Following on from the Wii MotionPlus interview, I am joined today by the Wii Sports Resort development team. Let’s start by asking each of you what role you played on this project and what you worked on prior to Wii Sports Resort.

My name is Kenta Sato and I work in the Software Development Department of the Entertainment Analysis and Development Division. I worked on the programming side for this project and was responsible for swordplay and table tennis. On the original Wii Sports¹, I worked as a programmer on tennis.

1	Wii Sports was a title featuring five sports: tennis, golf, bowling, baseball and boxing. In Japan it was released in December 2006 at the same time as the Wii console, while in Europe Wii Sports was bundled with the Wii console.

What did you work on between Wii Sports and this latest title? There was a fair amount of time between them.

I worked on Wii Fit. There was a jogging² section in the software…

2	Jogging was one of the training exercises that featured on Wii Fit. Players jogged on the spot either holding the Wii Remote, or placing it in their pocket.

So the programming for that was also your handiwork, Sato-san. Okay, let's move on to you, Dohta-san.

I’m Takuhiro Dohta and I also work in the Software Development Department of EAD. Like Sato-san, I’m a programmer, and I was in charge of boxing on Wii Sports.

You really managed to pull boxing together in an incredibly short space of time.

I remember you asking us at the time: “Look, are you really sure you can make it?" (laughs)

And you said: “We’ll pull out all the stops!” (laughs)

That really was a close-run thing.

It kept everyone in suspense right until the last moment!

(laughter)

After Wii Sports, I worked on a whole variety of experiments on software for Wii while also helping out a little on Wii Fit and Mario Kart Wii.

Next, Shimamura-san.

My name is Takayuki Shimamura and I also work in the EAD Software Development Department. On the previous title, Wii Sports, I oversaw the general direction of the project while also being responsible for golf and bowling. After that, I was transferred for about four months to the Special Planning and Development Division.

You took part in a kind of short-term study tour within the company, didn't you?

You could say that! (laughs) During my time at the Special Planning and Development Division, I was in charge of direction for Sight Training³ on DS. Following that, I returned to EAD and worked with (Keizo) Ota-san… I believe Ota-san took part in the Wii MotionPlus interview.

3	Sight Training: Enjoy Exercising and Relaxing Your Eyes was released in Japan in May 2007 for Nintendo DS. It was released in Europe in November 2007.

Yes, that’s right. He told us all about his bitter struggle with the awkward piece of kit that is the gyro sensor.

I was working alongside Ota-san in doing experiments to assist the creation of new software, and as a consequence I became involved in the development of Wii Sports Resort.

And finally over to you, Yamashita-san.

My name is Zenichi Yamashita and I also belong to the EAD Software Development Department. On Wii Sports, I was responsible for baseball and boxing. Once that title was complete, I took it easy for a while before working on the Mii Contest Channel. I have been involved with the development of Wii Sports Resort since around March 2008.

What I’d like to ask each of you first of all is what you think of Wii MotionPlus. When you initially had the concept explained to you, what did you make of it?

Well, I had been heavily involved in running experiments with software for use with the Wii Remote...

Yes, it was because of this experience that you were asked to join the Wii Fit team and create the jogging section⁴. Miyamoto-san pushed for its inclusion rather forcefully, but I'm very glad that it ended up in Wii Fit.

4	For more details, please see the Iwata Asks interview about Wii Fit, Volume 1: Exercises Using All Sorts of Ideas.

Working on those experiments, there were times when I ran up against the limitations of the Wii Remote accelerometer and would find myself wanting to make this movement or that movement but finding that the sensor wasn’t able to detect it.

The accelerometer on its own does have limitations in terms of detecting precisely how you moved or rotated the Wii Remote.

That’s why I was extremely excited when I heard about the new sensor. I thought that if we used that, all those things we hadn’t been able to do up to now would become possible.

I see. How about you Dohta-san?

In the same way as Sato-san, I was involved in experimenting with different movements of the Wii Remote which could be utilised in software. Then, just as I was starting to feel that we had exhausted all the possible movements, I heard about the gyro sensor and felt that all these new possibilities had opened up.

What did you think, Shimamura-san?

When I was working on golf for Wii Sports, Miyamoto-san would constantly say things like: "Simply using brute strength when you swing is no fun!" So when I heard about the concept for Wii MotionPlus, I thought that issues like that would now be easy to resolve.

Yamashita-san?

When I first heard about it, I too felt a sense of pure anticipation. I wasn't sure at that point what kind of things would become possible, but I remember feeling tremendously excited.

So what did you think when you first got the chance to actually get your hands on Wii MotionPlus and use it? Let’s ask the two of you who had worked on programming for the Wii Remote from the start.

Yes, well… I felt that my expectations may have been a little bit excessive… (laughs)

I’m glad to hear you giving your honest opinion!

(laughter)

You have to bear in mind that this was hardware which was in the process of being developed, so as you'd expect, there were a number of problems with it early on. My honest reaction was: “Are we really sure this is going to work?”

At the start of the development process, there were indeed a variety of problems to contend with, such as the narrowness of the detection range and the sensor’s inability to detect slow movements. Dohta-san, how about you?

