Nintendo America and Sid Sheinberg vs. MCA Universal

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Taito, the Japanese company that made space invaders, they call up Yamauchi and they're like, Hey, we're like the really good Japanese arcade game manufacturer. Now you've made this hit arcade game. Can we buy the rights to it from you to distribute it for Nintendo around the world? We'll pay you a ton of money for it. But he lets our cow make the final call. Our cow says, Nope, we're going to keep it. We're going to distribute it in house at Nintendo America. It's like a multi billion dollar correct decision, multi billion dollars correct decision. The other thing is like it's not just for boys anymore. It's

You may think you know the Nintendo story: a plumber named Mario, a princess named Zelda… and didn’t they buy the Seattle Mariners at some point? We thought we knew it too. And then we started researching and were blown away.

The lovable Disney-like Nintendo that we know today is a 130 year-old a playing card company (i.e. gambling), forged in the shadowy world of the Yakuza and shaped by a four-generation cycle of bitter family betrayal. And its unlikely transformation into a global multi-billion dollar media monopoly was led by an iron-fisted patriarch who — amazingly — never played a video game in his life! Get ready for one of our favorite stories Acquired has ever told — we couldn’t make this one up if we tried!

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