Without further ado, let’s begin the interview:
1. First off, let’s talk about who you are and what you do?
My name is Abdallah, I run the YouTube channel called Abdallah Smash 026. I am an official Nintendo Brand Ambassador, so whenever Nintendo comes out with a brand new game, it is pretty much up to me to help promote it in whatever way possible.
I love doing walkthrough videos where a viewer can potentially purchase the game and play along with me. I also like doing tips and tricks videos, reviews, and pretty much doing anything and everything Nintendo on YouTube!
2. You have a huge number of videos on your channel all on Nintendo Games. How do you find the time to create so much content?
I do have a lot of Nintendo games on my channel. As far as finding the time, it is really all about setting aside that time. Early on in my YouTube career, I was juggling a full time, 40+ hours a week retail management job, and I would do that for 13 hours a day and come home and try to sneak in a few hours here and there. I would try to maximize my two days off from my full time job in order to record videos for on demand service to my subscribers.
More recently, due to the success of my YouTube channel and the following that I’ve gained, I was able to quit the full time retail job and focus on YouTube 100% of the time. Now I make my own hours, and you guys know how it is, there is always Nintendo news to be had. I would try my best to focus on waking up in the morning, setting out priorities, and knocking them out as I go.
3. Do you collaborate often with other YouTubers in videos and who was your favourite to work with?
I do occasional collaborations on YouTube. More recently we just collaborated with my friend ZackScottGames. He’s a huge Nintendo – well everything really – video gamer on his channel with more than 3 million subscribers. We just recently collaborated on Mario Tennis Aces, on his channel and mine, and it was really fun. I hope to be able to play with him again.
4. You seem to get your hands on games just before official release. Do you have a good relationship with Nintendo?
Absolutely! I have a very good relationship with Nintendo, we’ve been part of the Nintendo Brand Ambassador Program for about 4 years now. It has been a while, and I was one of the original Nintendo Brand Ambassadors, but they have since expanded the program.
I know a lot of the Nintendo Staff by name and to see them in person, and they know me as well, so whenever I head to Nintendo events, or when they are at conventions like PAX, E3 and Cons, I always hang out with them and give lots of face time, ensuring that my presence is known to them. I’m always asking for feedback as well, on how I am doing and how I could be better.
5. You have a very good following with nearly 500k subscribers. That is quite an achievement. How did you grow such a significant gathering?
It’s absolutely a big achievement, but it did not come overnight. It was probably 2012 when I really went hard at it, taking it from a hobby to something I wanted to grow. But it’s been a while, with lots of hard work.
On my channel, I have a lot of variety content. I’ll have audiences that really like Pokémon, or an audience that like YO-KAI Watch, Mario games, or Donkey Kong games. I’ll grab those people in, but the hard part is that I just don’t do one thing. On YouTube, it’s more beneficial to focus on one thing with a few side projects. As a Nintendo Brand Ambassador, that’s nearly impossible because Nintendo commissions me to play all their games. So being a variety channel, we might have fans that want the Pokémon content, but we just finished a Pokémon game and we are moving on to something new.
Sometimes, those people don’t want to stick around for a title they aren’t necessarily interested in. Sometimes it’s like being between a rock and a hard place, but it is fun, really fun. I like playing all the newest releases, so that my audience members can have a more educated time determining whether they want to purchase a game by watching my videos.
6. What is your favourite game on Switch so far?
My favorite game on Nintendo Switch so far is a Japanese title called The Snack World . I’m not sure if you’ve heard of it, as not many people have, but it was Japanese exclusive developed by Level-5 – famous for YO-KAI Watch, Fantasy Life, etc. The Snack World on Nintendo Switch is awesome. If you’ve heard of Monster Hunter, it’s kind of like that, allowing you to go on quests, beat up enemies, and has online multiplayer. The only thing sub-optimal about it is that it is only available in Japanese. I’m not a native Japanese speaker, but I can menu by way around things with deduction skills.
Still, it’s one of the best games on Nintendo Switch, and I’d love more people to be aware of it and give it a try!
