Best quote I've seen in ages! From Gamasutra today, via IGN:
When Yukan Fuji reportedly pointed out press coverage suggesting that the shortages that have historically plagued Wii supplies were strategy on the part of Nintendo, Iwata said that when he sees the articles, "I honestly feel sad. Game machine production amounts are set about half a year in advance, so they cannot be easily changed. The concept of the Wii is 'a machine that makes people who play it smile.' We wouldn't use a strategy that is at odds with smiling. Getting as many people as possible to show us their smiles when playing a Nintendo game -- that's the energy source that drives us."
I confess, I'm a little bit of an innocent type. Game writers -- especially if they want to write for consumers -- seem to need a healthy portion of skepticism. Seems they need to master a specific brand of cynicism. It's tough sometimes for me to be a critic, because I don't really like being critical. I like to play games, dude. And I like to be happy, and though it's my job to wonder how cheerful president Iwata would be if Nintendo didn't print money, I think I'll just like the idea that he seems like such a happy guy. Yay!
There is a sort of personality behind Nintendo's games consistent with what Iwata says it is, which is why it's easy to believe. I have a special soft spot for the work of many of the big-name Japanese directors for a similar reason, like Hideo Kojima, or even Keita Takahashi. There's a sense, much of the time, that the game very much wants to be a reflection of that person's value system, the things that are important to them on an emotional level, their sense of fun. I remember once reading somewhere that Miyamoto primarily watched people's eyes when they were playing games, in order to determine if the design was successful or not.
I played games for many years without once thinking about the designer behind the work; I was just an enthusiast, really, and didn't really realize until somewhat recently that I'd end up writing about games. But I'm realizing I like games to have that kind of integrity -- the feeling of a person's spirit and intentions behind what I play. I think that's why Portal became such a cult hit, so emotionally close to a massive community of people. Again I recall reading something somewhere I can't recall to link to, about how Portal's designers just sat around and laughed about how people like cake. The objective was not to manipulate us to feel the way we do about the game, but to share with us they way they felt about it.
I still don't enough about the design community to know where this relationship between a product and the spirit of the designer comes from, or whether the increased focus on value system is a particularly Japanese trait. Whether it's a lucky accident that happens when a team's particularly creative -- or even just particularly happy -- I can't say.
I went to acting conservatory for two years, and learned there the relationship between storytelling and audience response. It's considered a great achievement, of course, to make your audience feel something, but paradoxically, that should never be an actor's objective. We were taught that our only job is to make our characters' circumstances feel real to ourselves, and to cultivate a genuine emotion about it. If you force crocodile tears just to make the people watching cry, it's manipulative and hollow. It's not real storytelling.
Acting, writing and game design share this trait in common -- the stories they each tell become more sincere when the storyteller is a conduit, not a puppet master. Then, the final result reflects a part of who an individual really is, and human empathy for the story is born. Again, I don't really know much about what it's like to work in game design, a rare condition for someone who does what I do for a living. I hope to learn from everyone I get to speak to over the course of my career. But in a hit-driven industry, people have got to feel pressure, sometimes, to just make hits. And maybe so many big-budget games feel manipulative because making a hit was the only goal.
Anyway, keep smiling, president Iwata. If you do, we will too.
