Issue 1,000 of Japanese magazine Famitsu Weekly features a revealing interview with Shigeru Miyamoto to talk about Nintendo’s past, present, and future. He harped on why he saw the GameCube controller as a failure (and how that subsequently led to the development of the Wiimote) and how one of the main problems tackled during development of the DS was to make it “something Mom won’t hate.”
It’s not a game, but maybe the GameCube’s controller. We made it as a culmination of everything leading up to it, but it really underwhelmed. ‘This line of thinking doesn’t give us anything else to shoot for, does it?’ That’s how I felt.
The GameCube controller is a product of us feeling that, without this or that, people wouldn’t be able to play the games we make. But then we realized that was a problem,that we were thinking based on that controller as the premise.
For GameCube software across the board, we weren’t able to predict the sales figures as well as before. It was around then that it hit us: the market was disappearing.
When discussing the DS, Miyamoto said, “The first was ’something Mom won’t hate.’ It had always been that if your mom caught you playing Mario she would frown, but if she walked in while you were watching a Disney movie she’d be all smiles. Both give kids something to dream about, if you ask me.”
He continued, “The other theme was ‘making it so you could bring the system to school.’ Why can’t a game system help out at school, right?
“I wanted to make titles like [the Japanese/kanji dictionary released only in Japan] even if they didn’t sell. If we could succeed in getting them out there and take that next step, people might be able to take their DS’s out into public or to school.”
Reading that, I couldn’t blame you for worrying that Miyamoto is ready to leave Mario, Zelda & co. behind, but when asked about those series, he replied with a laugh: “I’m making ‘em all.”
via 1UP
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