Masahiro Sakurai recently received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association of Media in Digital Awards (AMD for short). Shortly afterwards, Sakurai was interviewed by Entax.
As always, Sakurai had some interesting thoughts to share about a variety of subjects. At one point, Sakurai was asked if the Japanese game industry should be following the hype that’s been following the standards set by overseas.
“Lately, there’s been a lot of hype for games from overseas, China in particular. Do you have any thoughts for the Japanese game industry like ‘this is what you should be doing’?” asked Entax.
“As a trend for our gaming industry, I think that Japanese developers should push forward with games that Japanese players like.” — Masahiro Sakurai
“This isn’t my original idea by any means, but, as a trend for our gaming industry, I think that Japanese developers should push forward with games that Japanese players like,” responded Sakurai.
“A little while ago, a lot of American games were doing well so there was a lot of focus on the “Americanization” of our games… There was a culture that was very much like this. Basically that this should be the de facto or our standard…”
However, the implementation of this as a standard for Japanese developers ended up carrying some consequences. It turns out that there’s a uniqueness in games developed by Japanese developers that can’t really be found elsewhere.
There are even players that live outside of Japan that seek out these sort of qualities in games. If Japanese developers only focus on making games specifically for American audiences, then it would just mean that the gaming industry as a whole would have less uniqueness to offer.
“But, unexpectedly, overseas players who like Japanese games are not looking for something like that but it feels more like they’re specifically looking for the uniqueness and originality of Japanese games themselves and what we find fun.” — Masahiro Sakurai
“But, unexpectedly, overseas players who like Japanese games are not looking for something like that but it feels more like they’re specifically looking for the uniqueness and originality of Japanese games themselves and what we find fun,” continued Sakurai. “So basically, make what you like and the people who embrace it will have fun with it… I think that’s the ideal.”
As the Director of the Super Smash Bros. series, Sakurai has a bit of experience in dealing with this sort of mindset. Had Sakurai simply just followed along with beliefs about American gamers, the Super Smash Bros. series might be in an entirely different place right now.
Funnily enough, Nintendo was initially skeptical about how well Super Smash Bros. for the Nintendo 64 would perform overseas as they weren’t sure how fans would perceive characters like Mario and Pikachu duking it out in combat (and were even skeptical about it in general). Regardless, it ended up being a huge hit. Had things gone differently, Super Smash Bros. might’ve become a Japanese exclusive (or perhaps not even exist at all).
Additionally, Super Smash Bros. Melee was the first game in the series to introduce characters from a Japanese exclusive game series, Fire Emblem. As a result, there were apparently discussions about whether or not the North American version of the game should even include Marth and Roy as playable characters since they wouldn’t be recognized anyhow.
Due to the decision to keep Marth and Roy in, the Fire Emblem franchise is now released worldwide. Of course, this has also resulted in there being as many as eight Fire Emblem characters — Marth, Lucina, Roy, Chrom, Ike, Robin, Corrin, and Byleth — in the latest game in the series, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate.
With all of that said, Sakurai emphasizes that his thoughts are really just guidelines and suggestions. They’re not necessarily rules to strictly follow by. Indeed, he believes that everyone should just pursue their own beliefs and do the best that they can.
“What I want to say the most is really ‘do what you want.,'” said Sakurai towards the end of the interview. “After having made so many videos and programs I honestly think forcing my opinion on others is a bad thing.”
“What I think and believe is, at the end of the day, simply one possible way of thinking, after all,” continued Sakurai. “I said it on my channel as well but it was made with the intent of letting every person ‘wear their own shoes.'”
“At the end of the day, it’s basically a hint and then people can take it as they want and what they do from there is what’s important,” reiterated Sakurai. “All these different people should move in the direction they believe in and then we’ll see products emerging from many different directions, I think. So let’s end it on ‘lets’ all do our best!'”
A special thanks goes out to our very own Nicholas “MajinTenshinhan” Taylor for the translations used in this article.
Source: Event Hubs
