“I wouldn’t say that I’ve ever made a bad game, per se, but a game I think we could have done more with was Zelda II: The Adventure of Link.”
“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. In Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, unfortunately all we ended up creating was what we had originally planned on paper.”
“I think specifically in the case of Zelda II we had a challenge just in terms of what the hardware was capable of doing.”

As far as what Miyamoto would have liked to do with Zelda II, he said:

Iwata on software delays, says highest-quality products needed to keep maintain consumer trust

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News, Podcast Stories, Wii U | 0 comments

It has been made clear that Nintendo was unable to deliver all of its intended software for Wii U on time. Nintendo has cited a number of reasons for development days, such as the difficulties in making the jump to the HD era. It’s also true that more time than usual was needed to bring some 3DS content to market.

Nintendo president Satoru Iwata also pointed out during the Q&A portion of Nintendo’s E3 2013 analyst briefing that the company must polish its games to the highest level. With the popularity of games on smart devices and other recent trends, Iwata feels that “it is becoming increasingly more difficult to have consumers understand and appreciate the value that a particular game offers than ever before.”

Putting out the highest-quality products is therefore essential. Nintendo feels the need to “improve and re-polish any game that we feel is still lacking in quality.” If Nintendo were to release poor software, consumers’ trust could be lost and the brands of popular franchises could be damaged.

Iwata discusses Nintendo’s free-to-play plans

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News | 0 comments

Nintendo has some free-to-play software in the works. What exactly the company has planned is unclear, but we do know that it will have nothing to do popular franchises such as Mario and Pokemon.

Putting out free-to-play software provides Nintendo with “greater flexibility in terms of how we offer our products to consumers and how to monetize them”, president Satoru Iwata explained during an E3 2013 analyst briefing. However, Iwata warned that unbalanced such software “could result in some consumers paying extremely large amounts of money, and we can certainly not expect to build a good relationship with our consumers in this fashion.” Balanced and reasonable free-to-play games are needed so that Nintendo can maintain “a favorable long-term relationship” with consumers.

Iwata estimates that we’ll be seeing Nintendo’s first free-to-play title this fiscal year.

E3 2013 – Nintendo booth tour

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, Videos | 0 comments

Austin put together this neat little booth tour video from this year’s E3. Watch it below!

Mario Kart 8 team on anti-gravity idea, Miyamoto’s reluctance to include Miis, scrapped drill idea, more

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News, Podcast Stories, Wii U | 0 comments

Nintendo’s Hideki Konno and Kosuke Yabuki divulged a number of intriguing tidbits about Mario Kart 8 and Mario Kart in general while speaking with MTV Multiplayer. The two discussed the origins of the anti-gravity idea, how Shigeru Miyamoto was very reluctant to make Miis playable, an abandoned idea for drills on karts, and more.

As always, you can find the full responses after the break.

Sakurai on the formation of Smash Bros. roster, selection is stressful “almost to the brink of death”

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News, Podcast Stories, Wii U | 0 comments

Choosing the roster for the Super Smash Bros. games isn’t easy. Director Masahiro Sakurai describes the stress put on him as coming close “to the brink of death.”

“The amount of stress I feel, it’s almost to the brink of death. Because it’s not just a matter of me personally thinking this character or that character is going to be in the game; it’s that we also have the game balance, animation, graphics and sound to think about in order to make that character fully fleshed out in that universe. I have to think about all of that when I go through this decision-making process.”

In Sakurai’s opinion, Smash Bros. is all about the character roster. Not having characters such as Mario, Kirby, Samus, or Link playable would make some feel that “it might not be Smash Bros.”

Super Mario 3D World producer hints at another project; announcement soon

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in General Nintendo, News, Podcast Stories | 0 comments

Yoshiaki Koizumi may have a second project in the works alongside Super Mario 3D World.

Koizumi is acting as producer on the upcoming Wii U title. But in an interview with Spanish publication El País, he hinted at an additional game.

El País asked director Koichi Hayashida as well as Koizumi about what their next projects are. Hayashida said that Super Mario 3D World is taking up all of his time at the moment, but Koizumi’s response was pretty interesting:

“I can not reveal it now, but soon we will make an announcement.”

Could EAD Tokyo be developing another title in addition to Super Mario 3D World?

Source

Reggie: Nintendo “thinking about” its older franchises, “looking hard at” Tomodachi Collection for North America

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News, Podcast Stories | 0 comments

Zelda, Mario, Metroid, Kirby, and Donkey Kong. These are some of the names that should be familiar to most Nintendo fans. But certainly, the Big N has other franchises at its disposal – some of which have been long forgotten or dormant.

Nintendo managed to bring Kid Icarus back to the 3DS after a very lengthy hiatus. Perhaps a similar situation could be realized for the company’s other characters? At the very least, Nintendo seems to be mulling over a few possibilities.

Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime told MTV Multiplayer:

Nintendo is a very fortunate place, we have over 30 different franchises, and we look constantly for opportunities to bring those franchises to bear on our most current systems. I’m not making any promises, and I’m not making any commitments, but certainly we are thinking about, for Wii U and for 3DS, what are those franchises? Maybe those franchises that have been dormant for a few years, that we can loving bring to those platforms to drive our business forward.

Reggie also revealed to MTV that Nintendo is considering Tomodachi Collection for North America. He said that the 3DS game “is something that we are looking hard at for our market”.

“Animal Crossing” is the type of game that you want to play certainly every day, and there are benefits to having the digital version right there on your hardware. I have to say, personally, I don’t find it a huge inconvenience to be swapping out my game cards. There are other games, “Tamagotchi Collection” in Japan, which is something that we are looking hard at for our market, that’s another one that benefits from those short bursts of play, on a day-in, day-out basis.

Source

Youkai Watch anime to air in Japan starting January 2014, manga this December

Posted on 11 years ago by Brian(@NE_Brian) in 3DS, General Nintendo, News | 0 comments

Youkai Watch will be getting its own anime early next year. The TV show, which is based on the 3DS game, will begin airing in January. Level-5 also has plans for a manga that will be distributed through Shogakukan’s Ciao magazine in December.

Source