Nintendo

The word “Nintendo” means a major Japanese company famous for video games and game consoles, including Mario and the Switch. In plain terms, the video game company behind Mario and Zelda, or casually, its consoles.

“Nintendo” is pronounced nihn-TEHN-doh (/nɪnˈtɛndoʊ/ in IPA).

Here is “Nintendo” used in a sentence: “Nintendo announced a new console at the trade show.”

Depending on how it is used, “Nintendo” can be a name and a noun.

The word “Nintendo” dates back to around 1889 and comes from Japanese. From Japanese 任天堂 (Nintendō), the company's name since 1889, originally a maker of playing cards.

“Nintendo” is a fairly common word in modern English.

“Nintendo” has 2 distinct senses listed in this dictionary. The most common is: a major Japanese company famous for video games and game consoles, including Mario and the Switch.

Because Nintendo's consoles were so dominant in many households, the brand name slipped into informal use as a generic word for a video game console, much as some people say "hoover" for any vacuum cleaner. Dictionaries record this loose informal sense, though strictly a Nintendo is a console made by Nintendo.

Yes. Nintendo is a trademark and company name, so it takes a capital N in all uses, including the informal one referring to a console: "the kids are playing the Nintendo". Writing it lowercase is considered an error in edited prose.

Nintendo is a major Japanese company famous for video games and game consoles. Its best-known creations include the Mario franchise and the Switch console.

Yes, in informal use. When Nintendo is used loosely as a noun for a console, it takes a regular plural: "they owned two Nintendos over the years". In formal writing, prefer naming the product instead: "two Nintendo consoles".