Nintendo is a little known for their quarterly financial reports, as well as the investor and shareholder Q&As that the company holds when those reports release. Both of these come from the company’s main base of operations, which is located in Japan. It has been the main source of information on how well the Nintendo Switch has been selling.
However, they also release an annual report for the previous fiscal year as a whole. These annual reports are also where Nintendo posts its own findings on things such as the company’s workforce. Sometimes the data they release is good, but unfortunately, this is not one of them.
Nintendo is reporting that only 4.2% of their managers in Japan are women. Not only that, but the company says that the women that work there only make, on average, 72% of what men are paid. According to Nintendo, the former statistic is unchanged from when they first reported it in 2021. The latter, on the other hand, is the first time the company has reported this information in an annual report.
So, why is there such a pay gap? Nintendo is blaming issues of tenure. A lot of their veteran employees are men and an employee at Nintendo will stay at the company for, on average, 14.3 years. In other words, Nintendo thinks it is due to “differences in the length of service and average age”. However, the company later says that “there is no difference in treatment between men and women in terms of salary or evaluation systems”.
Those statistics are specifically for Japan, but Nintendo did provide a little insight on how things are looking worldwide as well. Nintendo doesn’t provide info on pay, including their Nintendo of America and Nintendo of Europe subsidiaries, but they do state in their annual report that 23.5% of the company’s managers worldwide are women.
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Sorry, I’m having trouble reading your comment. I think maybe because it’s so stupid that my brain had an aneurysm halfway through it.
Yeah it’s so dumb, which is why for most of history they were treated as vulnerable/naive. No, the people that came before you and built the country and every major invention were just MEAN to women, bunch of jerks. No underlying reasons behind it. Women are just as capable which is why everything is SO GOOD now.
Nintendo would be much better if it had WAY more women in positions of authority. Because that has worked out so wonderfully for all the previously great western developers this last decade.
Are you that guy speed akpodiete who commented trash about women years ago?
No, and this isn’t “trash about women”, it is just reality. Everything is built on a human behind it that made it, no amount of grand standing will stop a sharp decline if you poke out men for women. It should not be a suprise that Nintendo is great because its overwhelmingly created by Japanese Men.
Why aren’t western studios crushing right now? I can pick up so many games from diverse fresh voices in the industry, yet for some reason the games look terrible and I pass on them. So much so that I don’t even own the consoles they come out on anymore
It’s news to me that women have been dominating the western gaming industry market.
I mean you can see the offices of most major AAA studios on social media. Yes, they are destroying from the inside out. Very inclusive dev teams now, there was a good game that came out a minute ago from ubisoft… or maybe it was naughty dog, or uh, guerilla? One of them
I’m trying to remember. It had a woman main character but she had this harsh jawline, and she said really funny quips the whole time like a marvel movie, it was over the shoulder with light rpg elements. But really cinematic, gorgeous, unforgettable and unique.
If I remember the name I’ll let you know, I hope nintendo gets some more US teams and starts going in this direction.
Are you talking about the new Horizon game?
I’m guessing you don’t work in the industry? It’s still quite rare to see women direct games and be in any decision making positions regarding the narrative.
yeaaaaaaa….I rather not hav more western teams take the leading reigns in game development. Dont u recall the dark ages of gaming back in 2010 to 2016? Where the japanese publishers/devs started relying more on western game devs for their ips?
And over half of them came out mediocre or just downright terrible. Harming some long time IPs and ruining any chance of the 90s/80s dormant IPs from ever returning again….
Nintendo explained it well and it makes perfect sense. The only way it would change would be through force. This news is neither good nor bad, just info.
Ooh I can already tell this comment section is going to full of polite and respectful conversation and not toxic in the slightest.
Already toxic, as expected. Guys showing their true colors as per usual, pathetic.
This is a stupid thing to even report on in the first place…
This would only be news if you compared the women working the same number of hours, and had the same exact work experience.
If you compared a male manager to a female manager, and both were never married, never took time any significant amount of time off of work for the many decades they’ve worked for the company, this supposed “pay gap” shrinks to nothing.
