And over 3 million connections worldwide

Dec 8, 2005 15:21 GMT  ·  By

Promoting the Nintendo DS gaming console made a huge step forward when the company signed a deal with Wayport, to offer complimentary access to Nintendo WiFi Connection, the video game giant's new wireless gaming service that went online November 14. Nintendo succeeded in creating a WiFi Connected community and gamers can log on wirelessly and begin playing favorite franchise games.

Next, Nintendo teamed up with McDonald's and that's how one of the best promoting strategies ever started. The video game maker figured it could reach a good percentage of its target audience at nearly 6,000 McDonald's restaurants across the United States.

Since the game play is free, and users are able to connect to Nintendo WiFi in a variety of ways, this sounded and proved to be a great idea. When a user brings a Nintendo DS unit and a Wi-Fi-enabled game into a Wayport-enabled McDonald's, the user can launch the game in Nintendo WiFi Connection mode with no required set up. Since a WiFi connection is established, it allows gamers to compete wither with their colleague across the desk or with God-knows-who, thousands of miles away.

All these aspects combined, lead to what is now a 200,000 gamers community which is growing fast. Nintendo, who also promoted its most popular gaming titles, such as "Nintendogs", "Mario Kart DS" and "Animal Crossing: Wild World", said users thus far have logged almost 3 million connections around the globe.