At this point, last year’s NES Classic is best remembered as the cute, retro gadget no one could buy because Nintendo didn’t produce enough of them. In a new interview, Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aimé swears this won’t be the case with the SNES Classic—and that pre-order screw-ups were not Nintendo’s fault.


Fils-Aimé told the Financial Times that the short supply of the NES Classic were not an intentional move to create buzz. He claims that the production numbers were simply based on sluggish sales of rival retro-gaming machines. But those machines weren’t made by Nintendo.


Despite retailing for $79.99, the NES Classic was going for upwards of $200 on eBay almost immediately. The Nintendo exec insists that they’ve planned to manufacture plenty of consoles this time around. “I would strongly urge you not to over-bid on an SNES Classic on any of the auction sites,” Fils-Aimé said. “You shouldn’t [have to] pay more than $79.99.”

His comments follow several pre-order debacles at major retailers like Best Buy and Wal-Mart. But Fils-Aimé says that those issues were “outside our control,” implicitly moving the blame to the retailers. Reports of customers using a bot that could rapidly snap up the early pre-orders were also widespread.

It’s easy to cast doubt on the exec’s claims, but it’s worth noting that he seems less optimistic about meeting the holiday demands for the Nintendo Switch. From the report:

“Certainly the demand is there and the supply chain is there. Can we do more? It depends on our ability to make more,” Mr Fils-Aimé said on stage at the Variety event. “We don’t want to have a consumer disappointed by not being able to get one for the holiday season. But managing that complex supply chain is a challenge.”


He did not want to go into specifics about which parts in the supply chain have created problems, and when FT pressed him, he would only say that “there are multiple choke points.”

So, if you wanted an SNES Classic this year, you might be in luck. If you want a Switch, you’re still going to have to fight for it.


[Financial Times]