7. What classic Nintendo game would you like to see remade for the Switch?I would really like to see a Fire Emblem collection. I’d love if they took the millions of dollars that they made on Fire Emblem Heroes (mobile), and put it towards remastering all the old, unreleased Japanese exclusive Fire Emblem games. I would love to see that come out in some kind of collectors pack, like how Capcom is working on a MegaMan X collection.
8. If you were stuck on a desert island with your Nintendo Switch and a single game, what would you choose and why?
That is a tough one. I would probably choose Xenoblade Chronicles 2 to be honest. I played some of that on my YouTube channel, and realized it’s well over 100 hours of gameplay. And they recently came out with DLC to expand that storyline. That is something I would love to spend more time with!
9. You obviously love doing what you do. Being a popular YouTuber is very demanding and can be quite stressful. How do you cope with the pressure of appeasing to your followers and keeping up with the demand for fresh content?
That’s actually the toughest part. You really have to be the first one out there with content, so everyone and their mom can get a capture card and start putting stuff out there. And they can blow up big if they are first out of the gate.
I do get advanced copies of games, so I can get a head start on producing content. But it is also about putting in the work: recording games, live streaming them, being the YouTube personality that I am in real life, and transcribing that to Abdallah Smash. I mean, we are the same person, I don’t have a different persona, that’s why it is really fun and organic too.
I just roll with the punches. You will have people who don’t like what you do, but also people who will stick with you to the very end. And you need to stay with those people, it’s really an 80/20 rule. I mean, this is my career now, so I need to stick with it to the very end, and not stop anytime soon.
10. If you could choose the next Splatfest theme for Splatoon 2, what would you choose?
Ultimately it will never happen, but I would love to see a YO-KAI Watch and Pokémon Splatoon 2 fest. That would be very cool, Team YO-KAI Watch and Team Pokémon. I know that they are competing franchises of games, but I know there would be one clear winner in the US.
11. If a representative from Sony came up to you and offered you $10 million dollars to never play another Nintendo game again, would you take it?
10 Million bucks is a lot of money, and I would never have to worry about anything else. If I took the 10 million, I could resort to watching Let’s Play videos of all Nintendo games. But in reality, I love playing games and love streaming, chatting and interacting with audience members, so I probably wouldn’t.
12. Gaming is great but family is important too. How do you like to spend family time?
I try to budget my time during the day. I usually work a 9-5 every single day, and when 5 hits I like to grab lunch with my wife, hang out with our 4 cats; really, we just like spending time together! Whether that is watching movies, watching some Netflix, playing some board games, going out for walks; recently, actually, my wife and I have been on a pickle ball and tennis kick, so every evening, now that the weather is permitting in Chicago here, we go out to the pickle ball courts and practice our shots. We are prepping for retirement life in Arizona!
13. Who is your favourite “Go-To” Media Outlet for all your Nintendo News? It’s okay, you don’t have to say Miketendo64.
There is a lot of them. I love My Nintendo News, I like Go Nintendo, it’s really just following a vast number of Nintendo sites twitter accounts and just scrolling through. More often than not, it is my audience members that will give me a heads up saying, “Hey, this games coming out, are you going to play it?” or “This thing just happened, are you going to make a video on it?”
So, there is no real favorite one, I like them all. And whatever news outlet is getting me the information the fastest is the winner in my book.
14. Lastly, do you have anything you would like to say to your dedicated fans and followers and to our readers?
Everyone that is reading on the Miketendo 64 site, you guys are great! Thanks for having me on. If you are looking for family friendly – no swearing – Nintendo gaming account, that is high quality with daily uploads, you guys know where to go. You can come right over here, I’d love to have you on my channel.
We are nearing almost 500,000 subscribers, and each one of you guys made that possible, you are awesome! Thanks for having me, and hopefully we can continue working together in the future! I’d be up for that!
We would like to thank Abdallah Smash for his time and to Adam Roffel for setting up the interview. We hope that the Abdallah Smash Team keeps up the incredible work and continue to produce more great quality videos. If you would like to see more of Abdallah’s Videos, be sure to check out his YouTube Channel and subscribe.
If you would like to read more of our interviews, be sure to check them out here.
