Everyone Loves Miyamoto

[Steerforth]

Just an observational topic....notice how Miyamoto gets ALL of the credit for Nintendo's success in the media.

Don't get me wrong - he is the Thomas Edison of gaming. He has done more for gaming than any other developer, and more than anyone else can hope to, just because he helped invent the fundamentals that apply today. Also he has stayed relevant, he continues to make original, compelling, successful games, and isn't known for just one signature franchise, like most of the other big boys. And I imagine Nintendo enjoys havinh him as a spokesman, he has a unique charisma.

But -

What about Iwata! He's their president for crying out loud, is it a coincedence that Nintendo's turnaroud coincided with his promotion to president?

What about Nintenod'os engineers and R and D department? Do we even know who came up with the Wimote? Did Miyamoto push the touch screen?

One thing I love about Nintendo is they have always been comitted to making their games fun and for everyone, and Miyamoto's philosphy of not turning to violence like their competition does time and again. There is no doubt games have continued to trend darker and more violent the last 15 years, and it is nice that some others are going in the other direction. I did like Shiggy's comment recently that he could easily make HALO, it just did not interest him. Some gave him flack but he is right. Let's see Microsoft make a compelling dog training game, or put a tiny scientist on a foreign planet and enlist Pikmin to put put his ship back together. Creativity, there is no substitute.

[KanYozakura]

If anyone is to be credited with Nintendo's success, it's Gunpei Yokoi.  He was the one who got Ninty into the toy business in the first place, and then pushed electronic toys as the next frontier.  His development teams constantly dropped great games, and he created the Game Boy for pete's sake.

As to the current situation, I agree that Iwata doesn't get nearly enough credit.  And what does Shiggy even do anymore?  Wasn't the last game he actually directed OoT?  I'm not trying to knock the man, I'm just wondering when the last time he didn't just produce something.

[Blah]

"If anyone is to be credited with Nintendo's success, it's Gunpei Yokoi.  He was the one who got Ninty into the toy business in the first place, and then pushed electronic toys as the next frontier.  His development teams constantly dropped great games, and he created the Game Boy for pete's sake."

Agreed. The fact that Nintendo dropped him so quickly for the virtual boy astounds me. So he made one freakin' mistake! He's still a genius!

[Iain]

Charismatic men with a nack for doing interviews make better front men than your standard Nintendo employee, who lets face it will just look like another programmer, who probably won't speak English either and won't be able to talk to the Western media.

It is all about giving Nintendo a charming personal feel. But at the end of the day it is just marketing. By the time they started pushing Miyamoto into the spotlight, he was already starting to cut back on making the actual games. Now he does no more than oversea them. But as far as Nintendo is concerned he is most useful as a front man.

Nintendo is a big company made up if a lot of employees (who are allegedly underpaid compared to employees of other Japanese electronics firms), the whole idea of Miyamoto or Iwata or anyone being that important when it comes to the design of individual products is a bit silly. However that is the way the public likes to imagine it, so that is how Nintendo presents it.

[Steerforth]

From interviews I read, he is his own man and goes where he wants and criticizes the ongoing projects, making suggestions. He is the head of their biggest game studio I think. But the publicity must cut into his game duties a fair amount.

[Superjay]

I sure don't love Miyamoto. Especially after this comment. "I could make Halo. It's not that I couldn't design that game. It's that I choose not to. One thing about my game design is that I never try to look for what people want and then try to make that game design." This would explain why they never made an online console Mario Kart for gamecube. Imagine if they made a FPS just as good as Halo. I mean why do something that people want when he could just do what he wants. Almost sounds Ken Kuturagish.

[feilong801]

[QUOTE=Superjay]I sure don't love Miyamoto. Especially after this comment. "I could make Halo. It's not that I couldn't design that game. It's that I choose not to. One thing about my game design is that I never try to look for what people want and then try to make that game design." This would explain why they never made an online console Mario Kart for gamecube. Imagine if they made a FPS just as good as Halo. I mean why do something that people want when he could just do what he wants. Almost sounds Ken Kuturagish.
[/QUOTE]

But like all artists, it is that stubborn individualism and ego that helps make him great in the first place. According to "industry lore," the other designers and programmers thought Donkey Kong was a stupid idea; games were mainly imitating Space Invaders at the time, and the idea of some contractor jumping over barrels seemed ridiculous. Yet he insisted on it anyway, and the rest is history.

There are plenty of designers that only wish to "give em' exactly what they want." That's how we get 12445238 World War II shooters. That's fine, not everything can or should innovate. But we need a few Miyamotos, lest things get too stale.

-Rob

[Alienblue]

I respect individualism in an artist. I am a graphic artist and I always do WHAT I WANT. I have sold dozens of drawings, cartoons and a few paintings because other people liked my style and wanted them too. But I never tried to copy the ones that sold, I always did what my heart felt like doing. If I sell it, great, if not, it doesn't matter...I put down what my heart tells me to.

Unfortunately, my black and white "pointilest" drawings (done with dots, very time consuming) and cartoons ceased to sell as the 90's introduced the Internet and a zillion artists started giving stuff away free. I still sell a few paintings, but it's virtually impossible to live as a freelance artist in the computer age. But still I do art. I have to. What is within me must come out. I think Miyamoto is much the same.

[BanjoPickles1]

I agree. That stubborn individualism is what separates pioneers like The Beatles from go-with-what-everybody-likes garbage like REO Speedwagon. Personally, I like developers, musicians, writers, etc. with enough tenacity to TELL me what to like rather than trying to cater to what I like! There are some things that we don't even know we like until they reach the market. If S. Miyamoto just made what everybody liked, Donkey Kong would have been a Monkey at the bottom of the screen, throwing bananas at slow-moving space shifts moving from one end of the screen to the next. Evolution doesn't happen by repeating what's already been done. Also, Superjay, he has the know-how in the industry to do a carbon-copy of Halo(how hard could it be if you know the tools and have the history that SM has) but what would be the point?