Miyamoto ‘never throws away bad ideas’, we await Cooking Mama: Hitler Edition

Apparently, Mario’s dad (aka Shigeru Miyamoto) doesn’t throw away any ideas while he’s making games, even if they stink. Hmmm, probably explains why we’ve got Wii Music and still haven’t had a new Wave Race, then.

Speaking toSatoru Iwata, during the President of Nintendo’s regular Iwata Asks interview show, The Shig admits he locks unused ideas away untilhe can make them work. "If you think for yourself about what's wrong with your idea, and you understand the reasons why it's no good and get a handle on the problem, then you're sure to be able to use that idea sometime," Miyamoto points out.


Above: Hey, a Hitler cooking game might seem like a bad idea now, but maybe it could work on the Wii 14

He goes on to add: “That's why, while I used to tell people to store up ideas in a drawer, I recently suggest putting ideas that were no good into a drawer with the reason why they were no good affixed to them. If you have a bunch of ideas like that in store, the time will come when, in some way, you can take off that label. Like, 'oh, the rules are different now, so it's okay'.”

The Wii’s Mii avatars illustrate Shigy’s thought… eh, drawer-locking process. Miyamoto had wanted to make caricatures of people since the days of the NES back in the 1980s. Alas, he couldn’t think of a way to make the idea work. And it wasn’t until technological wizardrycaught up that we were finally given Mii Forest Whittaker.

What an age we live in.

Source: Official Nintendo Magazine

Sep 28, 2010

David Meikleham
Google AMP Stories Editor

David has worked for Future under many guises, including for GamesRadar+ and the Official Xbox Magazine. He is currently the Google Stories Editor for GamesRadar and PC Gamer, which sees him making daily video Stories content for both websites. David also regularly writes features, guides, and reviews for both brands too.