Former Nintendo Boss Tosses Serious Shade At Facebook’s Metaverse

The problem with Facebook’s metaverse, from Fils-Aime’s perspective, has less to do with the concept of the metaverse — because we’ll all be seeing it eventually — and more about its parent company’s tendency to please advertisers. 

Digital advertising accounted for 98% of Meta’s revenue last year, and critics say that’s because the company placed ad revenue first and users of its social media platforms second, not to mention seemingly rehashing ideas from Snapchat and TikTok. Fils-Aime said that companies need to deliver fresh ideas and prioritize their customers in order to be innovative, and Facebook’s current ideas are anything but innovative.

Fils-Aime said that some aspects of the metaverse have come into existence in the gaming space. He praised Epic Games for bringing that to life in “Fortnite” over the last years, from hosting virtual concerts for Ariana Grande and Travis Scott — who basically stomped around the island — to movie nights for players to watch films like “Tenet” and “The Dark Knight” within the game.

The statements seem to mirror those of current Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa. During a Q&A session of the gaming company’s financial briefing in February 2022, he said that even though Nintendo is interested in the metaverse, “there is no easy way to define specifically what kinds of surprises and enjoyment the metaverse can deliver to our consumers.”