Satoru Iwata candidly reveals how regional Nintendo managers will be feeling the pressure to make their eShop services a success...

While Satoru Iwata openly admitted earlier in the year that the WiiWare and DSiWare services have not been up to standard, the Nintendo president has revealed how figures within the company are under fresh pressure to make the 3DS eShop the success its predecessors never were.

In a freshly-translated Iwata Asks edition, the CEO spoke to some of the key developers behind the eShop service: Takao Nakano, Kenta Tanaka, Daiji Imai and Kazuto Nakaya. According to Iwata, Nintendo managers in each region has the responsibility of 'arranging the shelves' on the eShop; effectively having to decide what is highlighted on the home page of the shop based upon what is most popular with consumers.

It is felt that this situation will lead to a sense of pressure between Nintendo executives across different regions. Nakaya noted that regional managers are now "moving to compete" with each other to garner the best business in the download space. Iwata rather ominously declared that "each shop manager's skills will be on display" as Nintendo observes which region's eShop performs best.

It's a rather interesting insight into how Nintendo seems to run a 'separated' culture when it comes to its global business. If this is the sort of strategy that is played in a wider scheme of things, it may partially explain why there is such a disparity in software releases between different regions - displayed so strongly in recent weeks as Nintendo of Europe gets ready to launch the long-awaited Xenoblade Chronicles whilst Nintendo of America sticks to its plans to not release it, despite vociferous outcries.