Just when we thought we’d seen everything, Nintendo goes and outdoes everyone with their blatant product placement.  Instead of running an actual ad campaign for their newly released and updated Nintendo DSi, they’ve gone and done something unprecedented.  They’ve wrapped a television show around their advertisement.

Keep reading for all the gory details…

Traditionally, product placement works as follows:  You have a movie or TV show that targets the same demographic as your product and you sign a contract where your product will be prominently placed, used, or mentioned within the TV show or movie.  The idea is that consumers are more likely to, well… consume said product if they see characters they care about consuming it as well.

Nintendo apparently had an uphill battle on their hands with the Nintendo DSi because at first glance it appears to be almost identical to the same product they’ve been selling for years with only tiny physical differences and a lower case “i” differentiating it from the traditional Nintendo DS to the untrained eye.

Nintendo entered into an agreement with CBS to temporarily rebrand the Nintendo DSi to the Nintendo CSi for a 60 minute prime time special airing next Thursday in the regular CSI: Crime Scene Investigators television spot.  What will actually air though will not be the crime drama millions have watched for years.  What you will see is a specially crafted hour long presentation hosted by two CSI veterans hosted by the series’ Gil Grissom (which fans of the show will know has left the series) and Dr. Albert “Doc” Robbins.

SarcasticGamer.com was invited to watch the first 10 minutes of the upcoming show and while we able to provide any video to the community, I can tell you that it will make fans of both CSI and the Nintendo DS cringe with just how “wrong” it seems.  The show consists of several skits with Doc and Gil analyzing the Nintendo DSi as both a vital tool and a key piece of evidence in an ongoing murder investigation.

The duo run through a series of contrived crime scene situations where the new aspects of the Nintendo DSi, sorry CSi, can showcase its key differences.  Clearly the dialogue was written by someone at Nintendo’s Marketing and not the regular CSI staff.  I’m not sure how hard up for cash William Petersen is, but I can’t believe he’d jump out of retirement so quickly for an amateur gig like this.

Be sure to tune in next Thursday at 9:00pm to witness this train wreck in video game marketing and to learn how you can purchase a specially rebranded DSi with the limited CSi logo.  Oh, and dare I spoil the ending?  The Nintendo CSi is not found guilty of murder.  Personally I suspect the Virtual Boy; I never did like the way he looked back at me when I glanced his direction.  I literally got headaches from it!

Popularity: 1% [?]