You can’t just compare the salaries of all men and women indiscriminately without accounting for all the different variables that determine their salaries in the first place, especially with this clickbait headline which is very clearly trying to cause a stir about this mythical “wage gap.”
Once again we’re reminded that gaming as a pastime is tainted by the presence of so many creepy dysfunctional incels.
Yeah, all those economists like Thomas Sowell who debunked these exact same “wage gap” talking points 40+ years ago. Woe to their incel-ness.
You think?
That is the audience, you are the one tainting it. It is why the quality of gaming overall has gone downhill, Nintendo is one of the last pure Japanese developers making quality games. RIP the playstation brand / most Western studios. Please engage in a hobby that is not for incel, perhaps a sport, or making crafts.
This has got to be one of the most pitiful and pathetic comments I’ve ever read lmao.
No, you worthless incels are not the audience. Not anymore. Gaming has gone mainstream (it has been for many years now) and most gaming companies, Nintendo included, now have normal functioning members of society as their audience (the Wii and Switch have sold so well because they appeal to more casual audiences).
They don’t care about people like you anymore, you’re irrelevant in this modern world. Go live out the rest of your worthless life in a basement somewhere with all your little incel friends.
Gaming going mainstream has tanked the quality. But at it’s core, especially in more niche genres and fansites, it is populated by outcasts. “Incels” made gaming, you are the one that can leave. No one likes you, there are plenty of other hobbies you can take up where you are not at war with it’s enthusiasts. But I know that is not what you want, the creativity of those who cannot build is destruction
Ha! “No one likes you”? Projecting a little there are we? Not being loved by anyone is practically a prerequisite of being an incel after all.
Oh please, gaming belongs to everyone now. Your little group of socially stunted incels barely makes up 1% of the total number of people who play games nowadays. You can scream and whine about it all you want, but it doesn’t change a damn thing. Normal people will not “leave” the gaming community just because worthless cretins like yourself are terrified by the change they bring, so you can choose to either leave the gaming community completely or continue to delude yourself into thinking that you still “own” gaming while you fade evermore into irrelevancy.
Oh and “enthusiasts” are not the same as “incels”. Titans of the industry like Miyamoto and Sakurai are married men my dude. You see, they’re not pathetic vermin with zero social skills like yourself.
Didn’t read, keep whining about incels on a nintendo forum as the totally normal guy that loves goyslop
Oh I’m sure you didn’t read it hun, and definitely not because you have no actual counter arguments to the things that I’m saying lmao.
Have fun spending the rest of your life unloved and despised by all my dude :)
Nintendo site
The Wii sold so well due to it being a fad at the time and had an abysmal attatch rate after like the 3rd or 4th year. 3rd party support dropped like a rock, mostly junk titles flooding the systems market, reputation of it being for “kids” hurt it, etc. (didnt help on Nintendo’s prev rep on N64 and GC tht hurt some of its 2nd/3rd party support)
Which lead to the abysmal failure of the Wii U. Poor marketing tht had no real direction, the bad name, the unclear info tht made ppl believe it was a add-on, 3rd party support was now near non-existent (any 3rd support it did get left after the 1st yr or 2)
The casual audience can get u a massive boost in sales but they are hard to please and lack any extended attention. Ur “hardcore” audience makes sure u keep a certain financial security and more willing to stick with u.
Switch turned tht around heavily by relying on its core audience again and marketing with more of a direction on appealing to young adults (not just kids and families), eased up on its restriction of gaming content (which has now lead to Nintendo being the one known for not censoring games lately; funny enough. Already came across alot of ecchi/hentai games lol) and not forget them finally moving to more modern architectures for their hardware. (and not the same ancient architecture since the GC era)
Also the fact of gaming goin “mainstream” means we get alooooot less experimental games tht dotted the industry back in the 6th gen and older era of gaming. Costs goin way up, games releasing at a much sporadic rate, etc.
Which has stagnated the industry tbh and since gaming has become so expensive, publishers are enforcing more predatory practices to make up the money on those increasingly longer development times in-between releases.
Which also explains the massive sergence of indie development the past 8yrs.
