Shigeru Miyamoto

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Revision as of 13:12, 3 March 2007

Shigeru Miyamoto

Shigeru Miyamoto is a Japanese electronic game designer. He is the creator of the Mario, Donkey Kong, The Legend of Zelda, Star Fox, Wave Race, and Pikmin video game series for Nintendo game systems.

He is one of the world's most celebrated game designers, and is often called one of the fathers of modern video gaming. His titles are characterized by refined control-mechanics and imaginative worlds in which the players are encouraged to discover things for themselves, as well as basic storylines, which had been almost unheard of before he introduced one of the first, featuring Mario.

Employed by Nintendo (then a Hanafuda manufacturer) as an artist, in 1980 he was given the task of designing one of their first coin-op arcade games. The resulting title Donkey Kong was a huge success and the game's lead character, Jump Man — later renamed Mario — has become Nintendo's mascot. Miyamoto quickly became Nintendo's star producer designing many franchises for the company, most of which are still active and very well-regarded.

Shigeru Miyamoto has two children with his wife, Yasuko Miyamoto, who was general manager of Nintendo of Japan in 1977. Neither of their children has expressed a desire to go into the family business. He is currently the Director and General Manager of Nintendo Entertainment Analysis and Development (EAD), the corporate sector of Nintendo of Japan. In 1998, Miyamoto became the first person to be inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame.

Biography

Early life

Shigeru Miyamoto was born in Sonobe (now Nantan), Kyoto, Japan. As a young boy, Miyamoto loved to draw, paint pictures, and explore the landscape surrounding his home. Stories describe his fascinated discovery of hidden caves, lakes, and other natural features that were linked to his later work. In 1970, he enrolled in the Kanazawa College of Art, and graduated five years later, though he would later remark that his studies often took a backseat to doodling. In 1977, Miyamoto, armed with a degree in industrial design, was able to arrange a meeting with Hiroshi Yamauchi — a friend of his father, and the head of Cheese of Japan. Yamauchi hired Miyamoto to be a "staff artist", even though one was not needed at the time, and assigned him to apprentice in the planning department.

Nintendo

In 1980, the fairly new Nintendo of America was looking for a hit to establish itself as a player in the growing arcade market. After successful location tests using prototypes, NoA CEO Minoru Arakawa ordered a very large number of units of Radar Scope, an arcade game. However, by the time the arcade machines could be produced and shipped to the U.S., interest had vaporized, causing Radar Scope to be a huge flop. To stay afloat and clear the costly inventory of "Radar Scope," Nintendo of America desperately needed a smash-hit game that the unsold machines could be converted to play. Yamauchi assigned Miyamoto — the only person available — the task of creating the game that would make or break the company.

After Miyamoto had consulted with some of the company's engineers (he had no prior programming experience), and composed the music himself on a small electronic keyboard, Donkey Kong was fully conceptualized. When the game was complete, the chips containing the new program were rushed to the U.S. and Nintendo employees worked around the clock to convert the "Radar Scope" machines. It was fortuitous that Nintendo had so many units on hand, because Donkey Kong was an overnight success, and not only saved the company, but introduced the character who more than any other would be identified with Nintendo.

Out of the three characters Miyamoto created for the game — Donkey Kong, Jump Man, and Pauline — it is Mario, a character who descends from Jump Man, that has found the most success, and since his debut in Donkey Kong he has appeared in more than 100 games spanning over a dozen gaming platforms.

Miyamoto is usually listed as "producer" in the credits of Mario games. The few exceptions include the Super Mario Land series for the Game Boy, which he had virtually nothing to do with. (Gunpei Yokoi, Miyamoto's mentor, produced the Super Mario Land series.) In early U.S. releases, he was sometimes credited as Miyahon — a mistranslation of the kanji in his name (本 — which can be read as either hon or moto).

Despite being an influential figure in video games and responsible for multi-million dollar franchises, Miyamoto is said to be very humble, insisting on settling for an average income, and often rides a bicycle to work.

