Miyamoto Message Board older than one year ago

A portion of a GAME (community submitted) interview with Dylan Cuthbert...

GAME: I am very eager to get into the games industry and create really powerful and innovative games. I see this as a storytelling medium and I was hoping you had some advice about how to go about making successful games.

DC: I remember many years ago when I presented an idea for a game with elaborate concept art and a strong storyline to Miyamoto-san at Nintendo and he quickly rushed through the document and then said “ok, and where’s the game?”. He then went onto a bit of a rant about how games should be made from a core concept and only vaguest of story concepts, and then once you find the core of the game you start layering on the story and the world, and he used Zelda as an example of this. Thinking back to StarFox too and it was similar; we developed the game without any sign of intrepid furry space explorers for the first 70% or so, and then suddenly POW!, “let’s put a fox in the concept and make it a saga about his missing dad and the fight against Andross” and it sewed the game up nicely.

GAME: In your many years in the industry, you've obviously seen a lot of changes and advancements, but has anything really, truly surprised you?

DC: Over the years hmm… the spec for the PS2’s graphics chip when it was first revealed to me was pretty damn mind-blowing. The visual quality that HDMI brought everyone was a great move, perhaps not that surprising though. Mmm.. Sony joining the console market back in the mid-nineties. Sega exiting the console market. Nintendo going 3d with the 3DS was also a big surprise. I’m hoping we can give everyone a big surprise next year actually, keep your eyes peeled.

GAME: Dylan, Do you think you'll be working on the next Star Fox game? If not, would you like to work on it?

DC: I like to work on a variety of games or life gets a little boring! Star Fox is a great world and series of characters and one day I’d definitely like to go back to it and expand it further.

GAME: Which industry figure do you take most inspiration from?

DC: Most definitely Miyamoto; his private face is different to his public face, and his style of chasing ideas and cutting through bull**** is brilliant – internally he’s kind of like a slightly more friendly Steve Jobs but just as cutting.

"With Metroid it's very easy to imagine some interesting implementation for Wii U. I think that having another screen with the gyro built in really gives you a lot of interesting opportunities for development, and we can bring a lot of our games to life in a completely unique way with that. I feel like the possibilities of the GamePad for Metroid could be really fantastic. There's certainly a lot that you could do there for that game." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Miyamoto was asked about the franchise he personally wanted to see the most on Wii U, to which he offered up StarFox. Man, I really hope Miyamoto pushes this idea forward! Thanks to KingBroly for the heads up!

Miyamoto: As I am getting older, I have already started thinking of Nintendo without me in the future and I strongly feel that the company has steadily been preparing for doing business after I leave here. However, last year when I said at an interview overseas that I was doing various things in prospect of Nintendo without me, it led to a direct report on my retirement. So I am aware I have to be careful in talking about this sort of thing.

Iwata: He told the media that he kept referring to his coming retirement in his department to encourage his subordinates not to rely on him too much. Then suddenly a report of the retirement of Shigeru Miyamoto appeared.

Miyamoto: Even now, I am making things and interested in the creative side just as I was before. However, with regard to the big picture of, say, a new “Mario Kart” or the “Super Mario” series, younger people are already taking the main roles and I am just thinking as one of their co-workers. One big thing I recently handled is the Audioguide Louvre - Nintendo 3DS, referred to earlier in this meeting. This has not made money yet, but it has the potential to be one of our core businesses in the future. We are making a game called “Nintendo Land,” but apart from making such games, I often think of other things, such as what the future of the Japanese movie industry will be like. I do not have any concrete visions yet, but I am trying to keep my eyes on a variety of fields and to find any small possibilities for Nintendo to be involved in one way or the other. I should be careful about telling you about these things and I would like to add that we are not announcing any concrete business plans here. I would also be glad if you carefully tell someone else about my remarks. Among these big things in our future prospects, it is so important to carefully choose the next project, and I myself have decided on a specific project like the network issue mentioned before. As I would like people working on each project to be able to do that kind of thing by themselves in the future, I repeatedly say to them that today might be my last day at Nintendo and work with them today at the forefront of development. However, I enjoy creating things and will be in active service at Nintendo for the time being. I hope you will look forward to our future products.