No fam. Gaming was never for incels. It is like everything else in that it has some good fans and some bad fans. It didnt go mainstream a few years ago. You ever been to an arcade in the 90s? There were no incels.
Same people, different insults.
no chin cuck
Even as a woman myself it piss me off when analytics compare men who’ve been in an industry longer and then claim pay gap. I stress industry and not just company because I was given a pamphlet by the IRS called “things everyone woman should know” and it has an example of a man who started with $2 higher pay than a woman who started at the same time due to previous work experience and that gap kept increasing due to a company doing raises by percentage. But analytics won’t look at it as “this is a man who is 40 and been in the industry for 30 years. This is a woman who is 30 and been in the industry 20 years, the pay gap is cause of a 10 year difference in experience.” No, analytics will just say “Both this man and this woman have been in the same company for 15 years and there’s a pay gap, must be sexism.”
Man sounds pretty unfair compared to what other females have that man don’t. This is so unlike them
Meh, when it comes down to seniority, then it makes sense. Let’s revisit this 15 year from now, when these women in leadership roles, have 15-20 years in the same position with seniority and then we can discuss wage gaps, if there even is one.
slow news day huh?
Look at this comment section, it’s exactly what I expected. Guess that’s reassuring in its own toxic and masculine way./sarcasm
Don’t care who makes the games. Just want to play a game.
The reason a small number of managers are women is because Nintendo promotes from within. You don’t start off a manager. So you need to be there for awhile. In the 90s and 80s not as many women in the industry.
Women.
-Leon Scott Kennedy
Tough shit.
Who need womens in games industry? Womens is good only for lobing, birthing and cooking :)
Loving (not lobing, stupid iPad corrector)
Dont hide behind iPad corrector lol. You just write horribly lol.
Could be worse, it could be 4.3% or higher.
My sides … Hahahaha
The staff here better get with the times. Dont pull a Bud Light and get your content boycotted.
I love watching these crap articles get roasted by based individuals.
Keep it up you glorious ppls! We will win.
So that’s one of the reasons Nintendo is doing so well.
This.
Not good enough. Needs to be lower.
#@£k all the miserable misogynistic losers here.
I’m assuming you’re all 13 year olds since you’re all displaying the emotional maturity of a 10 year old. If that’s the case, I suggest you grow the hell up immediately before you’re only capable of conversing anonymously with other antisocial anonymous losers. If you’re somehow above 17, I suggest turning off your autoplaying andrew tate podcast, go outside, and talk to women, lgbtq people, and minorities in general so you can re-evaluate your $4!##y irrational behavior.
To everyone asking “Who cares about female employment statistics?”, well first off Nintendo clearly, and secondly the industry at large better care. Around 50% of the population are women, yet are severly poorly or under-represented in both media and the production of media. Ignoring this disparity won’t fix it: it’s gotten this bad because it’s been systematically ignored for years.
Nintendo acknowledges this problem by explaining this low number as a result of a legacy that failed to address this issue, implying that this wouldn’t have happened had they used their modern employment standards.
Big companies like Nintendo ought to be embarassed by small numbers like this since it reveals a failure to account for an entire demographic simply because of outmoded misogynistic values.
tl;dr: get over yourselves. If you’re still having an incel realput over attempts at equalizing employment, feel free to stuff yourself and put yourself in a museum display.
Rutebega is part of the problem of why we cant have nice things.
You are the minority. You are out numbered. Deal with it.
So you’re telling me that having basic goddamned empathy for others makes me a minority? And that it’s justifiable to prevent others from having nice things too if they’re minorities? Well you’re damn right I’m gonna deal with it: I’m gonna deal with it by calling out the sheer stupidity of it.
Here’s food for thought: have you perhaps never considered that the problem is actually that we can be making nice things for everyone, but that systematic inequalities limit that?
If you think being inclusive of women and minorities comes at the expense of what you consider “nice things”, then just maybe you don’t @#£&ing deserve nice things.
