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Nintendo Businesses Entertainment Games

Comments From Miyamoto On Wii, Industry 209

Posted by Zonk from the wise-man dept.
This past December, Nintendo designer Shigeru Miyamoto sat down with the Talk Asia program. It was only just recently translated and (via Ars Technica), CNN is carrying the resulting commentary. Miyamoto discusses the creation of Mario, the future of the Nintendo, the problems facing the games industry today, and the 'awesomeness' of the Wii's name. "I think anyone can enjoy video games. But some people shy away from them, just by looking at the shape of the console, or they think it is complicated when they have to plug the machine into their television set. However, I think if it is something that is simple to connect and play, it can be enjoyed by anybody, especially if they can interact with the characters. We also have to think about the themes of the games. There is an abundance of themes that people are interested in, and video games have only touched on few of them."
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Comments From Miyamoto On Wii, Industry More

Comments From Miyamoto On Wii, Industry

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  • The controller is shaped like a remote control, something everyone is familiar with, the characters are cartoons, which people of all ages can relate to, and the controls are as simple as moving your body.

    The success of the Wii validates everything Miyamoto says.
    • You have obviously never meet my parents... My mom can't manage to use a remote to save her life and both think that cartoons are for kids... Not anyone who has to deal with the 'real world'...

  • It's Far harder (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Bullfish ( 858648 ) on Friday February 16, 2007 @11:39AM (#18039528)
    To make games that anyone (literally) can pick up and play, and enjoy, without the crutch of violence and fancy visuals. I like fancy visuals and I do like my counterstrike, but frankly they are truly deriviative and really add nothing truly new over their predecessors. It seems that to use less graphic power and not use the dramatic tension that violence provides requires the kind of out of the box thinking that this guy brings to the table. Games are supposed to be fun, they really are toys, (even the PS3 and 360). That's why you buy them. Those two systems don't have the mass appeal that the Wii is getting by sticking to it's path. And at the Wii's price... many people will get one fix on their 360 pr PS3 and the other with the Wii. In the end, you can have all the violent viseo games you want, but if you really just want fun games that you can play with anyone, it's much harder to do. This guy really deserves to be called a genius.
    • To make games that anyone (literally) can pick up and play, and enjoy, without the crutch of violence and fancy visuals.

      They also trade off depth for a shallow learnign curve. Which means after a couple of sessions, the game is stale. Niche games with depth like FF:tactics can keep a interested gamer in it for months or even years while Rayman rabbits got old about the 2nd hour. Ditto with the wii sports. Zelda is the only exception out of the launch titles and even then is often refered to as tedious.
      • Trauma Center for the Wii had a relatively easy learning curve but a lot of depth IMO. You really needed to plan and strategize to have a shot at even beating the later challenges, let along getting anything above a "C" ranking.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by LKM ( 227954 )
        Easy to pick up does not imply lack of depth. Games like Tetris or Mario Kart (and even Wii Sports, to a certain degree) are very easy to pick up and to learn. They have simple rules, but these rules result in deep gameplay.

        If you've only played Wii Sports for two hours, you haven't even scratched the surface. Did you know that you can slice the ball in Wii Tennis? Or that you can make uppercuts in Wii Boxing? Thinking that you've seen Wii Boxing after two hours is like thinking that you're a pro bowler aft
        • Easy to pick up does not imply lack of depth. Games like Tetris or Mario Kart (and even Wii Sports, to a certain degree) are very easy to pick up and to learn. They have simple rules, but these rules result in deep gameplay.

          If you've only played Wii Sports for two hours, you haven't even scratched the surface. Did you know that you can slice the ball in Wii Tennis? Or that you can make uppercuts in Wii Boxing? Thinking that you've seen Wii Boxing after two hours is like thinking that you're a pro bowler aft

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by LKM ( 227954 )

            Wii bowling and real bowling are vastly different

            They do not seem to be, as I said. Despite having been playing it since the Wii came out, somebody who had never played it before, but does bowl in real life, was competitive right from the start, when "normal" people don't stand a chance against me.

            Even wii boxing, the vetrans can be taken by the noob

            Totally wrong. I'm guessing you really haven't played it more than two hours. The only person I know who can compete with me in Wii Boxing is my brothe

            • Again, from my experience with wii sports. It is shallow. The guy who owns the wii and has been playing with it for weeks was taken down soundly by me in boxing. The bowling is fairly limited and once you get the hang of the controls it's a fairly shallow bit, we usually have 7 or 8 people over at my friends house at any given time. All our scores in bowling are about the same. Despite some of us playing it a lot more and some of us being hardcore gamers. Anyone who has had some time with wii sports will re

  • Still Playing (Score:4, Interesting)

    by lucyfersam ( 68224 ) on Friday February 16, 2007 @11:44AM (#18039624)
    Miyamoto is still a luminary of game design, and I look forward to his future projects. Wii Sports is still incredibly popular (it just passed a million units sold in Japan, where it is not a pack in), and people are still waiting in line to buy units here in the US. Twilight Princess is an excellent game, though not having tried the GC version I can't really speak on it being more immersive than using a controller. I still play my Wii whenever I can find time, as does everyone I know who has one. In addition to Wii Sports, games like Wario Ware, Rayman, and Excite Truck continue to be a great deal of fun, and I still haven't had time to start on Trauma Center due to playing the other games. Add in the virtual console and a long list of games I want there, and the Wii has an amazing lineup already, and enough to keep someone who doesn't spend there whole life playing video games busy for some time to come. Whenever the NPD numbers for Jan come out, I think we will see that the Wii is continuing to dominate console sales, given that stores can't seem to keep them on the shelves for more than a few minutes at a time.

    As far as Miyamoto and Nintendo at large being able to access new markets, my mother has purchased both a DS and a Wii in the last 3 months. She wouldn't even allow my brother and I to have a NES when we were growing up, so that's a pretty big shift for her, largely due to a fresh look at game design being encouraged by Nintendo.
    • Twilight Princess is an excellent game, though not having tried the GC version I can't really speak on it being more immersive than using a controller.

      I assume the GC version handles much the same as Ocarina or Wind Waker. In which case I love the Wiimote for aiming - especially when Spider-Maning through the sky city with dual hookshots - and I could never go back to an analogue stick for that, but shaking the nunchuck for the spin attack, or shoving it for the shield charge, that doesn't quite work.

      I

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by TheDreadSlashdotterD ( 966361 )

        - and I could never go back to an analogue stick for that, but shaking the nunchuck for the spin attack, or shoving it for the shield charge, that doesn't quite work.

        Doesn't quite work? In OoT, I never bothered with the spin attack because I couldn't integrate it into my normal attack. Shaking the nunchuck lets me do that.

        And, yes, I have played the gamecube version of Twilight Princess, and I have to say that I could never go back to a button interface for that.

  • The interviewer says:

    And you know better than anybody almost that in your industry a single game can revolutionize the entire gaming industry -- and you experienced that with Super Mario Brothers which invented the side scrolling adventure.
    Wrong. SMB is obviously not an adventure, it is a platformer; but it is not the first side scrolling platformer either, far from it. Rock-Ola's Jump Bug was the first, 4 years before SMB.

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