I had the same kind of impression as Sato-san, but I was still very taken aback by the responsiveness of Wii MotionPlus when I first had the opportunity to use it.

What precisely do you mean by responsiveness? Did you feel that there was a difference in the precision of the controls?

With the original Wii Remote, when you made a twisting movement there was always that sense of a slight delay before it was reflected in the game. But when you attach Wii MotionPlus, hold it with one hand and make short, rapid movements then the corresponding object on screen will also make the same short, rapid movements. So I thought, this really feels...

You thought: “This really feels like something new!”

Exactly. It felt very new and fresh.

Everyone was saying: “You can make it stop! You can make it stop!”

"You can make it stop?"

There was this programme that Ota-san came up with.

Ah, this must be the SDK⁵ that Ota-san put together.

5	An SDK or Software Development Kit is a component used in the development process of games.

Yes, that’s right. There’s a programme on one of the SDK demos which lets you twist and turn the Wii Remote while the doll on the screen moves in the same way. We all tried twisting it…

And that’s when we all found ourselves saying: "You can make it stop! You can make it stop!" (laughs)

We were saying: "Look, you can make it stop at the last second⁶!” (laughs)

6	The term used in the Japanese is sundome which is a term used in non-contact karate that refers to stopping at the precise instant before making contact with an opponent.

With the original accelerometer, you couldn’t make a sudden stop like this. There was always this slight sense of a delay before anything came to a halt.

What was the reason for that?

Regardless of the angle at which the Wii Remote is held, the accelerometer can only detect the position it's in once the Wii Remote has stopped. This means that while it’s in motion, it can only make predictions about which way gravity is acting upon it.

So that’s why it wouldn’t come to a clean stop and there would be this slight drag.

With Wii MotionPlus attached, however, it recognises the Wii Remote’s position whether the user is beginning to move it or is bringing it to a halt.

This is why if you move the Wii Remote, the doll on the screen will move in real time and if you stop moving it, the doll will come to a complete halt. When I saw this, I simply thought: “Wow!”

When the prototype model for Wii MotionPlus arrived and you all got a chance to use it, what did you think you’d do with it?

That’s exactly what we thought: “What are we going to do with this?” (laughs) Actually, the idea of developing a sequel to Wii Sports was one that we’d considered a long time before this. We’d even had discussions about which new sports to include, but we weren’t able to see how we could come up with new ways to enjoy the game, so it was temporarily put on hold. When Wii MotionPlus came along, we thought that we might now be able to revive the plan.

So you hadn’t settled on a plan to develop the sequel to Wii Sports right from the start. It was rather that you sat down to consider what you could develop that would utilise this new device and you subsequently concluded that the best thing would be to use it in a sequel to Wii Sports.

That’s right. We thought that Wii MotionPlus would be well suited to Wii Sports. Miyamoto-san had also spoken to us…

Was Miyamoto-san expecting a sequel?

Um, no… Well, he actually spoke about an island. It was known as the “Island Concept”.

The “Island Concept”? What does that mean exactly?

I think that Miyamoto-san might be the best person to ask about that one...

Miyamoto-san, could you explain the “Island Concept"?

Certainly. I had been thinking about the “Island Concept” in one form or another for more than ten years.

You’d been thinking about it for that long?

Well, one part of Nintendo’s business has been creating a whole host of characters which we have then licensed out.

Characters like Mario and Donkey Kong.

That’s right. But I’ve always thought, seeing as we are a games company, that in addition to characters resembling people, why couldn’t we also turn the actual stages of games into characters?

So now that we’ve turned people’s caricatures into characters by way of the Mii, you thought about actually turning the island that forms the setting for the game into a character?

And also licensing it out as a franchise.

Licensing an island! (laughs)

We’ve discussed ideas like this for a long time, with suggestions such as: “Let’s create Dream Island!” We also experimented on Wii Fit by making a large island.

Ah, yes: “Wii Fit Island”. Is the island in Wii Sports Resort the same island as Wii Fit?

It’s called Wuhu Island, but the concept is more or less the same. We really polished up the island, turned it into a resort and actually made the location into a kind of character. This will then lead to a range of island series…

So you’ll be releasing a range of series?

You could have adventure games, role-playing games, city-building simulation games... It will be fun to see all the ideas that we can come up with, won’t it?

So the idea is basically to use the same island as the location and then afterwards develop games covering all sorts of genres. Shimamura-san, how did you react when you first heard about the “Island Concept"? Did you have any reservations about it?

Well, I was really taken aback. In fact, I was at a loss for words! (laughs)

Well, that's not surprising considering you’d just heard someone suggest turning an island into a character and then licensing it out! (laughs) Having just heard the explanation, I understand the concept but under normal circumstances, I think anyone would find themselves thinking: ”What on earth is this person talking about?”

Absolutely! (laughs) Using an island as the setting for a game is very common, but the idea of turning it into a franchise...

So how did you end up coming round to the idea?

Well, I heard an explanation that really made everything fall into place. If you see a street on TV that you’ve been to before, even if it was just the once, you’ll always say: “Hey! I know that place!”

