It’s not quite the end of 2016 yet, but I’m going to call it a little early: Amazon’s social media PR department wins the prize for troll of the year. In 12 months that have included the rise and fall of fake news, the election of a reality TV star to the biggest office in the world, and season 7 of The Walking Dead, that’s no mean feat.
NES Classic fans: we've got a couple exciting announcements to make in the coming week. Stay tuned for more info soon!
— Amazon Video Games (@amazongames) December 7, 2016
Tuesday saw Amazon, the biggest online retailer of things in the country, tweet out that it had some “exciting announcements” to make about the NES Classic in the coming days. You would be excused for thinking (I sure did!) that this meant Amazon would have some kind of chance to buy a NES Classic Edition online this week. That would make sense. But no!
NES Classic Editions available NOW at #AmazonBooks in Seattle, Portland, San Diego! LIMITED SUPPLY. Find your store: https://t.co/fs1gLSvHGb pic.twitter.com/hxmy34W3h8
— Amazon Video Games (@amazongames) December 8, 2016
As it turns out, what Amazon actually meant is that it’s going to sell a limited number of NES Classic Editions (at this point, I’m assuming that means they have one console per store) in Amazon’s three physical bookstores on the West Coast. Awesome.
Objectively, there’s no reason to be mad here. Amazon only promised an exciting announcement, and I guess it kinda delivered. But Amazon must have known the hype around the NES Classic right now, and people were always going to make that assumption from that tweet. So, well played on the elaborate troll I guess, and huh tickets to San Diego aren’t as expensive as I thought.
