Nintendo

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Nintendo
Founded September 23, 1889­
Current president Shuntaro Furukawa

Nintendo Co., Ltd. is a multinational corporation located and based in Kyoto, Japan. "Nintendo" roughly translates from Japanese into "leave luck to heaven." It was founded in 1889 as a company that produced hand-made hanafuda cards. From the 1950s, it ventured into several niche businesses before developing into one of the most influential video game companies in the industry following the release of Donkey Kong in 1981.

History with the Kirby series

In the early 1990s, HAL Laboratory was on the verge of bankruptcy. They had fully finished the production of Kirby's Dream Land (then titled Twinkle Popo) but had no funds to release it. Seeing potential in the title, Nintendo licensed the game and published it themselves, while changing the title character's name to Kirby and making some adjustments to his overall design. Over time, HAL became a second-party developer for Nintendo, and all future Kirby video games were distributed and published by them. Today, Kirby is considered one of Nintendo's major video game franchises.

Franchises

Nintendo is the creator and/or owner of many well-known and beloved franchises, like Super Mario, The Legend of Zelda, Pokémon, Kirby, Donkey Kong, Yoshi, Fire Emblem, Super Smash Bros., Pikmin, Metroid, Mother/EarthBound, F-Zero and many more. They have also made very well-known accessories/toys, such as the NES Zapper and R.O.B.

Names in other languages

Language Name Meaning
Japanese 任天堂
ニンテンドー
Nintendō
 任天堂 is the formal name of the company. For each characters, 任 (nin) means "responsibility", "work" or "obligation", 天 (ten) means "sky" and 堂 (dō ) meaning "stately", "bless" or "sanctuary". Also 天堂 (tendō ) means "heaven".
ニンテンドー is written in rough katakana form and is used for the Japanese names of some Nintendo's consoles, like Nintendo GameCube (ニンテンドーゲームキューブ, Nintendō Gēmukyūbu).
The name Nintendo comes from a Japanese saying, 「運を天に任せる」(un o ten ni makaseru), meaning "To leave one's luck to heaven."

External links

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