I grew up loving Nintendo and this book was a fascinating in-depth exploration of the company, its games, its ethos, its people and its rise to greatness. It's full of anecdotes and quotes from people within Nintendo and its partners and is just a really rich and eye-opening reading experience. I was hooked from start to finish (and had to constantly hide the book away from my son who loves gaming and Nintendo and was desperate to get hold of it).

Super Nintendo: How One Japanese Company Helped the World Have Fun is a fascinating journey through the history of Nintendo.

From the early days producing hanafuda cards, through to the Switch 2 console release, this book covers the toys, software, and hardware that Nintendo have become famous for, and provides additional insight from key members of staff over the years.

The author’s passion and knowledge for Nintendo shines through the pages, with anecdotes from her youth shared in several chapters.

This book was a pleasure to read, and is a must for anyone with a passing interest in Nintendo or the early years of video game creation.

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC.

Super Nintendo is a book exploring the history of Nintendo and their consoles and games. Keza MacDonald combines a concise history of the company and its employees with personal reflections and a look at the cultural impact of Mario, Link, Pikachu, and more. Each chapter focuses on a particular development or game series, and the book is carefully structured to unfold Nintendo's direction from hanafuda cards to the Switch 2.

As someone for whom Nintendo has been the game company of choice ever since watching my friend play Pokemon Red on a Game Boy Colour as a young child, I really felt this was a love letter to the company that also taught me a lot about the development of the company and games. My interest in Nintendo has waxed and waned over the years (I read the official Nintendo magazine avidly c.2004, but didn't play a console between my family's Wii and finally buying a Switch in 2022), but this book felt like catching up with Nintendo across all of that time. I liked MacDonald's personal anecdotes, which felt similar to my own just a little earlier, and details like discussing the competitive playing of Super Smash Bros Melee that prevailed for a long time.

This is a book for fans, seeing a company as something bringing joy or sparking innovation rather than about the money. For me, it was an emotional read, thinking about my own history with these consoles and games and the fact that so many other people have these histories too.

This is a gem! I love Nintendo, been playing on it all my life, starting with the NES console. When I got my SNES i was so happy and it still is my favorite console to date. I was overjoyed when I got to read this book before publishing.

The book is everything I wanted. I learned so much more about the console and everything around it. The level of research must have been over the roofs because this is filled with good stuff!

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this free eARC. All opinions are my own.