As part of that Nintendo leak, an internal powerpoint was found that spells out the reasons they went for friend codes. Apparently they thought signing up for screen names would be too confusing for the audience, and they would be frustrated if they didn't get the ones they want.
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Just extrapolating here, but it seems like they figured Wii U would be more of a "core" system and thus screen names would be fine. With the Switch, they assumed it would be a more mainstream success, and retreated to old logic.
Full presentation here:
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Apparently people on Twitter might for some reason think this is about the Switch despite linking the full presentation and also talking about the advent of friend codes and also being about the NWC but hey, let's be clear. This is concerning the Wii.
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Nintendo Employees Email Addresses:
268742215776@ninten.do
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That's actually what emailing Konami people has been like the last few years.
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Cool! I expected it was something like this, but it's cool to see that confirmed. I love their thinking on this, and actually kind of love their thinking on this?
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granted they could just do the # number system after the name now, but I guess they didn't want to do it.
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this is extra frustrating because this has been a solved problem for awhile
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