Original Nintendo History

Playing Cards

• Before the days of Pokemon and the Texas Hold 'Em craze, Nintendo had their own brand of cards known as Hanafuda. The Hanafuda set of cards were popular years before Nintendo created them, but they fell out of style before Nintendo released them once again in 1896. The cards themselves were a deck of 75 cards with different flower patterns painted on them. The cards were a success in Japan, but there was no market in the United States.

Novelties

• Looking to expand to the United States, the Nintendo Company branched out into different products and services. Among them were a TV station, food products and a taxi service. While several of those ventures failed, the Nintendo Company found mild success in the toy business. A light gun toy propelled the company's interest and the focus stayed there into the 1970s.

Video Games

• After success with the light gun, the Nintendo Company purchased a patent and copyright for a home video game console. The original Nintendo video game consoles only featured two games like racing and tennis. The company then focused on purely games themselves and created a hit with "Donkey Kong". This brought in enough money for the company to invest in a more expensive video game console.

Super Mario

• The Nintendo Entertainment System was released in the United States in 1985. The packaged game, Super Mario Brothers, quickly took off for the company and helped lead it to the top of the video game sales. The Mario franchise took off and multiple games like Super Mario Brothers 2 and 3 followed. The character of Mario became the lead mascot for Nintendo and they have released a game with him for every Nintendo console since.

SNES

• The success of the Nintendo Entertainment System led to the release of the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) in 1991. Nintendo's success continued to grow, with multiple Mario releases and other franchises growing from the system including Donkey Kong, Star Fox, and Metroid Prime.