Legendary video game developer Shigeru Miyamoto will soon be retiring — sort of. Nintendo’s head of game development (Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong…) will be stepping down, er, aside, from his position to work with younger developers on smaller titles. The 59-year-old wishes to remove himself from the titles that take five or more years to develop. His motivation is to inform the young minds at Nintendo that he will not be there forever. It’s time for the geniuses-in-training to begin walking on their own, but first they must suckle upon the nurturing teat of Miyamoto’s brain-boob.
He also wishes to design small games — also known as wittle games as far as I’m concerned — by himself. I’m hoping for a Nintendogs spin-off where you take care of a baby Donkey Kong titled “Foal Kong.” It feels like this isn’t so much a “retirement” as much as a refocusing of his energy within the company. At the Nintendo press conference from this year’s E3, it seemed like he has no interest in avoiding his favorite properties including Mario and Zelda. I think he simply wants to put more responsibility on the shoulders of other developers so he may get back to doing what he does best – create fun games.
Keep an eye on Wired.com this week for a full interview with Miyamoto for his thoughts on Skyward Sword, Mario Kart 7, emerging hardware trends, and the future of gaming. I’m confident we will all breathe a sigh of relief after reading it.
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Skyward Sword was a fucking fantastic game. Got it launch day (with the golden Wiimote) and beat it two weeks later.
Long live the King.