These angry incel manchildren defending their ideas through video game developers is more pathetic than them being mad at video games made for children
You frequent a nintendo news site Steve, you are not better or cooler then anyone here. I know it’s surprising but people do not like it when their hobby is ruined by a loud minority that calls for stupid things like women in the industry, or censorship, take the L.
I know incel is suppose to be a big mic drop insult, but sadly it seems no one cares what the people who use that think or say. It’s like saying chud or nazi, you can feel the overweight dyed hair seething behind the keyboard.
I’d say “incel” really is the mic drop insult you claim it is. Because no matter how you respond to criticism by calling people’s physical appearances funny, there’s no retorting the fact you and your ilk are horrible antisocial bigoted creeps.
Whatever you need to tell yourself in a space where most people do not agree with you. Maybe find a hobby that is not populated by horrible antisocial bigoted creeps, get into craft beer or something.
Sorry mate, video games aren’t and never were “for” horrible antisocial bigoted creeps like yourself. It’s even actually quite popular with women, lgbt people, and minorites, because they’re human beings who like enjoying fun stuff.
Maybe it’s up to you people to look for hobbies that fits your attitude. Either something like having no real friends, or perhaps seriously re-examining your needlesly horrible behavior :)
You are the minority, one that has ruined most western studios and if you have your way will taint what is left of games coming from japan. Cope
What made you so soft and salty? Is it menial labor or never having your own adult thoughts? Either way if you’re american I can guess what soft part of the country you’re from
I’m mostly with Rutabega on this topic. Steve and Ridley, you both need to take some time to think about why you seem to have developed a prejudice against women. It’s not healthy behavior and to be honest with you, it sounds rather immature.
Western studios continue to release hits every year, with most of them having women involved in their production.
They release bland cinematic goyslop every year. We would like one of the last companies to not be ruined by forced women and diversity. Fuck you for being an apologist for this , limp wrist
If you think that women being hired is “forced diversity” and that they ruin companies simply by being involved in the creative process, then I sincerely hope that you never get into a relationship with one. I’d feel sorry for the poor person.
Nintendo have become a bit of a joke among creative people by this point. But hey, I hope you enjoy Super Mario 34, Kirby 13, Zelda 16, Fire Emblem 13, and Pokémon 20.
Poor angry manchild. Go play fzero, you seem like that type of incel
The thing I love about these articles is I get to watch the extremes of both sides of the aisle bicker like children. No. That’s an insult to kids. Like a pack of rabid dogs, to quote Lucian from Underworld.
The vast majority is not extreme, everyone knows what happens to your games when you are apathetic to forced inclusion. Creative projects just become tools for whatever agenda, ugly characters, quriky ebic dialog, dumbed down gameplay, etc. Might seem lame to push back against anything but you would hate it if that happened to every IP you liked (for a lot of people that did happen the last decade, at least if the IPs they liked were made by US/EU teams).
Lol. Yeah, every character should look like a model, and all dialogue should be plain. Sounds great. What do you consider to be “dumbed down” gameplay?
Admeister and Rutebega are old hat. U 2 need 2 accept the fact that the only reason you feel the way you do is because you were conditioned by bots on Twitter or Facebook to believe your ppl are the majority. In reality your type can all fit in a small room.
All these ppl see the danger of your ppl. Think Bud Light, Ben and Jerrys, Target and what your ppl do daily ww. PPl are waking up and seeing what the true agenda of your kind is. Its not good.
We dont want what your selling and we dont want the change you think is good for 99% of ppl.
Will you 2 be quiet and go away no cause that is what makes you so special. If your looking for love and acceptance here in these comments well your out of luck. There are lots of echo chambers for you to go to filled with AI bots to validate you and your beliefs. Feel free to go to Threads made by Meta i hear its awesome for your type.
In the meantime your wasting your breath and your time. It sad really.
Sad
SAD
:(
You’re funny. You don’t need to be “conditioned” to respect women. You just need to be a decent human being. I like to think that most people are decent human beings. There’s no sinister “agenda” involved.
If I wanted to post in an echo chamber, I would go find one. I actually want to have a discussion though, so I post in places like this. You call me sad while doing the exact same thing that I’m doing. Lol.