E3 2010: Shigeru Miyamoto Likes Donkey Kong Country After All

IGN: In terms of the 3D market in general, some people think it's gimmicky so it's going to be a slow adoption for people to go out and buy a new 3D television set, or see a movie in 3D when you have to pay a premium. Now that you have a system that comes with that 3D technology, do you think this might kick-start a new revolution of 3D that would end up affecting televisions as well?

Miyamoto: I think that particularly with this device, because you can show them the screen very easily or take a 3D picture and they can immediately see it on the screen right there, definitely I think it will have an impact on people's overall impression of 3D. It's that single environment where you can experience the effects and play the content all in one device, which is obviously very important. But at the same time, I don't know to what extent it's going to effect other areas of the entertainment industry. Particularly what I think is hard to see is the future for console gaming.

IGN: You mentioned the 3D camera. I think it's great that you can take photos in 3D, but obviously that feature's locked down to the system. Has there been any thought for creating a standard to get those 3D pictures into other mediums so people can share those pictures?

Miyamoto: Well, maybe somebody will start making 3D picture frames.

IGN: Let's talk about Steel Diver. That game was shown back in 2004 at E3, and it took until now for it to seem like you want to bring it out as a full-fledged product. I understand you feel it's a perfect game for the 3DS, but it was originally for the first DS. Why wasn't it a perfect match back then?

Miyamoto: We developed it on Nintendo DS up to a point where it was very playable and a pretty robust game. But what we found was that the play control was a very different style of play. It's an active, button-pressing kind of game. It's a slower-paced play control, and because of that we thought the game would need a little something extra to really help it shine. Something to make it look prettier. So as we were developing it and spending our time on it the Nintendo 3DS hardware came out. And when we first saw the screen, we thought it would be the thing that would really help make this product shine. At that point we decided to take it and bring it over to Nintedo 3DS.

And then when we moved it over to the 3DS, that gave us another idea for something that's not strictly submarine-related. And so we're working on implementing that mode now too.

IGN: Any clues on what that might be?

Miyamoto: (makes a torpedo noise and laughs) Swwwwwwwwiiiiiihhhhh!!!

IGN: I don't know how we're going to put that into text. (Editor's Note: Use your imagination.) Let it be known that Mr. Miyamoto pointed his finger and said "Spwiissh!"

Steel Diver looks to me like it would be a downloadable game. But is it being prepped as a retail product?

Miyamoto: When we were working on it for Nintendo DS, we were considering whether to release it as a retail product or as DSiWare. It was in the midst of those deliberations that we looked at Nintendo 3DS and decided to move it over there. So I'm leaning at this point toward it being more of a retail product.

IGN: Speaking of which, on the show floor there are very few, if any, WiiWare games or DSiWare games. I'm wondering if those services are still a strategy for Nintendo.

Miyamoto: We think that E3 isn't really the best venue to showcase those types of titles. Because at a show like this there are so many games, and particularly so many big games on consoles that it can be hard even for handheld games and regular Nintendo DS games to capture attention. And when you move into the digital space, the types of games that we see there can easily get lost at E3. So it's definitely still a strategy for Nintendo. We just felt that this isn't the right venue to showcase them.

IGN: Donkey Kong Country Returns. Of all the legacy games, I wouldn't have expected to see a return to Donkey Kong Country. Why that game over anything else?

Miyamoto: One of the reasons is that a lot of people in North America have been telling us that they want another Donkey Kong Country. So that's one reason. The other reason is that when Retro was considering what project to work on next and the Donkey Kong Country name came up as an option, everyone on the Retro team got very excited. I thought they might be more interested in creating something that has more realistic graphics, or something like that.


IGN: I was interviewing them earlier, and even though you weren't directly involved you were definitely very inspirational in making sure certain things were done in that game correctly. I'm wondering, which parts of Donkey Kong Country did you like versus not like? And what did you address with them?

Miyamoto: The first point that I want to make is that I actually worked very closely with Rare on the original Donkey Kong Country. And apparently recently some rumor got out that I didn't really like that game? I just want to clarify that that's not the case, because I was very involved in that. And even emailing almost daily with Tim Stamper right up until the end.

And with this game too, I'll be involved on a check/confirmation level, looking over the game and checking the content. So it'll probably be a similar role to what I played in the development of Donkey Kong Jungle Beat.

In terms of things that I really wanted to see them focus on, particularly was the idea that in the original Donkey Kong Country the rendering and the effects that they used were very different from what you'd see in a Mario game. It had a very distinct feel. I thought it was important for them to keep that in mind. And also the fun of seeing the motion of that Donkey Kong hand slap is something that you don't get in other games as well.

IGN: I'll finish up with one more question. I want your reaction, and I'm just going to say two words -- Pikmin 3.

Miyamoto: I'm not going to say anything this time. (laughs)

You know, Nintendo's development style is very unique in that we often have projects going on that are very small groups of people working on them, and we don't really blow the team out to a larger size until later on in development. So Pikmin is a project we're working on, and we're maybe getting near to the point where we'll start increasing the team size. But we've got so many other things at the show here that I'd rather people not focus on that, and instead focus on the plethora of other titles we have on display.

The one thing that I can say about it is that it's a Wii game.

IGN: There you go! Thank you so much.