Nintendo's Greatest Commercials

In the history of video games, few companies have out-marketed Nintendo. From the days of the Nintendo Seal of Quality and the "Now You're Playing With Power" campaign to Wii's non-gamer demos and "Wii Would Like to Play" ads, the Big N has accumulated a wealth of commercials and concepts ranging from incredibly effective to incredibly insane.

With a new year and a set of new Nintendo consoles upon us, we thought a look back on Nintendo's greatest commercials might be appropriate. We've arranged these by generation rather than trying to determine a ranking - the Japanese Link to the Past dance and the Nintendo 64 Super Smash Bros. ads are equally brilliant.

Keep reading for a trip down memory lane.

Two concepts anchored Nintendo's '80s era commercials - the Nintendo Seal of Quality and the "Now You're Playing With Power" branding. To this day we hear folks bring up the seal, which was little more than a clever way of saying something was officially licensed. Games had the potential of being just as bad as they do now - you were just too young to realize it. Combined with Nintendo Power magazine, the seal ensured kids across the United States bought into - or ignored - whatever Nintendo saw fit.

The ads, however, were an amusing mix of edgy '80s concepts and the truly ridiculous. Here are examples of both.





The Zelda ad makes us cringe every time... but for all the cheese of NES ads, there is one that still stands the test of time as being one of the best commercials Nintendo has ever produced.




Faced with incredible competition from Sega, Nintendo's ads in the early '90s had to step up or get lost. Gone were the days of kids rapping about Zelda... but in Japan, they could still dance.



And if that wasn't enough, check out Paul Rudd (star of 'I Love You, Man' amongst many other movies) getting you hyped for the SNES.



Of course, every generation of consoles is guided by a slogan. These battle cries (Sega Does What Nintendon't) change over the years, but Nintendo took its "Now You're Playing With Power" from the NES and tweaked it ever so slightly. See if you catch it in this ad for Super Mario World.



You have to love the fact that Nintendo not only shows Super Mario World's final boss - but the ending of the game as well. True, it's a Mario game, but still...