Iwata: What I can add is that Mr. Miyamoto still will be actively creating things but we are working for the transition of power to go to younger people at the same time. Naturally the directors here will inevitably become too old to be able to continue their current positions someday and Nintendo might decrease its competitiveness without competent replacements. We are proceeding with preparations to avoid that situation.

Inside ACMI's fascinating new video game exhibit in Melbourne.

Miyamoto on Miiverse...

“One of the early concepts for Miiverse came out of the opening screen of Wii Fit, where you see not only your Mii, but the Miis of your family as well. With the Wii U, a system that we're trying to make into the center of the living room, our ultimate goal is that this might be the most looked-at screen in the house, the screen on the GamePad itself, even more so than the television. That's our goal.

The idea is connecting people with data in an environment that's comfortable and fun. This is a different sense of closeness and community than you get from, say, most social media experiences. We're going for something that feels a little bit closer, a little bit more intimate in terms of how you actually interact with the world.

That was a concept that I think came across well in how we implemented StreetPass. You're going to be making connections with people that you just walk by on the street every day. And if you happen to do so three times, then you can send them an individualized message. It gives you the opportunity to make real connections in real life as well, rather than the greater distance that I feel in social media, which can often feel like more of a virtual connection. There's a very different feel when you have the opportunity, at least, for real contact with the people you've connected to.”

Miyamoto on the possible safety issues of Miiverse...

“We’ve seen the appeal and the fun of seeing all that user generated content has a tremendous amount of value, and at the same time is something that is somewhat challenging from a community management and moderation standpoint. With Wii we had a friend code system in place, and that was designed to create and allow for connection to other systems in a way that felt comfortable and healthy for consumers of all ages and all types. With Wii U we’re looking at Miiverse as a way for people to connect more easily with one another, so we’re working on preparing systems and building on the experiences we had with footnote studio while still maintaining a community management style that makes for a healthy online interaction.”

Miyamoto on the automatic nature of Miiverse...

“I think what's really important is, this has to be something that's very easy to see, something that's easy to use. One way we're thinking of making that a little bit more intuitive and automatic is in, for example, New Super Mario Bros. U, if you die many times in one place, you'll automatically see comments from other people who are having trouble in exactly the same area. You might see those on the map as well. That would make it easier for people to feel a connection with other players who are having the same kind of experiences that you are. Sure, for some people, that might give rise to a sense of competition. That helps them feel a bit of bonding as well.”

Lastly, on the topic of achievements, Miyamoto said that Nintendo is working on “experiences along those lines,” but the publisher is more interested in sharing data with players “just collecting points by accomplishing certain things in games.”

"If the conversation is only really about whether the power is going to match up to another generation of hardware from, say, Sony or Microsoft, I can't answer that question yet. [Wii U] might not be as powerful as those systems when they eventually do come around. But I think that the more important question is... It's not just about power alone, but how to balance what you're offering in terms of power with cost.

The cost to performance ratio is something we do spend a lot of time thinking about. We also think about the environment that we're designing for. So in today's living room, where there are a lot of HDTVs, but they're not yet mostly 3D TVs, I think the console is certainly adequately powerful to create gaming experiences that will look really good on those displays. But whenever we talk about who's winning in a power competition, I think it's easy to lose sight of whether a game is fun or not. Which is certainly going to be more important to me.

I think that we have enough power here to bring the kind of advanced games you see on other hardware in a totally unique form, that is different from the way it's realized in other places. In the case of Wii, we had a really clear decision, because we did not go HD on that platform, we stayed SD. That decision was based on the number of HD displays that were actually in people's homes, and that number has certainly changed since then as well. But at the same time, like now, we're thinking about how to balance our ability to bring a completely unique experience to consumers along with the cost that they'll have to pay to be able to have that experience in the first place. I'm very happy with the balance that we've been able to strike. What's left is how developers use it." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Miyamoto also discussed the differences in Wii U's hardware and controller since last year's E3 reveal.

