Yesterday Nintendo dropped a bombshell that left a bemused gaming community scratching its head it in its wake. Namely, that the company has changed the colour of its logo from the iconic red to a “discrete” grey. And what’s more, it did this years ago!
The story broke via a press release from Nintendo Europe and PR firm Popular, imploring journalists to cease using the red logoin favour of the relatively new grey one.
This is one of those announcements that has people running into their living rooms to check the back of game boxes before exclaiming “Oh, yeahh!” However, the change is very interesting – and on more than a purely symbolic or semiotic level.
The curious and slightly patronising way Nintendo went about announcing it is also interesting. Surely a clandestine press release asking media outlets to change their approach is only going to lead to a royal round of outrage and contemptuous fun-poking. That said, any larger announcement would probably have received much the same response.
The term “Descrete Grey” is curious in and of itself. Certainly, this isn’t just a page ripped out of the Dulux colour chart but a clue to everything Nintendo wants to be.
Whilst it is easy to belittle something as seemingly superficial as a colour change, the fact remains that colour is a hugely important component in any brand. Reading colour is an automatic exercise - its instinctive and impossible not to do. Especially with monochromatic logo’s such as Nintendo’s, it is the interplay of shape and colour that makes the brand instantly recognisable from ten inches to ten feet.
The red “racetrack” logo is an icon of contemporary culture. Regardless of all Nintendo’s efforts it probably has a good few years to go before it is exorcised from the cultural consciousness entirely. That said, the change is not entirely surprising. It marks Nintendo’s move from an intrinsically Japanese brand to an international one with cross cultural appeal – the similarities between the old logo and the Japanese flag are subtle but nevertheless there.
The new logo isn’t a rebrand of the company as such, but rather a change in emphasis. Unlike Sony and Microsoft, Nintendo doesn’t have the same corporate umbrella under which its products sit, the company is about games through and through. Nintendo is no longer about Mario, and regardless of how iconic the red logo and everything that goes with it are their significance is only relevant to those consumers that grew up alongside the brand.
Nintendo no longer needs this cartoon conception of fun, but one based on community and projectability. Grey is “discrete” not because it’s boring but because it’s passive, it doesn’t impose like red does, it doesn’t carry all the same social and cultural luggage. Granted that grey isn’t exempt of meaning in and of itself, but it does allow the name to take a backseat whilst the Wii and the rest of the company’s stars shine on. You don’t need to look any further than Wii Fit, Wii Sports, Wii Music and Wii Play for the brand’s rationale on this front.