In an interview with French website Gamekult, the well-liked Shigeru Miyamoto confirmed the rumors and hints swirling around the Nintendo-verse about his future involvement in the development of Mario game titles.
In recent years, we’ve seen Miyamoto’s role in the Mario games diminish, giving him more or less the role of a producer who’s involved through oversight rather than going hands-on with the development. That said, we can all see his handiwork in the new Super Mario 3D World, so it’s a little bittersweet to hear the news straight from the source.
Still, it’s important to be developing younger talent from the ground up, and this has been Nintendo’s strategy with its senior managers as of late. This new, talented generation of game designers will eventually have the responsibility to keep these beloved franchises moving—freeing up people like Miyamoto to work on new ideas and consider new ways to expand Nintendo’s game library.
Some of his thoughts on the shift were:
“Creating a Mario of 3D World’s calibre takes a lot of energy and there is little change that I could take the time needed to work on the next Mario. However, I want to get involved again and more thoroughly in the development of smaller projects, but that does not mean it will be a very modest title only for download or such thing. It is not impossible for me to present you a new game as the main producer in the future, but even when I’m not directly in charge of a project, I always look at what the teams in terms of gameplay and I trust them. Do not worry about Mario!”
We’re trusting that Miyamoto is leaving the franchise in capable hands… we’ll see what the future brings for Nintendo and its famous game designer!