We thought it would be a fun idea to have a location that everyone knows and then have all sorts of stuff going on there. It would mean that players would already know the town like the back of their hands by the time they came to buy the next adventure game. Everyone could play in a location they were familiar with which would truly turn it into a miniature garden.

So the player would already know the terrain and the layout of the streets.

If you play Wii Sports Resort even once, you’ll get a good feel for the lay of the land. That means that if you buy a new game, you could be dropped anywhere on the island and it wouldn’t take you long to work out where you were.

That’s why Miyamoto-san suggested we make symbols. If you have symbols and landmarks on the island, it will be a lot easier to pinpoint your location.

When you put it like that, it occurs to me that there were various memorable landmarks dotted around the island in Wii Fit. Was that intentional?

Indeed it was.

This time, the mountain is also in the dead centre of the island, but it wasn’t like that originally.

There were just a few fairly small rocky mountains but that was all.

We decided to go all out and created a huge volcano. Then we put ancient ruins behind it.

We were instructed to make the island large with plenty of open space so that it could be used for other titles in the future.

And all these ideas came courtesy of Miyamoto-san?

Yes, they did. We received instructions such as: “Make it so it will become like a familiar street corner!”

And things like “Make it so we can reclaim the land if we have to!”

(laughter)

The kind of island someone from an industrial design background comes up with is always going to be a bit different, isn’t it?

But it’s not as if Nintendo is getting into the real estate business! There may be people out there who could get the wrong idea, so I thought I'd better make that clear from the outset!

(laughter)

So you decided to create the island that would form the setting for the game based on Miyamoto-san’s “Island Concept”. What happened next?

I believe the “Island Concept” was finalised in early April, 2008 and there are notes from that period stating: “We’ll show it at E3⁷."

7	E3 is the Electronic Entertainment Expo held in Los Angeles annually at which video games companies unveil new products and titles.

Was it Miyamoto-san who said: “We’ll show it at E3”?

That’s right.

In 2008, E3 was held in July, wasn’t it?

Right.

This means he was asking you to get it ready to unveil at E3 which was a mere three months later.

At that time, all we had was the doll Ota-san had developed and nothing else…

Miyamoto-san certainly comes out with some amazing things, doesn’t he? Although the software doesn’t exist in any shape or form, he’s setting you the task of getting it ready for E3 in the space of three months.

(laughter)

Well, I judged that the team had the capacity to pull it off. Moreover, as Shimamura-san mentioned briefly earlier, the idea for Wii Sports 2 had already been included in the original plan for the software to develop for Wii.

For the original Wii Sports, you experimented with all kinds of things and the plan was to use those ideas which you couldn't bring fully to fruition at that point for Wii Sports 2.

So it wasn’t as if we were starting from zero.

That’s true. We weren’t starting from zero.

At that point, we were discussing the idea of having a game featuring winter sports and marine sports.

We had already decided that we would use an island as the setting for the game, so we thought of all kinds of marine sports and sports suitable for a tropical island. We selected three of those ideas to unveil at E3.

Those were Frisbee Dog, Swordplay and…

…And Power Cruising. But in fact we actually had a fourth one as well.

That was archery.

Why did you decide not to unveil archery?

At that stage, we weren’t sure whether or not we could actually successfully recreate sports like archery.

In archery, the Wii Remote represents the bow, which you hold in your left hand, while you pull the Nunchuk all the way back with the right hand. We created a test version but as it is a sport that demands extremely slow movements, we didn’t yet know whether or not we would actually be able to make it work.

So you mean that, at that point, Wii MotionPlus was able to detect rapid movements, but it still wasn't clear whether it would be able to pick up slow movements.

Because the development of Wii Sports Resort and the Wii MotionPlus hardware took place at the same time, there were cases where we went ahead and developed something without yet being certain about whether it could be successfully realised.

Are there other examples of that besides archery?

It was also the case with swordplay.

We originally decided to make swordplay as we thought it would be well suited to Wii MotionPlus, given that the position the player holds the Wii Remote in would correspond to the position of the sword on-screen.

You could of course also stop the sword just before making the strike! (laughs) So we began to experiment with it, but we just couldn’t get it to work successfully...

Why was that?

If you repeatedly waved the Wii Remote, it would gradually become out of synch.

So you experienced “temperature drift”. This was something I learned about in the last Iwata Asks interview when we discussed Wii MotionPlus. The point which is calculated as zero can shift due to changes in temperature or humidity.

That’s right. If you played the game for a while, the angle that the player was holding the Wii Remote and the angle of the on-screen sword would drift out of synch. No matter what we did, we were unable to resolve this issue and thought that we wouldn’t be able to make the game.

It was at that point that we all discussed it together and decided that we would attempt a game in which you only swing the sword once.

Can you really make a game in which you only get to swing the sword once?

The idea was to have a game where you and your opponent face each other and strike with your swords only once. The player struck by the sword would lose.

One strike and you’re out!

(laughter)

I expect you remember the title WarioWare: Twisted!⁸ That game also utilised a gyro sensor, but as expected, the point representing zero would drift out of place.

8	WarioWare: Twisted! was released in Japan in October 2004 for Game Boy Advance. It was an action game where the player had to use split-second reactions to twist the Game Boy at the right moment.

