Game Development Giant

In Japan, there is also a designer who has just completed his first independent game and is waiting for inspection after its release. He is very much looking forward to the release of Dreambox 3.

Since joining Mars Entertainment, Satoru Iwata has become extremely fond of game development.

After participating in different types of game design work for several design groups, with the accumulation of experience and the improvement of his status within the company, plus it seems that there are people in the head office who are constantly supporting Satoru Iwata, finally, he One of the games I applied for was approved by the headquarters and became one of Dreambox 3’s launch games.

However, Dreambox 3’s launch games are packed with masterpieces.

It can almost be regarded as a large collection of more than 70% of the entire Mars Entertainment’s fist products.

His small game with a small investment is actually not very eye-catching in it. The biggest reason why his game was chosen to be selected as the first game camp of Dreambox 3 this time is because of this Specialization of this game.

Satoru Iwata calls this game "Kirby".

It is a very unique and fun little game. It was originally made by him and his friend Masahiro Sakurai for their own entertainment. Later, it became widely circulated in the Japanese branch. At that time, someone asked Satoru Iwata to play it. Apply to see if you can really develop this game, so this time "Kirby" was created.

The style of this game is very different from what is popular today.

Let’s not talk about the uniqueness of the setting. I just want to talk about the difficulty of this game. Simplicity is also its selling point. You must know that the most popular games nowadays are high difficulty. No matter which company makes the game, if it is not difficult enough, It seems that he doesn't know how to play games, but Iwata doesn't like this trend of all high-difficulty games.

That’s why he made this Kirby game.

Even Jester was alarmed by this incident. After watching this game, Jester first said that this game is relatively rough in production, but it is very creative and thoughtful. Compared with the console platform, the more suitable platform for him should be a handheld console. However, it was the time to choose the first game for Dreambox 3. In this case, Jester first refined the game. Become one of the first games of Dreambox3.

Although the company does not have high expectations for the future of this game, which can only be said to be a scratch game, after all, the amount of investment is not too much, a total of 50,000 US dollars has not been used up, and the development team of five people , it was developed in less than half a year.

But Satoru Iwata doesn’t see it that way.

This is the first game he has developed personally as a producer.

Moreover, he now has an even crazier game development plan. If this development plan wants to pass the application from the headquarters, he must have sufficient status and qualifications. If his performance in "Kirby" cannot make everyone Words that shocked everyone. Then I'm afraid the headquarters won't share so many company IP characters for its own use.

This game that is still in Satoru Iwata’s brain is a Smash Bros. game. Satoru Iwata has not yet decided on a specific name. In his design plan, he called it "Mars Entertainment Super Smash Bros." However, He has never told anyone about this except his friend Masahiro Sakurai, who was also very excited after hearing about Satoru Iwata's development plan for this new game.

He believes that Satoru Iwata's game will definitely be a big success.

certainly. If he wants to get the qualification to develop "Mars Entertainment Super Smash Bros.", he first needs to succeed in his "Kirby". He doesn't need to be a big success, but he can't be so cold that no one cares.

Actually. Jester also accidentally learned about Satoru Iwata’s development plan for Kirby.

Logically speaking, this game is of such a small scale that it has no qualifications for him, the head of Mars Entertainment, to pay attention to or interfere with it. But who knows that this game is so famous in Jester's and other places? , and he knew it when he saw Satoru Iwata's name behind this game. That masterpiece in history finally appeared a few years later.

What makes Jester most incredible is that this game is still the work of Satoru Iwata and Masahiro Sakurai.

You know, after Nintendo announced its withdrawal from the game industry, the game studios originally affiliated to Nintendo also fell apart, and the staff naturally dispersed.

Many people have gone to other companies to do other jobs and want to continue developing games, and have been recruited by several major game companies. However, the status of HAL Research Institute is not too high in Nintendo, although they have developed " Although Balloon Fight, a blockbuster game on FC, also participated in the production of Nintendo's "Pinball", their later works were relatively mediocre.

When Nintendo announced its withdrawal from the game industry, HAL Research Institute was actually on the verge of bankruptcy. Without good games developed, the previous accumulation must have been in vain. Moreover, they have always been Nintendo's second Where Fang Studio existed, Nintendo used to be the boss, but now that Nintendo doesn’t make games themselves, it’s naturally impossible to continue to take advantage of them.

In fact, this is not difficult for Satoru Iwata, because he is a programmer in the HAL Research Institute, and he is a very high-level and very famous programmer.

At that time, many well-known Japanese software companies wanted to let Satoru Iwata go, and they also offered high salaries.

But for Satoru Iwata, his biggest hobby is developing games, rather than simply being a programmer. Turning those cold codes into games that can make people laugh is the most amazing thing for Satoru Iwata. , Therefore, he directly refused these invitations.

Moreover, if he really wanted to work in a large company, why would he come to this newly founded HAL Research Institute with only five people when he just graduated?

You know, he is a top student at Tokyo Institute of Technology, and his father is Hiroshi Iwata, the mayor of Muroran City, Hokkaido. In such a family, if you want to enter a large club, you can start from the promotion path of ordinary Japanese. That was also extremely easy.

but. For Satoru Iwata, developing games is his favorite thing.

