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Shigeru Miyamoto says he's preparing Nintendo with retirement talk
Ricardo Trejo
Despite the exclusive interview with Wired, in which Nintendo’s godfather, Shigeru Miaymoto — who created such franchises like Super Mario Bros. and — mentioned he was thinking of taking a smaller role at legendary gaming firm, and would “retire” from his current position, it now appears that this won’t be the case at all. And while Shiggy seemed to know that Nintendo wouldn’t allow it, he seems to enjoy scaring the exec’s at the Big N.
Explaining his retirement plans with MSNBC, Miyamoto says all he’s doing is preparing Nintendo for the inevitable.
“There is no plan to retire. I have no intention to retire. (Jokingly) And probably they won’t allow me to retire. What I really meant by this was that people have to retire someday, sometime, and I am not the exception at all. The company really has to get prepared for that kind of thing.
It’s not just quite recently, actually, but for many years now I’ve been repeatedly telling this to the team at Nintendo so they can be more responsible. So they can take on more important assignments and take the initiative to make quality games to finalize and commercialize for the company.
In that process, I say ‘You’ve got to be prepared for the time I’m going to retire. In other words, I was spurring the younger developers to take on more important assignments.
As a matter of fact, when we look at the most recent work from the teams I’m supervising, games like Super Mario 3D Land and Skyward Sword, they were shaping up quite nicely, so I think they are coming very very close to what I want these teams to be. This is the thing I was trying to tell.”
“That is a feeling (I have) that they are growing up so that sometime, someday, if I needed to retire, they are going to carry on the ultimate responsibilities — they are going to make Nintendo-quality games. After all, a game is not made by one single person. It is the result that reflects on the entire ability of the team. Now I think I have some meaning being involved in any development team. The question is, if I’m out of there, what sort of ability will the entire team be able to exercise? My impression is they are growing up today so that they are going to be able to make something really great without me.”
If there’s anything to take from this is that Miyamoto understands where he stands at Nintendo probably even better than the company does. He is their most valuable asset with his continued childish outlook on the most everyday tasks of our life’s — i.e. exercising, gardening, and dog care. But nowadays he wants the new generation who’s been influenced by his ideas, such as Masahiro Sakurai, to take the lead and guide Nintendo to continued success with previous franchies, as well as creating a few new ones.
