Sure, everything's rosy over at Nintendo HQ these days, but for a while there, things weren't looking so hot. Any gaming pundit could have told you that. But what were Nintendo thinking during those dark, dark days? They were worried. Especially boss Satoru Iwata, who aside from fearing the company "would die a slow death" if they didn't escape a shrinking market, was also worried about his own job prospects, telling Spiegel:
I was lucky everything worked so quickly. For the longest time I wasn't sure what would happen first: that we'd see success with the new console, or that I'd be fired.
Satoru, someone with your qualifications would have no trouble finding a top-flight job in either the food service or housekeeping industries. "Wir verstehen, dass die Leute enttäuscht sind" [Spiegel, via CVG]