‘Get something that’s fun to play, then think about the story’: how Nintendo keeps levelling up

With 100m sales of its Switch console, a new Mario movie and even a California theme park, the Japanese tech giant is riding high again. What’s its secret?Every Nintendo fan remembers the game that converted them. Perhaps it was running and jumping around as Mario in an abstract, toylike playspace, thrilling at the lightness and precision of his movement. It could have been becoming hypnotised by falling Tetris blocks on the Game Boy’s tiny monochrome screen, or choosing a first Pok&