How did they manage to resolve that issue?

They made each of the mini-games end within five seconds! (laughs)

(laughter)

By making it reset after each mini-game was completed and going on to the next game, they somehow managed to get around it. I remember the dev team saying that they’d come up with an idea and say: “This is really suited to the gyro sensor!” But if it was a game which lasted for any length of time, they’d say: “No, it can’t be done!”

At first, I really thought it would be impossible, but I knew that if anyone could do something about it, it would be Ota-san. And indeed it turned out that he managed to do something! (laughs)

Using the supplementary technology that Ota-san devised, we were able to get rid of this problem of drift.

He solved it in a way that you just wouldn’t imagine, so I wondered what sort of magic he’d used.

(laughter)

As you’re waving the Wii Remote, it steadily corrects itself.

Normally, you’d expect it to drift further away from the correct point as you wave it.

But in fact, it becomes more and more accurate.

The more you wave it, the more accurate it gets!

That’s really something!

I’m afraid we can’t reveal just how the magic works! (laughs)

In addition to that, thanks to technology developed by Sato-san and some tweaking of the rules of the game, in the final version, you can even take on 70 opponents in a sword fight.

So you started off with just a single opponent - and with only a single blow to defeat them - yet it grew to 70 opponents!

Well, the original plan states that the aim is to let players do battle with 1000 opponents.

So without knowing how you'd actually go about it, you just went ahead and said "Let’s have 1000 opponents!" (laughs)

Right. We thought that the more opponents we had, the better! (laughs) But taking on 1000 opponents in a sword fight just isn't feasible, no matter how you slice it!

(laughter)

At this point, I’d like us to cast our minds back to the previous title for a moment. In terms of units sold, Wii Sports is now the number one software title in the world. As it’s sold bundled with the Wii console outside Japan, I'm not quite sure if calling it "World Number One" is exactly the right way to describe it, but in any case it’s surpassed the record set by Super Mario Bros., which was unbroken for over twenty years. Coming up with a sequel to a huge title like that must be much tougher than coming up with a completely new title from scratch. How did you approach this intimidating challenge, and what sort of issues did you have in mind?

The last game was just such a huge, massive, enormous…

…But you did make it, after all!

Yes, that’s true. (laughs)

(laughter)

Before Wii Sports was released, we had absolutely no idea how well it would sell, in part because it was coming out at the same time as the Wii console. I was confident that we had produced an enjoyable game that players would prove receptive to, at least to some extent. But as the reality turned out to go so far beyond anything we had predicted, when it came time to work on the follow-up, I was naturally nervous. What’s more, all of the major sports which were easy to reproduce...

You had already used them all! (laughs)

Right, we had used them all! (laughs) As we had used them all in the previous title, all of the staff thought: “This is going to be very tough!"

But even so, if you had gone out on a limb with just minor sports it would have felt somewhat too low-key.

Precisely. That was when we decided to structure the game around two distinct core concepts: "activities" and "sports".

“Activities” and "sports”?

“Activities” were the kind of leisure options that might be enjoyed on the island, while "sports" followed in the same line as the previous title, comprising regular sports - ball sports and the like. We decided that we would build the new title around these two concepts.

With just one main concept, it wouldn’t have been all that different from Wii Sports. I guess that's why you decided to introduce another one to structure the game around. Just out of interest, who came up with the idea of using "resort" in the game’s title?

I think I’m right in saying that was Miyamoto-san.

We were considering a lot of different proposals.

We considered ideas like “Wii Sports 2 – Resort”, but after discussions with NOA (Nintendo Of America), they suggested using the simpler name “Wii Sports Resort”.

So that got rid of the “2”.

Including the “2” just seemed to be too awkward.

But why didn’t you want to call it "Wii Sports 2"?

Wii Sports is such a huge title, so if we called the new one "Wii Sports 2", customers might just think it was more of the same. This time around, the most important feature is the fact that the new Wii MotionPlus device enables new types of game that weren’t previously possible. That’s why we didn’t just want to call it “Wii Sports 2”.

The style of gameplay on this title also differs greatly from the previous title.

The first logo that we considered had “Wii Sports” written in larger letters. “Resort” was just written beside it in much smaller letters. But then Miyamoto-san said: “Surely it should be the other way round!”

Meaning that “Resort” shouldn’t merely be a sub-title.

Right. But I had always thought of it as a sub-title. Then when we experimented with a new logo positioning "Resort" right in the centre, the way I conceived of the project really went through a huge shift. That wasn’t just the case for me, but for everyone.

We realised that we weren’t making Wii Sports 2…

We became aware that we were making a resort-themed game.

After that, everything went incredibly smoothly, whether it was the design side or coming up with the game’s features…

We would say things like: “This really has that ‘resort feel’!” (laughs)

We used that phrase all the time, didn’t we? We'd say things like: “It’s lacking that 'resort feel'!”

That phrase “resort feel” really reminds me of the way the team who developed Zelda referred to that “Zelda-esque” quality. (laughs)

We constantly used the phrase, always asking ourselves what we could do to bring out that “resort feel”.