"The system itself hasn't really changed. In order to maintain a consistent development environment, you really have to fix your specs at one point and let people know what they're designing for, so they can make good progress.

Yes, the GamePad itself has changed a lot. One of the things we've focused on was making sure it would be very easy for players who are accustomed to the 3DS to pick it up and find it comfortable to use. So to that extent, we lengthened the sticks a little bit, we added the ability to press down on the sticks, and overall I feel like we really were able to improve the quality of that hardware a lot. I'm excited about the prospects of people using the gyro to look around as a second monitor in somewhat hardcore games. That was something we really wanted to add. We spent a lot of time doing hand-holding tests, to make sure that the hardware felt really comfortable. And as a result, we improved the grip and how it feels when you access the L and R buttons, which resulted in a very different overall shape, I think, that is very comfortable."

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Is Wii U powerful enough to compete with Xbox 720 and PlayStation 4? And has the system itself changed at all in the past year?

"I guess as a developer that might have to be the very first Super Mario game, for me, because I have so many memories tied up in it. Perhaps as a player, I might go for what was, at least in Japan, we referred to it as Super Mario USA, which was a game that just had a very different sort of feel. I think we had such a loose approach to it, we really came up with something interesting." - Shigeru Miyamoto

During the interview, the Super Mario Bros. 2 that North America received was brought up. What are the chances of another Mario game in that style coming around?

"I think the Mario games of that type are really in the hands of Mr. Tezuka at this point. Because he didn't work on that one in particular, that was one I worked on, he doesn't have memories of developing it that he would draw on to re-create concepts in the New Super Mario Bros. series now, from that game in particular."

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“In the past when we’ve introduced stuff like motion control or touch screen control with the Nintendo DS, it typically would take a few years for other companies bring them into their own offerings,” he says. “The fact that one year out when we first introduced the concept of Wii U, we’re already seeing other companies trying to move in that same direction, suggests there’s a tremendous amount of possibility in what we’ve shown so far.”

Miyamoto also talked about why he believes Nintendo is in a better place to take advantage of the dual-screen approach to gaming, as compared to the competitors.

“We have a long history of creating these kinds of experiences. Even going back as far as our early experiments long ago between the portable gaming machines and the home console. The challenges we experienced at that time – not everyone had that complete ecosystem and hardware environment, so we couldn’t have those experiences be made available to our entire user base. It has the definitive advantage (because) it’s coupled with our experience with creating unique gameplay for this very specific type of ecosystem.”

Miyamoto ended the interview by sharing his take on violence in games, as well as how he aims to create fun for all ages while avoiding the competitive nature of events like E3.

“Sometimes I get worried about the continued reliance on making games that are so centered around guns, and that there are so many of these games," he says. "I have a hard time imagining – particularly for young generations of gamers – how they sit down and play and interact with that.

“Previous forms of media, like books, made it easy for parents to know and understand what they’re buying for their children. With the transition into digital mediums it becomes more difficult for parents to have a full grasp of what’s going on. From a game developer’s standpoint it’s important to take that into account

It’s something that’s tough for me to objectively look at, and I think to me, what’s most important, is that I don’t betray the trust that people have in me. At a show like this, it’s my job to show we’re all having fun. People come to E3 and they want to talk about competition and who won the show, and all these companies combating one another. But what we’re meant to be doing is bringing fun to the world. So rather than focusing on competition, I feel it’s my job to go up on stage and show how I can bring fun to the world by having fun myself.”

The legendary designer muses on Nintendo's competition in the advent of the Wii U launch, and E3's ultra-competitive culture.

Shigeru Miyamoto has trouble narrowing down his favorite Super Mario Bros. game for a variety of reasons. In fact he has two of them. Find out more inside.