When he first joined HAL to make games, his family was furious. But Satoru Iwata followed suit.

Therefore, when Jester personally invited him to join the Japanese branch of Mars Entertainment, Satoru Iwata, who felt Jester's enthusiasm, did not agree on the spot, but after returning to Japan and thinking twice, he still accepted Jester's invitation. . However, he was only famous for his programming at HAL, and developing games as a producer was a completely new job for him.

In the original version, if he was willing to be a programmer supervisor, he would immediately become a middle-level member of the company.

However, Satoru Iwata insisted on becoming a game planner, so he could only slowly climb up from the bottom step by step.

Therefore, this is also the first time after so many years that he has obtained the qualification for independent development.

The game "Kirby" is not only very popular among the Japanese branch, in fact, Jester said that although the game is poorly made. However, after the comments that there was hope for a big hit came out, it was also very popular at the US headquarters.

Almost everyone is very interested in this game, which has a casual style, simple operation, and fun to play. Even within a period of time, there was even a Kirby trend in the headquarters.

However, this game is still not very suitable for consoles. As Jester said, the most suitable platform for this game is a handheld console. Many other designers also agree with this and even joked about it. If this game is released on a handheld platform, it might become the best-selling new game on GAMEBOY in recent years.

Although GB has dominated the handheld market in recent years.

However, it is a game that can truly be called a blockbuster. Except for the phenomenal game "Pokemon", most of the others are just transplants of previous console works.

Mainly games of the Dreambox generation, there is nothing innovative in the gameplay, it just has a relationship that can be carried around.

That's why players are full of interest in this, but in the past two years, it seems that players. Enthusiasm for handheld consoles has faded greatly, because current consoles are much more powerful than handheld consoles, and Mars Entertainment’s handheld consoles don’t even have a color screen. This also makes players feel that GB is no longer just a piece of equipment. A toy that can be shown off has become a backward thing that should be eliminated.

Therefore, within Mars Entertainment, apart from the Dreambox 3 project, the most important project is the development of a new handheld console. The standards for this development are basically known internally. First, it must have a color screen, and secondly , in order to achieve the performance of Dreambox2 or be close to Dreambox2, the Dreambox2 game can be successfully transplanted.

In addition to developing a Dreambox 3 version, "Kirby" has also developed a GB version. However, the GB version was launched late. Although the development is equivalent to a transplant and is not too difficult, it still takes time. , basically it will not be launched until the first half of 1996.

There may be one thing that no one, including Satoru Iwata, knows.

This little game that no one pays attention to has actually entered Jester's eyes for a long time, and he is always paying attention to the situation of this game.

Of course, his concerns are the same as those of Satoru Iwata. Satoru Iwata hopes that his console version can achieve good results, so that he can be qualified to go to the headquarters to apply for game development with a larger investment scale and more manpower, while Jace In particular, I focus on the handheld version of this game - in its original history, this game was a shot in the arm for GB, which was also in a period of exhaustion.

Although it did not bring GB back to life, it still sold well on GB, which made many people who had lost interest in GB once again pick up this phone that they had put in the drawer for who knows how long. The machine is playing again.

Of course, in the original history, the game that really brought GB back to life was PM. In the entire history of handheld consoles, PM's status is unique. If the kings of console games are Mario and Zelda, then , then the king of handheld games is undoubtedly PM, and there has never even been a game qualified to challenge them.

However, when Jester was released on GB, it had already taken out the super killer of GB.

Although this caused GB's sales to explode in the early and mid-term, far exceeding Nintendo's sales in the same period, but then again, this also consumed more of GB's potential.

At the beginning, Nintendo could rely on PM to bring GB back to life, but now Mars Entertainment may not have this possibility for the time being. Although PM's new games can still sell well, that's all.

That's why Jester fell in love with "Kirby".

Simplicity does not mean retarded. Kirby brings a very relaxed, cute and interesting atmosphere.

Although the first game did not draw on the setting of enemies to obtain corresponding abilities, it created many vivid characters and enemies common to the Kirby series.

For example, the funny final boss image of King Dedede is deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. In addition, the game adds a new mode Extra-Mode on a simple basis, which can be entered after clearing the level once. In this mode, the number of enemies and the difficulty of the entire game are increased. It is this mode that greatly improves the playability of the game and lays a good foundation for future percentage completion settings.

At that time, when the quality of GB games was generally not high, Kirby stood out and achieved success, and has since become a new generation star of Nintendo.

Of course, Jester also knows that it is unlikely to revive GB at present. The most important thing to do now is to release a new version of GB. This is what Nintendo did in history, but it will be many years later. , it was not until the failure of NGC that a color version of GB was released. And, changing from its past domineering style, it participated in the Tokyo exhibition organized by Sony for the first time with a low eyebrow.

The purpose is to promote the new handheld console.

This is also the only time in Nintendo's history that it has participated in the Tokyo Show.

The situation at that time was indeed at a critical stage for Nintendo. The console was unable to fight back in the face of PS2. If the new handheld console could not regain some share, then maybe Nintendo would be at that moment at the turn of the century. It will go bankrupt and will never have the glory of NDS and WII. (~^~)