been very informative to some of you, and has opened some eyes to how badly Nintendo has been screwing us over in North America, and what the program should and shouldn’t be. Even more so, hopefully some Nintendo representative will stumble upon this and actually consider what I’m saying . . . but that’s just wishful thinking. Still, with my final thoughts, here is what Nintendo of America SHOULD do for their Club Nintendo program:

- Make it as similar as possible to the Japanese one, where there are rewards of substance that people want, and exclusives for high registering members
- Make sure current games that have been registered are given points so that members who have registered dozens of games are not punished
- Create a much better interface and website for the program

If Nintendo can do those 3 things, then everyone should be happy and all will be well. Once again, thanks for reading and all, hopefully you’ve learnt something, and feel free to comment and all. Thanks!