Interesting Wired Article on Miyamoto (1 Viewer)

[Dave F]

"Grand Theft Auto is basically a rip-off of Zelda, because Zelda invented massive-world games that let players explore freely, rather than following a linear path"

I thought the exact same thing while playing Vice City, but I never mentioned it because I thought people would think I was nuts.
-Dave

 

[JoshF]

We do think you're nuts, Dave.

 

[Dave F]

I never said I wasn't, I just didn't want people to realize it.
-Dave

 

[JoshF]

So, in the spirit of the thread, I'm curious: what other game designers do you feel bring a certain magic to their games? Hideo Kojima? Lanning?

 

[JamieD]

Heh.. someone asked me what Grand Theft Auto was like, and I told them:

Well.. it's like if you took Shenmue and Driver, smushed them together, took out the long conversations from Shenmue, and added in the old GTA games.

 

[Anthony Thorne]

I had to shake my heads when the article commented something like "...even if Miyamoto's games will never appeal to adults..". I tend to feel that the ability to appreciate Mario/Zelda type games AND the latest iterations of Unreal or Battlefield 1942, or Splinter Cell, is indicative of a mature mindset.

Blackley's "he is not helping" comment also made me laugh. Artists follow their own muse. I'd never anticipate Miyamoto to take Blackley to task for not focusing on family-oriented software - for Blackley to aim similar invective at Miyamoto for not making the games that Blackley himself likes seems similarly pointless. Blackley is a games designer - if he feels that Miyamoto's contributions would be obviously superior to his own, he should use the example of Miyamoto's achivements to aid his own inspiration rather than criticising another designer for not producing a Blackley-style game.

Miyamoto's comments at the E3 show are revealing. The article describes the show as being full of wall-to-wall violence and decorated with good-looking booth babes, (both of which have their place, but let me make my point). Away from the crowd, Miyamoto discusses games, and life, in terms of personal responsibility, respect, healthy enjoyment of life and with some consideration for others. Which overall view is indicative of a more mature mindset? Pretty much everyone agrees that Miyamoto's games are fun. If he 'matured' to the level represented by Blackley and the rest of the E3 fare, would it be that much of an improvement?

 

[Barry Woodward]

 

[Jean-Michel]

You do realize that's fake, right?

 

[Barry Woodward]

MOCHEESE! Of course!

 

[Iain Lambert]

I almost hesitate to say it, but Blackley and Lanning remind me of a certain breed of Fincher fan. I'm sure you've met them - every time the subject of who should direct the sequel to something, or the adaptation of some book, his name always gets mentioned, because he is bound to make it 'dark'. Dark has somehow become an end in itself, rather than something the tone of the piece had to start with, and it strikes me that these two, in this article at least, want to do the same to a Miyamoto game.

Sadly, they also seem to have failed to notice that several Zelda games do have a dark undertone to them, its just not presented with nasty, gory graphics.

Six or seven years ago, I'd have thought that the two had a point about progressing the industry with the introduction of some games with a harder edge. Now, however, The Getaway, Resident Evil, Eternal Darkness etc seem to be almost the norm rather than the exception, and so their comments come across as restricting rather than expanding of horizons.

I wonder how old these quotes are? I wouldn't be surprised if they date back to at least when Blackley was at Microsoft, and had an XBox to promote.

 

[Ryan Peter]

Kinda off topic...

I'd love to see Miyamoto and Miyazaki collaborate on a game together, Miyazaki has such a deep, amazing imagination and eye for visuals, while Miyamoto has a an equally impressive understanding of gameplay. Now that Nintendo has taken the plunge into cel-graphics games, they could paint a game canvas that looks very close to something from Spirted Away or Princess Mononoke and then plays like a mario or a zelda.

:drool:

 

[Ryan Peter]

Iain, the quote you are talking about was fairly recent (September), at least it says so in the article.

 

[Iain Lambert]

Ryan - I realise the article as a whole is recent, its just that some of the quotes from Blackley in particular strike me as trying to promote the view of games from the XBox, where guns, cars and sports rule the roost more than they do over at Nintendo. Of course, its entirely possible that the XBox pursued this route because its how Blackley feels, rather than vice versa.

Myself, my only criticism is that Blackley seems to have been granted his wish already - I like both Pikmin and GTA3. But then, I think thats no more odd than liking both Toy Story and Fight Club, which is the real crux of the matter.

 

[Morgan Jolley]

I almost hesitate to say it, but Blackley and Lanning remind me of a certain breed of Fincher fan. I'm sure you've met them - every time the subject of who should direct the sequel to something, or the adaptation of some book, his name always gets mentioned, because he is bound to make it 'dark'

I would LOVE for him to do the Silent Hill movie, but I can't see him making a movie for many other games. Same for movies and movie sequels. His style is unique and well done, but it can't be applied to everything well.

 

[Anthony Thorne]

I've been a fan of horror movies and dark, violent thrillers for years, but recently have been blown away by some of the Miyazaki films that I've seen. I have filmmaking aspirations of my own and suspect that it's actually harder to make a KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE (or PORCO ROSSO, or SPIRITED AWAY) that works well, tells a solid story and touches on real emotions as opposed to cheap sentiment, and simultaneously avoids coming across as mawkish. Sequences in PRINCESS MONONOKE (and LAPUTA and NAUSICAA) indicate to me that Miyazaki could handle darker material with ease if he wanted to, but I'm less convinced of the range of many other currently-hyped 'dark' directors. I respond to the creativity and accomplishment of the work itself rather than prejudging it solely on whether it reaches a light or darker tone.

It was nice to see Miyamoto mention in an IGNCube interview that he was a big fan of Miyazaki's work, and that films like TOTORO and LAPUTA gave him some confidence with the design of the latest Zelda. The latest descriptions of the Gamecube Zelda title refute (for me personally, anyway) the idea that Miyamnoto's work is somehow counterproductive to the industry as a whole. I think violent FPS, driving and action games will always take care of themselves - unique, high-quality 'lighter' games like those of Miyamoto are possibly a rarer breed nowadays and should be supported.

 

[Andy Sheets]

So, in the spirit of the thread, I'm curious: what other game designers do you feel bring a certain magic to their games? Hideo Kojima? Lanning?

I'm not sure if he even does games anymore, but I always liked Eugene Jarvis. He seemed to have a philosophy of beating the shit out of the player that I liked, because he could do it in a way that no matter how manic his games were, you always wanted to come back to them instead of feeling frustration. You don't see too many developers hit that balance.

 

[Jean-Michel]

I'm not sure if he even does games anymore, but I always liked Eugene Jarvis.

Jarvis is still making games. Alas, his most recent credits (AFAIK) have been the fun-for-a-bit-but-long-since-beaten-into-the-ground Cruis'n games for the N64 and arcades. How low the mighty have fallen......

 

[Iain Lambert]

There is a very good interview with Jarvis in the new Edge Retro magazine. Its interesting to hear his philosophy that for a good game you've got to really want those bad guys dead, which is why Defender and Robotron see you fending off those nasties who want to turn the poor innocent people into zombies, rather than just attacking you. Basically, once you're defending someone else, rather than just attacking the bad guys, you're justified a whole new level of violence. Robotron was basically an exercise in how many enemies they could get on the screen at once