Nintendo never celebrated its 100th anniversary, Star Fox designer explains why

A company reaching its 100th anniversary is a massive milestone, but it turns out that day came and went without much fanfare within Nintendo.

Takaya Imamura, who is known for his work on the character designs for games such as Star Fox and F-Zero, revealed that Nintendo never actually celebrated that anniversary. It seems this was largely due to former president Hiroshi Yamauchi. Yamauchi had a certain mindset and believed in particular philosophies, so the 100th anniversary was treated just like any other day.

A rough translation of Imamura’s comments via the interview with 4Gamer can be found below. 

“I joined the company in the year of Nintendo’s 100th anniversary. At that time, society as a whole was in a bubble, so companies would take students who had secured employment on trips and throw parties to keep them from losing out, but Nintendo did nothing (laughs). We didn’t even celebrate our 100th anniversary, and it was a company that never got carried away.”

“It was ‘Keep calm when you’re happy, keep calm when you’re unhappy.’ No matter how well the company was doing, Yamauchi would always speak harshly to employees. Of course, this was because Yamauchi had failed in many businesses, but toys and games are a business that is a liquid business, so it’s right even if you think about it normally. Hearing Yamauchi’s strong and persuasive words made me think, ‘You have to make good, interesting things to sell, right?'”

Nintendo was founded way back in 1889. In September, the company will have its 136th anniversary.

As for Imamura, after his long career at Nintendo, he moved on to become independent and is about to launch his new game Omega 6 on Switch. Read about that here.

Thanks to Greatsong1 for the tip.