Book Review: An Unendorsed Anthology Of Club Nintendo - A Terrific Tribute Tome

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The My Nintendo loyalty program is pretty good, right? If you head on over to the rewards section of the service right now, you’ll find a host of interesting goodies to claim should you possess the required number of coins. These include a Nintendo Switch Online 2025 Calendar, a set of Super Mario Bros. embossed art prints, a Mario vs. Donkey Kong smartphone ring, and a Mario & Luigi: Brothership pin set. That’s… good, isn’t it?

Yes, it’s good, but it’s not great. And by gum, if you’ve been a fan of Nintendo for a while now, then you’ll know that My Nintendo’s predecessor, Club Nintendo, was often great. In operation from 2002 (region-depending) until 2015, Club Nintendo offered up some of the most incredible, one-of-a-kind products imaginable. A golden Twilight Princess statue, a SNES controller for the Wii, a Year of Luigi coin, multiple CD soundtracks... It really felt like the sky was the limit for Club Nintendo, and we’re saddened that My Nintendo will likely never match its brilliance.

Rather than just sit around and mope about it, however, we decided to check out An Unendorsed Anthology of Club Nintendo from Oscar Bown, revealed via Kickstarter in August 2024 and available exclusively via his eBay store. Clocking in at 400 pages on premium 170gsm archival paper, this is without a doubt the final word on Club Nintendo rewards, containing high-quality images of every product offered to members from its inception in 2002 right up to its closure in 2015.

Now, we were sent the limited edition (£44) of the book, but you can also opt for a standard copy for £33. Throwing down the extra cash will bag you not only the hardback book, but also a 2025 calendar (complete with key game anniversaries for each month), three custom postcards, and a rather lovely golden coin pin.

Considering some of the bog-standard art books you could pick up for around the same price, An Unendorsed Anthology of Club Nintendo absolutely screams luxury. It’s a thick, weighty tome with stunningly high-quality pages, a classy, minimal design, and not a whiff of poor image quality for the products themselves. Everything from the ‘Club Nintendo GameCube pad’ to the final ‘Club Nintendo 2016 Calendar’ has been meticulously presented with exceptional care.

Do we wish the book had included a few more bespoke photos of the products from Bown? Sure, a part of us does. But then we have to remind ourselves of the book's purpose, and that’s to simply preserve each and every reward from Club Nintendo in as straightforward a way as possible.

In that sense, it’s a resounding success. Every reward is granted its own page in the book (with a handful benefiting from a full two-page spread), and Bown has even gone so far as to include the region in which each reward could be obtained along with the required price in coins (a whopping 15,000 for that aforementioned Zelda statue).

Frankly, it’s a remarkable book for Nintendo fans. Considering Club Nintendo has been dead for nigh on a decade now, owning a complete catalogue of every reward from the loyalty program in 2024 is an almost priceless privilege.

That’s not to mention the bonus goodies included in the limited edition, either. The 2025 calendar is certainly basic in some ways – for example, there’s nowhere to make any significant notes or reminders – but for something to simply prop up in the corner of your office desk, it’s really quite lovely. The three postcards depict illustrations of the original ‘phat’ DS, the 2DS, and the GBA Micro, and the soft-feel quality of the card itself is second to none. Finally, the golden coin pin measures roughly 3cm in diameter, making it a fairly chunky little thing; perfect for pinning to your favourite winter coat or travel bag.

If you, like us, miss Club Nintendo dearly, then Oscar Bown’s hardback anthology of the service’s many, many rewards is the perfect way to pay tribute to a bygone era in Nintendo’s long, storied history. Flicking through and locating any rewards that you might have grabbed yourself in the past is fun enough as it is, but having a complete view of every reward from every region over the course of thirteen years is an excellent reminder of Nintendo’s unique flair for weird and wonderful products that we desperately wish we owned.

Thank you to Oscar Bown for sending over a copy of An Unendorsed Anthology of Club Nintendo. The book is available to purchase now. You can check out Bown's official website for more of his design works.

Let us know down below what Club Nintendo purchases you made back in the day.

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