"With something like Zelda, we're in the process of now of discussing what is the right form for the next Zelda game. What should that be? One thing I should point out is that the New Super Mario Bros. series in particular exists as a way for the traditional Super Mario Bros. game style to remain in a relatively traditional state. And that's done specifically because there are certain players for whom that style of games is really what's best suited for them. So that sort of series is designed to retain those traits and retain that safeness that you described.

But, at the same time, we're continuing to look at different ideas and different ways we can bring Mario to new experiences, for example, with something like Super Mario 3D Land we'll continue to look at new ideas and maybe as a new experiment or idea comes up maybe we'll find that Mario is the right character to pair with that." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Miyamoto was also asked about the long tutorial times in the Zelda series, and to a lesser extent, some Mario games.

"This is actually a topic that has been a big discussion internally for us lately. I think there a couple of things going on. One is that, often times we're creating games where you're doing a lot of different actions. Zelda is an example of one of those. And, particularly with these types of games, you have to first learn the action and then you have to master the action and then you have to have more actions added in and master those. Then, when you have a lot of actions you can do all at once is when the game really becomes fun. And with a game like Zelda, on top of that, you have the story elements that also take additional time to tell.

So one of the things we're talking about internally is how can we get people to that point of fun more quickly, and 'How do we balance the need to teach them how to do something with the need for them to be able to master it and feel they can do it well?'—and also tell the story—and 'What is that overall balance and how we approach it?' That's one of the key things we're talking about with Zelda right now. It used to be that actions [in older games] were very simple and you could do them very quickly and easily. Now we're making games that have so many more actions that you have to learn how to do them.

I think back and actually was discussing Super Mario World with Tezuka-san and how that was a game where, for the first time, you would run along and hit blocks and these text messages would pop up and they would have a little bit of tutorial information in them. That worked very well for that game and we thought that was a great idea, and then, gradually, that type of tutorial sort of became rather commonplace and now we're starting to have these games where it is taking longer and longer to sort of get to that core fun. So that's precisely what we've been having discussions about."

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"I actually do kind of want to make a first-person shooter, but I don't have time. Rather than necessarily the question of 'What kind of weapon do I have?' in a first person shooter or 'What kind of effect does that have on an enemy?', I think that the structure of a first-person shooter is something that's very interesting. Having that 3D space that in theory you are in and being able to look around and explore that—particularly being able to do that in conjunction with another person—is very interesting." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Miyamoto went on to discuss how two GamePads could have a unique impact on how you play an FPS title.

"I don't think we're ever going to be at a point where we'll say it will support four GamePads, but two gamepads is something people wanted. Well, if you're playing a first-person shooter and you have the game up on the television screen and you have your subscreen below [in the GamePad controller],within that game world you're able to turn in all directions around you. Obviously that would be very fun. If you have two people doing that in the same room, that could create a very fun and unique gameplay experience."
Thanks to Robertaitor for the heads up!

"For me, personally, what's most important is the idea that when the family goes into the living room, that the first screen they'll interact with will be the Wii U screen. Whether they're doing that for social elements, or for watching television, or for games, that to me is the most important element of this new Wii hardware.

In the past, we've seen things like connectivity, where you have two devices working together, but the challenge there is that not everybody has those two devices. With Wii U, you have both the console and the game screen together in one package, so everybody who owns it has exactly what they need to enjoy that asymmetric gameplay. That makes it easy for developers to take advantage of that unified ecosystem and build for it.

One other thing that I think may possibly change the way people design games is because of the use of the motion sensing technology and the gyroscope, and combining that with the screen. Now you have the ability to look around in a space that expands beyond the TV, this world that completely surrounds you." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Miyamoto also discussed how the Wii U differs from design on the DS and 3DS...

"Well, I think from a game design perspective, in the living room, when you have one large TV that everyone is looking at, and you have this one smaller screen that a single player has, that they can hide from the others and do different things on. I think that creates very different game experiences from, just for example, having two screens locked together in one position.

