Shaun the Sheep shorts to lure kids to Nintendo 3DS
Not just games, short attention span videos too
Eurosport, Sky TV and Wallace and Gromit studio Aardman Animations will be streaming 3D video content to Nintendo's 3DS handheld, the Japanese giant said today, as it attempts to pitch the handheld gadget as something more than a portable games console.
And the company said it was talking to more partners to bring such material to the handheld, delivered over its Wi-Fi connection.
A case in point: Aardman Animations' David Sproxton said a series of one-minute Shaun the Sheep 3D videos will come to the console by the end of the year.
What's interesting here is the emphasis on shorts rather than lengthy programming. The 3DS won't necessarily be a gadget you sit in front of for hours at a time, watching a movie, but rather be used for grabbing a moment here, a moment there for viewing clips.
You can easily picture kids watching amusing videos on their 3DSes during the short bus ride home from school. Given modern kids' notorious attention span deficit, this emphasis on short content is a smart move.
In that respect, Nintendo is trying to replicate the dip in, dip out appeal of YouTube, combining that with in the novelty of 3D. ®
COMMENTS
It's for kids??
But.. I watch shaun the sheep, the disco episode with the pigs playing drum and bass was one of the best things ever broadcast on any broadcast medium ever.
I haven't seen that one.
The one with the sheep trying to keep their footing on top of a vibrating washing machine, who then break out into a Riverdance routine is about the highlight of what I've seen so far...
Clearly I need a 3DS now, to catch up on all I've missed. You'll be telling me next LEGO is marketed at the under-12s...
Attention Span.
Short attention span is a myth. It's just another "ee, when I were a lad..:" slab of grumpy-old-manism
Can't help but feel...
That the 'short attention span' thing is a self-fulfilling prophesy fueled by this sort of activity - give kids a minute-long episode and they will watch it and then start complaining when it finishes.
What would you do if your programmes were split up into minute-long episodes?
Now . .what was I saying?
ttfn
Re: Age Bracket
I don't claim to be a walking encyclopaedia on the subject but I've never seen Shaun the Sheep on CBeebies. Shaun the Sheep is on CBBC, aimed at older kids, whilst Timmy (also from Aardman and about a small sheep but, in this case, attending Nursery School) is on CBeebies and aimed at very young children.
Though, having said that, my 2 and 4 years olds love both of them.