Even though I’ve never been near a resort…

That’s why I’d suggest things like: ”Let's go to Lake Biwa (near Kyoto) and watch wakeboarders in action.”

As well as ideas like putting a few hibiscus flowers around the office.

"How about all wearing Hawaiian shirts?" or "What we need is a banana boat!”

And that’s what you need to achieve that "resort feel"?

(laughter)

We ended up having no choice but to ask those few people with experience of going to a resort to tell us all about it.

You mean people who’d been to tropical islands?

Right. We’d ask them: “What’s it like there?” and “Do they play table tennis outdoors?”

(laughter)

And they’d respond: “Yes, apparently they do.”

“I think I saw some people playing table tennis outside once."

If you go to an onsen (Japanese hot spring resort), you can play table tennis!

I’m not sure it’s such a good idea to confuse onsen and tropical resorts! (laughs)

(laughter)

In any case, we decided to make it so you play table tennis outdoors.

It’s by the poolside, so you really get that “resort feel”.

It was a little more challenging for the team working on the swordplay game. It seemed to be lacking that "resort feel”.

Well, no one goes to a resort for a sword fight, after all.

Which isn’t to say that you can just make the sword fights take place on top of a banana boat!

(laughter)

I wanted to ask why you decided to include table tennis in Wii Sports Resort rather than tennis.

As far as possible, we wanted to avoid including sports that had already featured in the previous title.

I think tennis in particular left a very strong impression on players, so perhaps you were especially keen to avoid including it again.

I think that’s true. We want the original game to always continue to be played, so we concluded that it would be better to have different sports. Also, I personally wanted to give the cut shots and drives a bit of a harder edge.

So that’s why you decided that table tennis would be more suited for inclusion in the new title.

Yes, I think that’s probably right. Hmmm… I wonder. What do you think, Sato-san?

The superb responsiveness of Wii MotionPlus makes it very well-suited to table tennis. Tennis rallies are slow in comparison and had allowed us to make adjustments to overcome any delay in the response.

So whereas tennis has relatively sedate rallies, table tennis has extremely energetic, rapid-fire rallies – bang, bang, bang!

The fact that the developer of the game is able to describe the rallies using terms like that certainly convinces me that you’ve nailed it! (laughs)

Concerning the controls for cut shots and drive shots, these were also possible when playing tennis on Wii Sports.

They were, weren't they? Whereas existing tennis games had basically used buttons to select the shot type, it became possible to choose to hit drive shots or lobs using just the arc of your swing.

Yes, that's right. But there were players who found selecting shots in this way to be a little challenging. This time round, however, players will understand straight away that simply twisting the paddle a little will enable them to cut the ball or hit drives. This makes it easier for beginners, while also allowing more expert players to really show off their skills.

We also thought that perhaps table tennis is a sport that more people are familiar with when compared to tennis.

If you go to an onsen, you're always going to play table tennis.

(laughter)

I think there will be a lot of people who have actually played the sport and who therefore understand how to put spin on the ball. In that sense, we thought that this sport would be one where people would be able to grasp the concept very easily.

I actually did feel a lingering attachment to tennis on occasion, but on the whole I’m glad that we went with table tennis in the end.

Well, table tennis is still a kind of tennis!

(laughter)

We've already spoken about how you got that “resort feel” by locating table tennis beside the pool. What other resort-style sports did you go for?

Well, we have the aerial sports. Piloting an aeroplane to do an island flyover is one example.

The original idea was to use a hang-glider, but I was firmly opposed to this.

Why were you opposed to it? A hang-glider sounds like it has that “resort feel”.

I thought that the new control system for the plane would prove a much better match with Wii MotionPlus than a hang-glider.

Tell me more about that new control system you mentioned.

I think everyone has held a model plane in one hand and made it fly while making an engine noise.

Everyone did that when they were a kid.

Yes, I did it! (laughs)

That's why we came up with the idea of replacing the toy plane with a Wii Remote to let you enjoy playing in the same way.

One suggestion was that the plane should be controlled with a joystick, and we did consider having this style of control. The idea would be that you held Wii MotionPlus as a pilot would hold a joystick, but doing that actually made the controls quite fiddly.

Even given the fact that you are able to fly freely in a three-dimensional space, I think there would be a lot of players who would find it difficult to pilot the plane using the joystick-style. But if you are actually holding the plane in your hand and its movements are synchronised with the plane on the screen, you feel more strongly that it's you who is flying it. You can then manoeuvre through the three-dimensional space in a way which I hope is more intuitive and fun.

It also dispenses with the need to use buttons, doesn’t it?

That’s correct. You play by simply holding the Wii Remote between your index finger and thumb.

What's more, by doing a flyover, you'll get to know Wuhu Island very well.

We can also use it to fly over the island and conduct an aerial survey of the landscape, thinking: “Maybe we can use that terrain for a game!”

(laughter)

Being able to pilot a plane and do a flyover is a goal that Miyamoto-san has been working towards for some twenty years, isn’t it?

A goal he’s been working towards for twenty years? Would you care to explain that in more detail?

Have I really? (laughs)

(laughs) I can remember that wakeboarding has been a goal of yours for the last ten years and doing an aerial flyover has been a goal for twenty years.