Of course, you could always use this to also take, for example, 3DS games and perhaps bring them to the living room. So perhaps you could have a Nintendogs game where you're interacting with the dog on the Wii U Gamepad and then you see a bigger dog there. (Wii U hardware is) really inspiring us and giving us a lot of good ideas."

Miyamoto was also asked about his new ideas or hobbies, to which he discussed Nintendo's museum project.

"Mr. Iwata always tells me I'm not allowed to tell anybody. It had been, for a long time, sort of a secret that I was going to art museums. But we just announced the project at the Louvre in Paris. So I can talk about that now. Maybe in the fall it might feel a bit more complete."

Lastly, Miyamoto once again talked about the projects/small teams he's working with, with possible news at next year's E3.

"One thing I want to clear up is, people like to ask me if I want to do a small project with a small team. I do like working with a small team, and I'm working with a number of small teams on a lot of different ideas, but the problem is because of all these different roles that I have to fulfill, it takes me a long time to write the design document. It's not that it's a small project, it's that small teams take longer to do larger design documents. So maybe this time next year I'll have something ready to show you that perhaps will illustrate that idea. I have some storyboards that I have to draw before I finish this trip. It's fun, I use Flipnote Studio to draw my storyboards."

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"Retro is very busy right now, but I'm afraid I can't say exactly what it is that they're very busy [working] on." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Mr. Miyamoto was asked about the chances of Retro working on a Zelda title. Here's what Miyamoto said.

"In terms of them working on a Zelda, it's not out of the question, certainly, for them to work on an entire Zelda game amongst themselves. Traditionally I think that the Zelda team has always had a close contact with anyone who's working on a Zelda game. If you were going to have that happen in the US at Retro, that would be kind of difficult for them to be able to coordinate. Certainly they're too busy for that sort of thing right now. It would probably require me to be involved to a great extent as well, so I would have to get over quite a bit too. I'd probably have to live in Texas... [laughs]"

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"I really feel like I'm satisfied with the 3DS hardware as it is. I feel like it's the best for this generation. What we're thinking about right now is probably going to be for a future generation of handheld." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Looks like we're going to be hanging onto the current 3DS for some time. Miyamoto didn't have anything to say about revisions, but did admit to pondering ideas for a future generation portable. No worries, that one will be quite some time away.

"When we created the first Pikmin, we had a very clear concept of what we wanted to do. And then Pikmin 2 essentially took that concept, and... what we tried to do was make it easier to play, simpler to play and improve upon the areas that were a challenge in the first game. Since then, part of the reason it took so long, is because philosophically we were debating what should a Pikmin game really be? And the other reason, obviously is, because we have Wii and 3DS or Wii U, part of it was simply doing experiments on these platforms to see what kind of Pikmin game we wanted to make, which platform was best suited for it." - Shigeru Miyamoto

Here's a bit of bad news for those of us that enjoyed Pikmin 2's lack of timed gameplay. It sounds like Miyamoto is a fan of the timer...and that he's pushing hard to get that aspect into Pikmin 3.

"I personally am the kind of person that likes those sort of timer-based challenges. When you first play it, you're kind of nervous or feel pressured by the time. And, gradually, as you go back in and try it again, you seem to get calmer and are able to think more thoughtfully and work your way through a little bit better. With Pikmin 2 the development team tried to create that game with a lot of freedom. This time, I am more forcefully sharing my opinion."

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As far as any of us know, Shigeru Miyamoto was one of the driving forces behind the creation of Donkey Kong. That's how Nintendo history goes and that's the information we've been fed for countless years. What if all that talk wasn't the full story?

Some interesting information has popped up concerning the development of Donkey Kong. It seems that Ikegami CO. was involved with the creation of the game in a big way. Ikegami went so far as to sue Nintendo for Donkey Kong Jr., as it used the source code that Ikegami CO. claimed to create back for Donkey Kong.

