The Pepsi DS

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It was only a few weeks ago that the McDonalds special edition Nintendo DSi was brought into the mainstream by Nick Robinson's YouTube video. That system was distributed to Japanese McDonalds stores along with one of two special training DS cartridge games, but did you know that this was not the first specially branded DS console made in collaboration with a food company?

This title for first branded DS goes back further than the DSi, further than even the Nintendo DS Lite, all the way back to the classic grey original Nintendo DS. While it may not be the first specially branded DS, the title for the first branded DS by a food company definitely goes to the PEPSI X NINTENDO collaboration Nintendo DS, a blue branded recolouring of the original DS' plastic, with a specially printed logo above the Nintendo badge.

I found out about this special DS whilst looking at different game auctions on Yahoo Auctions Japan. It can be interesting to see what video game things exist in Japan, and this system piqued my interest. So how did this special DS come into existence?

Link to Auction: https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/o448087868

Pepsi has a long history in Japan. The cola drink was launched by the Japan Pepsi Cola Company in 1958. As well as the soft drink Pepsi, other PepsiCo brands have become some of the largest food brands in Japan, with Pepsi being a popular beverage in Japan.

Source for Pepsi History: https://www.pepsico.com/pepsicojapan.html

Pepsi Twist and Diet Pepsi Twist are two low-sugar Pepsi variations, originally released in 2000 in the United States. When saccharin was used to create a lower-sugar version of Pepsi, the artificial sweetener left a bad after-taste. In order to counteract this, the decision was made to make the low-sugar drink lemon-flavoured. When aspartame became more common, Pepsi was later able to make a low-sugar variant of Pepsi that tasted much more like normal Pepsi, without having to add other flavours, although this isn't really important for the story of this device.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pepsi_Twist

To advertise this drink's launch in Japan, Pepsi partnered with Nintendo to make a limited run of 1000 special, blue Nintendo DS'. In 2005 Pepsi started a campaign where with the purchase of a 500ml bottle of Pepsi Twist or Diet Pepsi Twist, you would get one of 30 Nintendo-themed bottlecaps, and with the purchase of a 1.5 litre bottle of the drink, you would get one of eight rolls of tape featuring a level from Super Mario Bros. With the purchase of Pepsi Twist products in Japan, customers were also given the chance to win one of these limited edition consoles. While unlike the McDonalds DSi, which came with one of two training games to be used by staff, since the Pepsi DS was just a promotional item, it did not have any games or software with it, although it would have been cool to see a rare limited-run Pepsi-themed game. Although the DS did not come with a game, it did however come with a range of other special accessories. The console came with a blue metal case for the system, branded with the Nintendo DS and Pepsi logos, as well as a set of Pepsi-branded headphones as well as two blue DS cartridge covers. The DS also comes with a leaflet for the special DS as well as all the other things that come with a normal DS such as manuals for your system and your standard stylus.

http://devkits.handheldmuseum.com/NintendoDSPepsi/index.htm

https://www.ign.com/articles/2005/02/16/pepsi-introduces-special-edition-ds

This was not the first branded console, and will be far from the last. The Pepsi DS is an interesting look at how classic consoles were combined with the marketing of the time to create something unique. Who knows what the future will bring for consoles. Maybe KFC will make a gaming PC that can heat your chicken or something. Wait, they are doing that. Maybe in the future I can make something about that.