You’re right. Being able to somehow manoeuvre freely through the skies has been something I’ve been pondering ever since the time of Pilotwings⁹.

I think I’m right in saying that Pilotwings was released in 1990.

That’s right. It came out in 1990.

So it’s been almost twenty years.

I was actually working on a water-skiing game over ten years ago. As it's a sport where you're pulled behind a boat, we needed to design the boat as well as the waves. It was a bit of a struggle for a console at that time to handle these kinds of things, so I gave up on the water-skiing idea and decided to work on a jet ski game, which resulted in Wave Race 64¹⁰.

9	Pilotwings was a flight simulation game for the Super NES console. It was released in Japan in December 1990.

10	Wave Race 64 was a jet ski racing game for the Nintendo 64 console. It was released in Japan in September 1996.

But even though over ten years have passed since then, you never completely gave up on the idea of a water-skiing game.

It just seemed like it would be a lot of fun. It seems that wakeboarding has become more fashionable than water-skiing recently though.

You can see lots of people with boats wakeboarding on Lake Biwa.

That’s why I can see young people really getting into it.

They’ll also be able to savour that “resort feel”.

You’ve just spoken about how you wanted to avoid including the same sports as Wii Sports as much as possible. But there are some sports that are the same, aren't there?

Yes, bowling and golf.

Why did you decide to include the same sports?

In Wii Sports, there was a bowling game where you could knock down 100 pins.

It was included in the training mode, and I remember that you were only able to bowl the ball once in the final stage.

That’s right. In the new game, it's now not only possible to bowl the ball a second time, but there is a completely separate mode where you can bowl a full ten frame match. In the regular game, the maximum score is 300 points, but in this one…

It’s 3000 points! (laughs) That’s the highest possible score in the 100-pin match.

This game is really going to get players excited.

The sense of unity the player has with the on-screen action has also been greatly increased.

The sense of unity?

In the previous title, if you press the B Button when you are holding the ball, the Mii will walk automatically with the player aiming to match the Mii's movement to bowl the ball. But this time round, even if the player presses the B Button, the Mii won’t move until the player does.

That’s because it can detect the movements of the player holding the ball.

That's right. So when you hold the ball up, the Mii will also hold the ball up and will release it when you release it.

So that’s how the sense of unity has been increased.

We also wanted to make the controls simpler this time round so we designed it so that you could play simply by swinging the Wii Remote with the B Button held down. Due to things like this, I think that anyone who has played the original bowling will find that there are major differences when they play this one. I think that’s also the case for golf.

In golf this time round, someone was saying that, once they get used to it, good players wouldn’t need to take a practice swing.

What do you mean by not needing to take a practice swing?

It was something a member of the team said. They said that even without taking a practice swing, once you get a feel for it, you'll be able to strike the ball first time and hit it more or less to where you want.

It’s undoubtedly been made more faithful to the real thing. The element of uncertainty has been reduced.

Basically, ever since the very first golf game on the NES, golf has always been a game where you have to stare at the shot meter. Making a practice shot meant taking a swing and watching the shot meter. But with this title, you don’t have to stare at a shot meter and can enjoy the feeling of working on your own swing. In other words, you are now able to enjoy a sensation that is close to the real thing. By the way, why did you decide to include golf in Wii Sports Resort?

Well, after Miyamoto-san got back from E3 in 2008…

Really? Is that right?

(laughter)

Right after getting back to Japan, he suddenly said: “You know we’re including golf now.” Apparently he’d stated in an interview that this time round golf shots would be determined by the backswing, even though at that time a golf game didn't exist in any shape or form! (laughs)

It’s a trick he often uses! (laughs)

That’s right. I block off the escape route.

I’m not quite as bad as Miyamoto-san, but I have been known to use the same trick on occasion.

(laughter)

It’s of course very appealing to be able to control the backswing in golf. In the previous title, it was all about the speed of the swing…

You determined everything simply via the speed at which Wii Remote was swung.

But it’s not healthy to swing as hard as you can and the fact that you’re only able to play using the appropriate speed meant that it could be a bit stressful. But for this time, as the degree of back swing could determine how hard the ball is hit, I really wanted to realise that.

And because Miyamoto-san had come out with this in an interview, we had no alternative but to make it happen...

It also grew to 18 holes.

That’s because of the “18 Hole Incident”. (laughs)

“The 18 Hole Incident”? Tell us about that! (laughs)

We originally planned to have a 9 hole course as we had on Wii Sports. We were developing the game based on the plan for a 9 hole course when the producer, (Katsuya) Eguchi-san, announced that Miyamoto-san had been speaking to Iwata-san. When we asked what they had been discussing, we were told: “Golf is going to be 18 holes after all.” I did wonder if it was really true though...

That’s another well-worn technique! (laughs)

(laughter)

When did this incident take place?

It was at the end of 2008.

But that was the period when you needed to be finishing things up.

Yes, the original plan was to release it for Christmas.

But it was right around that time when we heard that some flexibility might be possible regarding the schedule.

We won ourselves some extra time while things were left to stew in the pressure cooker! (laughs)

Pressure cooker?

