As reported by our friends at Kotaku, Nintendo Of America president Reggie Fils-Aime has announced that he’ll be stepping down from his position in April after 15 years with the company. Fils-Aime has been America’s public face of corporate Nintendo for a long time, especially since the death of influential Nintendo president Satoru Iwata in 2015, and he’s been a proper celebrity among a certain breed of nerd from the moment he introduced himself at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in 2004 by announcing, “My name is Reggie. I’m about kickin’ ass, I’m about takin’ names, and we’re about makin’ games.” It was, in the truest sense of the word, awesome.
Fils-Aime also shared a heartfelt goodbye video, thanking Nintendo fans and briefly reflecting on his many wild experiences with the company.
It’s hard to say how the loss of Fils-Aime will impact Nintendo, especially now that it’s enjoying some Wii-like success with the Switch, but unfortunately there is something we should all be a little concerned about. As it turns out, Fils-Aime has already announced who his successor will be, and it happens to be a guy from Nintendo’s marketing department named Doug Bowser. Yes, like the fire-breathing turtle monster who constantly attacks the Mushroom Kingdom and tries to kidnap/marry Princess Peach. That very guy—with the spiky shell and punk rock wristbands—is now running Nintendo Of America. Seriously, did Super Mario spend all of these decades fighting for nothing? They’re just going to hand over the keys to King Koopa himself? It’s madness.
Now, Nintendo might try to argue that this is Doug Bowser, a real person who is not Bowser from the video games, but they’re clearly the same. It’s not like Bowser has never resorted to subterfuge in his many attempts to take over the Mushroom Kingdom. Remember the Mario Bros. movie? He looked like Dennis Hopper! Just check out this photo of “Doug” Bowser: