Gunpei Yokoi - the grandfather of Mario, Link and Pikachu (2)

It was then that Satoshi Tajiri got a chance to meet the savior, Gunpei Yokoi. The veteran game producer of Nintendo had been thinking about making a game featuring Yoshi, a supporting character from Super Mario World.

Yokoi asked Tajiri if he could make a multi-platform game (for NES and GameBoy) within half a year. Although he didn't have much confidence, the young and desperate game designer had no choice but to say "Yes". After some discussion about its details, Yokoi decided to give the job to him.

It was a bit of a challenge for Tajiri and his team because they had never made a game following a strict schedule determined by other people. However, they could not afford to fail it. So, he decided to temporarily halt all other projects including Pokemon to concentrate all resources of the company on the newest project, which became the last hope for him.

Of course, they managed to complete the task before the due date and the finished product was released under the name "Yoshi No Tamago (Yoshi's Egg)" for NES and GameBoy in 1991.

Youtube : Yoshi - NES Gameplay

Despite the limited development time and small number of involved workers, the game became a big commercial success as it sold more than four million copies worldwide. He got the money he needed and earned trust from people in Nintendo, which helped him a lot when he resumed the development of Pokemon.

But at the same time he lost the most precious resource of his company - the workers. Although they did understand the company was doomed, they couldn't endure the pain of being forced to work hard for low wages. As a result, the company lost all three programmers at once.

Needless to say, no video game can be developed without a programmer. Besides, they were not only employees but also true friends of him; they had spent years together making and talking about games with the same passion. To overcome the extremely difficult situation - both mentally and practically - he had to transform himself from a "game freak" into a truly professional business manager.

He renewed his determination to complete the development of Pokemon and made use of every opportunity he had to stabilize the business. Fortunately, his company had achieved a good reputation as a reliable game developer thanks to their high quality products including Yoshi and "Magical Taluluto", which was released by SEGA. So he was able to secure new contracts with those two large publishers.

Youtube : Magical Taruruto Kun (released by SEGA in 1992)

Youtube: Pulseman (released by SEGA in 1994)

More notably, he expanded the size of the company by an M&A to deal with those increasing number of tasks, which was a highly unusual move for a Japanese company back then.

Although he had to put aside the most important project, Pokemon, for a while (probably between two and three years) due to the shortage of financial and human resources, it later turned out to be a beneficial investment. The core members of the original Pokemon team such as Junichi Masuda(composer) and Ken Sugimori(designer) polished their professional skills during those days while the company achieved solid financial stability, which enabled them to invest a large amount of time and money on the big project.

It was when they finished the development of "Mario & Wario", which was also produced by Yokoi, that he got the absolute confidence in the future of the company.

Youtube : Mario & Wario (released by Nintendo in 1993)

Satoshi Tajiri (2003 @ GameFreak)

When we released Mario & Wario, I was able to see a clear possibility for the first time that we could finish the development of Pokemon

- Continue (Vol.9, p.157) Ohta Publishing in Japanese


The rest of the story is well-known : his game Pokemon, which eventually took more than six years to make, became a legend. But he has never lost sincere appreciation for the person who supported him in the difficult days.



Satoshi Tajiri (2002 @ GameFreak)

I learned the professional way of making video games from Mr. Yokoi.

- Continue (Vol.7, p.134) Ohta Publishing in Japanese


Satoshi Tajiri (2016 @ GameFreak)

Mr. Yokoi was like a second father to me.

- Game no Kikakusho (Vol.1) from Denfami Nico Gamer in Japanese
http://news.denfaminicogamer.jp/projectbook/xevious/3

Gunpei Yokoi - the grandfather of Mario, Link and Pikachu (1)

Can you imagine a world where you will never meet Mario, Link and Pikachu? That's a truly horrible place. But without Gunpei Yokoi, you would have been stuck there.

--

Shigeru Miyamoto, the creator of Mario and Zelda, learned essential elements of good video games when he made his first one under Yokoi's supervision. Since then, he has never lost his respect for the senior creator - even after he himself became the most respected game designer on earth. I'll tell you the story in a future article.

Shigeru Miyamoto (2000 @ Nintendo) :

He would play my games under development for hours without a break and make pointed remarks about what aspects need to be improved, in very short sentences.
Although it was tough to admit my lack of deep thought, I was impressed by his professional behavior and promised myself one day I will become a skilled game developer like him.

- Game Taikoku Nippon (ISBN:4413032063, p.106) Seishun Publishing in Japanese

--

Satoshi Tajiri, the father of Pokemon, was in a desperate situation when he met Yokoi for the first time. Before then he was, as the name of his company indicates, a "Game Freak" who pursue his own interests.

It was not a wrong approach considering the fact he started his career as an indie game developer. He made his first game "Mendel Palace" with passion and love for video games.

