Miyamoto… this guy pisses me off so damn much. I just read that Kotaku article you linked to about how he thinks Zelda 2 is the worst game that he has made. A couple of things that I noticed:
“When we’re designing games, we have our plan for what we’re going to design but in our process it evolves and grows from there,” Miyamoto said. “In Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, unfortunately all we ended up creating was what we had originally planned on paper.”
This reminds me of that interview that was flowing around where Aonuma talked about Miyamoto’s goofy philosophy of “upending the tea table” when they are working on a Zelda game. So Aonuma would show Miyamoto something the Zelda team had just worked on — not that that was going to be great to begin with — and with his feedback The Miyamoto would throw a monkey wrench in the process seemingly just for the hell of it. It just goes to show that Miyamoto doesn’t care about the end product, it’s all about the game-making journey with him.
“So one thing, of course, is, from a hardware perspective, if we had been able to have the switch between the scenes speed up, if that had been faster, we could have done more with how we used the sidescrolling vs. the overhead [view] and kind of the interchange between the two. But, because of the limitations on how quickly those scenes changed, we weren’t able to.”
You know, Malstrom, I discovered your website around the time Other M came out, and have been a fan ever since. I used to be skeptical of what you call Miyamoto’s “sick, sick obsession” with 3D. At first it sounded like a conspiracy theory but over time I have seen the evidence and this is just one more nail in the coffin for me. So let me get this straight: Miyamoto thinks Zelda 2 is a bad game and when asked why, the very first specific example he gives is the lack of something that is akin to the “painting Link” in the new LTTP sequel. What I mean by that is that it sounds like he wanted to use a mechanic in Zelda 2 that flips between the two vantage points (overhead and side) and take advantage of some 3D gimmick (for puzzles?) that was unattainable due to the hardware. Thank God that wasn’t possible.
This is coming from someone whose first Zelda game (and second NES game ever) was Zelda 2: F-you Miyamoto. I beat Zelda 2 as an 8 year and loved every minute of it. I am so sick of you people ruining my beloved franchises.
— Happy non-Wii U customer
I wish I was a conspiracy kook too. This site started with a business outlook of Nintendo concerning the Blue Ocean Strategy and disruption. Yet, Nintendo’s decisions defy any business explanation. If the decisions aren’t being made by business designs, then what are the decisions about? The only way we can tell is by Nintendo’s past behavior.
Take Mario 3d World. Ever since NSMB Wii, EVERYONE has been complaining about the two toads and how every character is the same. NSMB 2 didn’t change anything. NSMB U doesn’t even have it either. Miyamoto explained it by saying they would have to design special physics for Peach’s dress. And then, magically, the most requested 2d Mario feature is the most prominent feature in the latest 3d Mario game. And the 3d Mario game imitates NSMB aesthetics (which no one likes, not even the NSMB fans). I can’t explain that on any business decision. The only way I can interpret it is that Nintendo wants 3d Mario to kill and replace 2d Mario. After all, Nintendo stopped making 2d Mario for nearly two decades.
Look at Metroid. When Metroid Fusion came out, everyone complained about Samus’s dialogue. Why is Samus talking in the first place? It SEEMED like Sakamoto heard this and dialed it back in Metroid Zero Mission. Then we get Metroid: Other M which is nothing but Samus talking. Did Sakamoto forget or was it intentional? It has to be intentional. And was Zero Mission an actual ‘listening to fans’ or was it something else? What if Zero Mission was made for Sakamoto to re-frame the original Metroid so it fits better with his long range plans of the Metroid series? It would be like Aonuma remaking the original NES Zeldas to revolve around puzzles and “story” so the original Zeldas would not contradict his definition of Zelda.
Look at Zelda. The Zelda DS games could have been so awesome. The DS has a SNES like control design, and you had the potential of the second screen. Instead, we got Wind Waker graphics (which no one asked for) with the first game being all touch screen based and the second game being about trains.
None of this sounds like decisions being made based on business. It’s like the developers have taken over and are doing whatever they want.
The classics you and I love were made for business reasons. Yamauchi demanded Miyamoto make a hit so he made Super Mario Brothers. Due to that success, Yamauchi forced Miyamoto to make more Mario games. To launch the SNES, clearly only Super Mario Brothers 4 would do. Sequels to Zelda and Metroid were made because they sold so well on the original NES. It makes logical sense to make more of what sells well.
But business sense doesn’t apply to Nintendo anymore. Wind Waker for Wii U? Why is money being wasted on this? We know it won’t cause people to buy a Wii U (as the original didn’t exactly get people to buy a Gamecube). So why is it made?
By Nintendo’s current trajectory, we should expect Metroid: Other M 2 and a sequel to Wii Music.
Apparently, business logic only applies to Nintendo owned companies like Retro studios (making more Donkey Kong because the first one performed so well) or the Pokemon Company. The same rules they enforce on others are not applied to NCL.
Do you want to know what it feels like? To you Smash Brothers fans, imagine if Nintendo was suddenly trying to remove or redefine Smash Brothers into a 3d only fighting game. You would say, “I want it to be like it was in 2d.” Yet, Nintendo keeps pushing 3d Smash Brothers which isn’t as fun.
No one thinks of Smash Brothers as ‘2d’ because the series has never been attempted to be replaced. As a HAL invention and relatively best selling along with the NCL president being its developer, Smash Brothers is protected. Miyamoto doesn’t get to redefine Smash Brothers to be “its not about fighting, its about working together” or something else crazy.
I don’t see anyone else offering an alternative explanation to Nintendo’s decision making. The ‘integrated hardware and software’ and ‘we’re being creative’ just don’t hold up anymore.
One reason I also continued doing this site is because I think there needs to be a voice of disinterest out there. I didn’t buy game consoles after the SNES. When Mario 64 came out, all you heard was praise from the gamers. Yet, you didn’t hear the disinterest. There is a sizable amount of people who did not like Mario’s move to 3d. No one knew they existed until NSMB’s sales numbers came in nearly fifteen years later.
With the Wii U, Nintendo is saying, “We need to get people to understand it.” We do! We understand it! We just don’t want it.
I remember Iwata around 2006 saying how it is important to listen to voices of disinterest. He doesn’t say that anymore (hahaha).
What I find incredible is that Nintendo only wants to frame disinterest against their games being in difficulty of controls or of complexity of the gameplay. Never does Nintendo consider that disinterest is against their ‘creativity’ (such as trains in Zelda. Trains are not the reason why I buy Zelda).
It is like Nintendo developers take criticism personally. This is a sign of an amateurish entertainer. You would think video games have ‘matured’, yet they probably never have.
I have a theory about game developers too which explains some of this behavior. However, it is so ridiculously controversial that I’m going to keep it under my hat until the time is right to post it.
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