What do you mean?

Read the previous Iwata Asks interview and all will become clear! (laughs) The scheduled release date was set back as the Wii MotionPlus hardware team continued their gruelling battle with the gyro sensor, experimenting by making the connector into a floating structure, attaching steel hooks and boiling it in a pressure cooker.

We had originally planned to make a 9 hole course in order to have it ready for a Christmas release, but when we were given more time, we somehow managed to turn it into an 18 hole course, which the team ended up feeling really positive about. To people who play golf, an 18 hole course that is a par-72 is expected. That's why they felt that the score they'll get after going round the course is incredibly realistic.

So it seems that the extension to the development period of Wii MotionPlus yielded an unexpected by-product. While we’re on the subject, Miyamoto-san, what sort of things were you thinking about when you learned that there was now more time before the title was released?

Well, we had settled on the features in order to get it ready for a Christmas release, but fortunately...

Fortunately? It certainly wasn’t a fortunate development from a business perspective! (laughs)

Yes, that’s true. Anyway, I remember going to see the sales planners, who said: "Let's wait a while." That came as a great relief, and under normal circumstances I would have just gone straight back to my desk.

But this time you didn’t just go back to your desk.

That’s right. I went to the room where the dev team were working…

And what did you do?

(loudly) “You guys got a lucky break!”

(laughter)

I bet you sounded really happy when you shouted it! (laughs)

I really did shout! (laughs) Well, I thought that the extra time we had courtesy of the delay in the Wii MotionPlus development really was a lucky break. I feel that being able to adapt well to changes in both environment and situation is extremely important in video game development.

I imagine that there were two ways someone could react to the extension of the development period. You might think that since you had worked so hard to get it ready for the end of the year, the hardware problems that led to the development being set back meant that all your efforts had been in vain. I'd imagine there are those who would take it like that.

That would be one way to take it.

You think you’re approaching the finish line when someone shouts "You guys got a lucky break!" (laughs) You then feel like you’ve been ordered to run another lap of the marathon – doubling a 9 hole course into an 18 hole course, for example.

The fact that I could say things like that is because I know the team will take it the right way. If I say there are customers who expect golf to be played over 18 holes, and who’ll be disappointed if it’s over 9 holes, so we should make it 18 holes, everyone takes it on board. That's a very healthy, positive situation. The reaction’s the same, even when the project is extended.

Taking the feelings of the team working on the game who believe that the finish line is just up ahead into consideration, I don’t know if that can be perceived as being entirely a positive thing! (laughs) But if in the end, it works out for the best then that is indeed healthy and positive.

But I really feel I need to apologise to our customers for the delay in the release of the new title.

But in the period after Miyamoto-san declared that you guys had got a lucky break, you did more than give the golf course 18 holes, didn’t you?

That’s right. We ended up adding new modes.

Originally, there were 12 sports, each of which had several modes available.

We had thought that this was sufficient in terms of the game content on offer…

But then there was the suggestion to consider adding another mode.

Who was it who made that suggestion?

Well, it’s not something that a member of the team would have said. Of course it was... (laughs)

(laughs)

It was you who said it, Iwata-san: "Add another one!"

What?

I told everyone that the President had said there still wasn’t enough game content and asked them what we were going to do about it.

Now I get it… (laughs)

Well, it was a direct order from the President, so we didn’t have any alternative.

You’ve got no choice but to do it.

(laughter)

Irrespective of what I may or may not have actually said! (laughs) What new modes did you add?

We added skydiving.

That was decided by myself, Shimamura-san and another director who had all come to the office on our day off. We huddled together and discussed what we were going to do. We were saying things like: "There’s no time left in the development schedule” and “We’re about to enter the debugging phase”. We batted around a few ideas, and one of those was skydiving.

That was very smart - coming up with a solid idea. Usually, they would come to see me on Monday morning and they would be as likely as not to say: “It can’t be done.”

And how would you respond when they told you that?

I’d say: "I don’t want to hear the reasons why it can’t be done!”

(laughs)

But this time, we didn't have to go through that part.

That’s one way of saving time! (laughs) You had only limited time available for development, after all.

The key is that instead of starting by stating all the reasons why something can't be done, they came up with an idea where they felt: “We can do this!”

Yes, I can see that.

Well, we had no choice but to come up with an idea and to get to work on making it.

But, having had a brief look at the skydiving game, it doesn’t seem like something that had been put together in a short time.

That’s good to hear! (laughs)

To tell the truth, we felt that the number of sports where slow movements are directly reflected on-screen was not quite sufficient.

It was really just archery and the island flyover which were like that.

So just when I was worried that there weren't any sports of this type that anyone could understand and just pick up and play, we added skydiving which I think worked out really well.

But it wasn’t just that which we added…

Really? There was more? (laughs)

The versus mode in canoeing was another one. There was a period when we were torn between making this sport one that would be played cooperatively or competitively. We decided that a versus mode would be exciting but would inevitably create losers. In order to prevent quarrelling, we decided to proceed with the cooperative mode and we had that one in the bag by the end of the year. Or so we thought…

Or so you thought?

Someone said: “You know, we should have a versus mode after all.”