Believe it or not, Nintendo actually settled with Ikegami CO. over the issue. Since that happened, it seems that all information has been swept under the rug. Has Miyamoto been unwillingly entered into revisionist history?

A portion of an IGN interview with Shigeru Miyamoto...

IGN: We've known that Pikmin 3 has been in development for several years, first starting on Wii, and so I was curious. When Pikmin 3 was on Wii, what was the original concept, before it moved to Wii U?

Shigeru Miyamoto: Fundamentally I would say that the game didn't change all that much. Rather, we saw the CPU power and HD resolution offered by the Wii U and simply thought that was the best platform possible for that game, allowing you to see the whole map at one time and things like that. Going back a little bit, I would have to say that we really debated what kind of game we should make Pikmin 3.

Having played them, you must know that Pikmin and Pikmin 2 themselves are very different games from each other. We had a bit of a discussion internally about which direction we should go for Pikmin 3. And at the same time we were also trying out different experiments on the DS and the 3DS and the Wii to see which platform the game would work best on. We had decided on Wii when the possibility of putting it on the Wii U became available, as we began to see what that framework was going to look like. At that time we definitely decided, okay, this is going to be much better on Wii U. Nothing huge changed in terms of the fundamental concept.

IGN: One of the things I think Pikmin 2 really drove home was the element of cooperative gameplay, and just multiplayer in general, allowing more than one player to play together. Can people expect the same from Pikmin 3? Perhaps even online Pikmin?

Miyamoto: Everyone asks that question! [laughter]

So in the case of Mario Kart, we did have online multiplayer, and that's something that... You have to be very careful that you don't drop frames as you're trying to sync up with other players over what could be a very great physical distance, over the internet. But in the situation of Pikmin, for example, since you would have lots of individual, small creatures, the Pikmin, whose every movement and location is going to be really important in the game, it would be very difficult to sync up over an internet connection.

So I think what we've decided to do is focus on the single-player and local multiplayer aspects, which are really fun. But unfortunately, no online multiplayer for Pikmin 3. But the co-op local multiplayer is really fun.

Shigeru Miyamoto says Zelda Wii U is still in R&D, with a "number of different experiments going on".

The above image comes from the Watch Dogs Twitter page. Apparently Miyamoto wanted to get a closer look at the game. Let's hope what he saw convinced him enough to try to get this game brought to Wii U.

Thanks to The_King_Up_North for the tip.

-Pikmin 3 has been in devolopment for 5 years
-Pikmin 3 on Wii U started 2 years ago
-Brought Pikmin 3 to Wii U because of processing power
-Wanted a title to show off the HD of the system
-On making Zelda for Wii U:

“What is the most important element of Zelda if we were to try to make a Zelda game that a lot of people can play?” So we have a number of different experiments going on, and [when] we decide that we’ve found the right one of those to really help bring Zelda to a very big audience, then we’ll be happy to announce it."


-Miyamoto says there were some people who got tired or didn't like the motion controls for Skyward Sword
-They are looking back at what worked and to improve what didn't
-Miyamoto has been watching a lot of Japanese television (We know his hobbies often influence his games)
-He likes the idea of a artist drawing a manga of what he wants, then seeing it come to television of movies
-He plays guitar to get away from working on games
-He will record a bit of music he likes with his 3DS, will slow it down to figure out how they did it


Thanks to Wiired for the heads up!

"One thing I want to clear up...people like to ask me if I want to do a small project with a small team. I do like working with a small team, and I'm working with a number of small teams on a lot of different ideas, but the problem is because of all these different roles that I have to fulfill, it takes me a long time to write the design document. I have some storyboards that I have to draw before I finish this trip. It's fun. I use Flipnote Studio to draw my storyboards." - Shigeru Miyamoto
This interview snippet made me realize that Miyamoto's DS and 3DS could be treasure troves of game info. What I wouldn't give to get a look at those!