Youtube: Quinty (Japanese version of Mendel Palace)

When it was released by Namco, he earned about half a million dollars and launched his own company. Although he was not so much interested in running a business, he thought it was a necessary step for him and his team to become professional game developers. But it later caused him growing pains.

After he became the president of Game Freak in 1989, he had been thinking for months about what kinds of games he should make. At that time, he had a notion that the industry lacked innovative products which provide entirely new experiences. After some research, he found a potential key to success inside Nintendo's newly released device : GameBoy.

Although the handheld game machine, which was developed by Yokoi, had a serial port for data exchange, there was no game which brought out the best of it. Certainly, many games supported the feature to implement multiplayer battles; the extraordinary success of Tetris would never have happened without it. But they were far from the innovative game experiences Tajiri was searching for.

One day, the basic idea of Pokemon, which was originally called "Capsule Monsters", suddenly occurred to him. He thought that if players could trade some valuable virtual items in the game, they would enjoy new social experiences no other game had ever provided. So, he wrote a proposal based on the idea and submitted it to Nintendo.

Youtube: Pokemon Beta | Capsule Monsters (a collection of original documents of Pokemon)

When the development process was to begin in 1990, he estimated it would not take more than a year to finish - which later proved to be a huge mistake - so, he signed a small contract with the publisher and received a moderate amount of money as the cost for development. But the actual development process was anything but smooth. About a year later, he found that he still had an enormous amount of work to do while his company was running out of money.

Actually, they had been developing three games in parallel to diversify the risk of failure, but unfortunately all of those projects were behind schedule. Facing a live-or-die situation for the company, he had been struggling to find a way to save it.

(continue to part 2)

Who is the most influential game designer?

Who do you think is the most influential game designer in history?

Shigeru Miyamoto (Super Mario)?
Sid Meier (Civilization)?
Will Wright (The Sims)?

or maybe Kenji Eno (D)?

Youtube: Kenji Eno Interview(JP)

Youtube: 3DO Longplay [002] D's Diner Director's Cut

Have you chosen one of those people? Sorry, you are wrong.

--

Certainly, they are truly influential creators.

Miyamoto laid the foundation for modern video games. Sid and Will created entirely new genres. Eno proved that video game is a form of art.

If the question were "Who is the most IMPORTANT game designer in history?" it would be much easier (or boring) because there's only one possible answer - Shigeru Miyamoto.

Although I don't think you need much evidence for that, here's some:

• He made two of the most successful video game franchises - Mario and Zelda.
• His games sold more than 400 million copies (excluding those games in which he is credited as a producer but didn't play significant roles, such as Pokemon and Super Smash Bros.)
• Many other important game designers including Hideo Kojima (Metal Gear) and Yuji Naka (Sonic) were deeply influenced by his works and philosophy.
  
  
  
  
  

Hideo Kojima (2004 @ Konami) : 

I can't express how much I was influenced by his works. Without them, I would have never become a game designer. But I can't call him my teacher of game design; he is much more than that. 

- Dorimaga (vol.23, p.58) Softbank Publishing in Japanese

Yuji Naka (2001 @ SEGA) :

I think there's no chance of me ever surpassing him as a game creator. Rather, I hoped that one day I would be able to make a game which has equally high quality as his works. I knew there was no way to achieve it if I had made a copycat of Mario; that's why I made Sonic in that way.

 - Weekly Famitsu (around Dec. 2001, p.168) Enterbrain in Japanese

Even so, I don't regard him as the most influential game designer. Why? That's because I know the person who deserves the honor more than Miyamoto.

His name is Gunpei Yokoi.

- He invented the most important input device for video games.
- In a sense, he is one of the founders of the most important gaming company.
- He created the world's first modern game.

- And most of all, he taught Miyamoto how to make a video game.

So, if you call Miyamoto the father of modern video games, he should be called the "grandfather".

--

I'm gonna write about his huge influence on the game industry and the creation of the world's first modern game in the coming articles.


Fmitz.

"Dice Break" Release notes 2.3

Version 2.3

Thank you for more than 8,000 downloads!

-Additional puzzles(Puzzle 41-Puzzle 53)

Version 2.2

Thank you for more than 5,000 downloads!

-Additional puzzles(Puzzle 27-Puzzle 40)

-Some bug fixes

Version 2.1

-Additional puzzles(Puzzle16-Puzzle26)

-Sound effects added.

-You can delete high scores

Version 2.0

-Additional puzzles(Puzzle10-15)

-The fourth mode named "Quarter" was added.

In this mode,you have to earn as many points as possible in 15 seconds.

If you do nothing,the time goes continuously.But while any dice is moving,the time stops.

It means that you can control the time like a quarterback in football.

And the allocation of dice is exactly the same throughout the day and all over the world.So you can compete with your friends wherever they are.

-All features and updates will be provided free of charge now and in the future.