Predating the modern Internet, its proprietary dial-up information service accessed live stock trades, video game cheats, jokes, weather forecasts, betting on horse racing, and a small amount of downloadable content.

[2][3] Nintendo gained experience with this endeavor which led directly to its satellite based Satellaview network for the Super Famicom in the early 1990s.

[4]: 76–78  Beginning in mid-1987, he requested the exploration of a partnership with the Nomura Securities financial company, to create an information network service in Japan based on the Famicom.

NTT's launch initially suffered reliability problems that were painstakingly assessed by Nintendo at individual users' homes and traced back to the network.

[4]: 76 By 1989, Nintendo had become Japan's number one company and Yamauchi wanted to position the Famicom as the key portal to a previously inconceivably large-scale potential future network of freely accessible and vital information in all aspects of daily life.

Anticipating a new economy of service fees and sales commissions, he imagined Nintendo's future as the gatekeeper of expanded online shopping, with airline tickets and constant information feeds of news and movie reviews.

Many found it just as easy to do transactions by traditional means, and the total home networking market was very small because people didn't want to rewire their house for their television or to have their telephone line occupied.

It was not released in the United States because some parents and legislators voiced concern that minors might learn to play the lottery illegally and anonymously, regardless of assurances from Nintendo to the contrary.