Awards and recognition

Miyamoto was the first member ever to be inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences' Hall of Fame in 1998, an award that outlines his lifetime achievement and dramatic effect on the video game industry. In March 2005, Miyamoto was among the first honorees in 2004 to receive a star on the Walk of Game, a section of San Francisco's Metreon Center that is modeled on Hollywood's Walk of Fame.

On March 13, 2006, Miyamoto received a French honor, by being inducted Chevalier ("Knight") into the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, alongside game designers Michel Ancel and Frédérick Raynal as part of the French video game policy effort.

On November 28, 2006, Miyamoto was featured in TIME Asia's "60 Years of Asian Heroes", among Hayao Miyazaki, Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Bruce Lee and the Dalai Lama.

At the Game Developers Choice Awards, on March 7, 2007, Shigeru Miyamoto will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award for a career that spans the creation of Donkey Kong, Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda to the company's recent revolutionary systems, Nintendo DS and Wii.

"A delayed game is eventually good; a bad game is bad forever"

It's not rare for Nintendo to delay its games. This is largely due to the perfectionist tendency of Miyamoto who would go as far as scrapping the entire development if he did not find a game up to his standard. Miyamoto and fellow developers refer to this scrapping as "Chabuda Gaeshi" (upending the tea table), a reference to manga and anime Hoshi of the Giants. It is also referred to as "Miyahon Check" (Miyahon is an alternative kanji reading of Miyamoto) or "Miyamoto Test".

• "Twinkle Popo" was a completed product with a pre-order of 26,000 units. It was supposed to be released under the game's developer, HAL Laboratory. Miyamoto intervened arguing that, with a tiny bit of tweaking, it would become a great game. After cancelling the preorder, the game was eventually released under Nintendo with the title Kirby's Dream Land, selling 5 million units globally.
• The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was supposed to be released immediately after the release of the Nintendo 64 (Japanese release date, 6 June 1996). Instead, Miyamoto, who was the producer, repeatedly ordered the game to be redone, resulting in numerous announcements of delays by Nintendo until the game's eventual release on 21 November 1998. Ocarina of Time sold 7.6 million units and is widely considered one of the greatest games of all time.
• Eiji Aonuma was initially the producer of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. However, between 2005 to 2006, Miyamoto switched to the director's role. He stated that the switch was the result of a year-long development being "Chabudai Gaeshi"ed. In the same interview, Miyamoto said that he had to clean up the mess of his Chabudai Gaeshi, so he joined in as a producer and also to assist in the development of the game. Twilight Princess, eventually released for both the GameCube and Wii consoles, has received tremendous critical and commercial acclaim.

Trivia

• Shigeru Miyamoto is ambidextrous, though he prefers using his left hand. As a videogame designer, he made some of his characters such as Mario and Link, left-handed or ambidextrous.
• Miyamoto likes quick, handheld games which he plays with his family.
• Miyamoto also plays the guitar and banjo in his spare time, and appeared on a concert for the Mario and Zelda Big Band.
• In 2002, rumours stated that Shigeru Miyamoto died of heart problems. People were very relieved to find out the rumours were false.
• Many of Nintendo's franchises and characters are a result of Miyamoto's past experiences. For example, The Legend of Zelda was inspired by Miyamoto's maze-like Japanese home; he'd often go exploring in the wilderness and caves. Another example is the infamous Chain Chomp enemy of Mario fame. When Miyamoto was a child, he was attacked by a neighbor's dog, which was kept at bay by a chain attached to a post.
• Shigeru (Gary Oak in the English version), a fictional character in the Pokémon franchise, is named after him. This is due to the fact that Miyamoto mentored Satoshi Tajiri, creator of Pokémon, during the production of the first two games of the series. Interestingly, the character Satoshi (Ash Ketchum in the English version) is named after Tajiri.
• The Pokemon Squirtle is named "Shiggy" in the German dub. It is unknown if this was an intentional reference to Shigeru Miyamoto.
• Shigeru is fond of gardening, which helped give him inspiration for the creation of the game Pikmin. The tiny creatures featured in the game are named after Miyamoto's Shetland Sheepdog named Pikku (pronounced "Pick"), who in turn helped inspire Nintendogs.
• Shigeru is known as a very social person, always doing interviews and willing to talk to fans about video games.