And that someone was Miyamoto-san once again! (laughs)

But because there had been no expectation that there would be a versus mode, the processing capacity was already at its limits in single-player mode.

After all you hadn't designed it with the versus mode in mind.

Yes, so we concluded that it would be extremely difficult to split the screen for the competing teams. We concluded however that if there was a single-screen versus mode, then we could most likely make it work.

Versus modes are always more fun when played on single screens rather than using a split-screen. So the end result really worked out for the best.

So with the development schedule extended, you really worked very hard right to the bitter end. At this point, I’d like to ask you each for a final message for our customers. Sato-san, if you’d be kind enough to begin?

On Wii Sports Resort, even with very familiar sports like table tennis, you'll be able to pull off some great moves that will make you feel that you've really become a master. We worked on fine-tuning table tennis right up to the very end, and for this reason I really want both players who‘ve never played table tennis, as well as experienced players, to get a lot of enjoyment out of the game.

Recently, I had the chance to play Wii Sports Resort table tennis. I must confess that there was a period when I got seriously into playing the real sport. It may well have partly been because of that, but when I was absorbed in returning the ball in the “Return Challenge”, it really felt to me just like the real thing. It may be unbecoming for someone of my age, but I got somewhat carried away. Now over to you, Dohta-san.

While it may not be the case for sports like table tennis and bowling, a lot of the activities on offer on Wii Sports Resort are things that you have seen but never tried, or sports where actually doing the real thing is quite tricky. I hope players will enjoy the opportunity to try these out.

Skydiving and the like are not activities you can easily experience yourself.

There’s actually one member of staff who got interested through playing Wii Sports Resort and actually went skydiving. So I’d be really happy if people played Wii Sports Resort and subsequently developed an interest in the real sports themselves.

Thank you. Now over to you, Shimamura-san.

I think we’ve succeeded in gathering together sports which may be a little unusual but are great fun to play under the "Resort” banner. Perhaps there won’t be many people who are fans of every single one of the sports on offer, but I'm sure everyone will be able to find a sport that they really love. What's more, as there are 12 different sports, you could play each one for a month and get a whole year's enjoyment out of the game. So you could decide: "This month, I'm going to master this sport!” and play it intensively. The game really suits that style of play. I hope that whole families, including people who may live alone, will all gather together to enjoy this title.

Over to you, Yamashita-san.

With Wii Sports being such a massive title, we worked on this new game with the desire to equal it and to ultimately surpass it. Now that it's complete, I feel that as with Wii Sports, we can hold our heads high and say: “This game is definitely going to be a lot of fun!" Now I just want lots of people to find that out for themselves.

Finally, a few words from Miyamoto-san.

I’d like people who play this game to become very knowledgeable about Wuhu Island.

Ah yes, the “Island Concept”.

If you use this chance to get familiar with the island in advance, you’ll enjoy the next game even more! (laughs)

(laughs)

One more thing is that with this title there is one Wii MotionPlus accessory included, but I would advise people to get hold of another one so you can enjoy competing with other players. After all, there’ll be other third party software coming out which supports Wii MotionPlus, so this is something I would strongly recommend.

While we’re on the subject, we are aiming to release Wii Sports Resort at a reasonable price. Precisely because we want people to enjoy multi-player gaming, we've also set a reasonable price point for Wii MotionPlus when it is sold separately. The only other thing I would like to say is directed at those customers who already own a Wii: I think it would be a real shame if you didn’t get to try this one out for yourselves.

As we still have a little time left, is there anything else you would like to add?

Well, I’m going to get back to work.

(checking to see Miyamoto has left the room) Now, I'm going to ask about all those things you don’t want to talk about in front of Miyamoto-san!

(laughter)

But once this interview comes out…

He'll read it and we'll be found out! (laughs)

(laughter)

Okay, while taking that into account, could you tell me what the harshest thing was that Miyamoto-san said to you?

The harshest thing was…

Given that he makes no allowances for planners…

It came as quite a shock when he said “Make another mode!” He would also constantly tell us things like: “You can’t do this!" He’d say things like: “If you carry on like this, we’re never going to get this finished!” He would always be kind enough to give us this kind of "advice".

(laughter)

I see – “advice”. (laughs) How about you, Yamashita-san?

I worked on a cycling race about which Miyamoto-san said: “This is incredibly dull!"

He doesn’t pull any punches, does he? (laughs)

He said: “What’s fun about this?” I had no choice but to respond by saying "Ah, okay. I see..." but actually it was really harsh.

Calling something “incredibly dull” is indeed harsh. There's nothing positive you can take away from that.

When we first started putting the cycling race together, we hit a stage where we weren't sure where to go with it. We started without having a clear plan of how to proceed.

That's something Miyamoto-san really hates.

But because he said those things, it ultimately presented us with an ideal chance to reassess the game's features, which is something we are all extremely grateful for. Hmmm… Did that sound a bit over the top?

(laughs)

But I think it’s really true. If he hadn’t said those things …

If you are working by yourselves without outside supervision, there is always a tendency to take the least challenging route. So in the end, it's good that Miyamoto-san got involved.

What’s more, we had to give a presentation, a kind of progress report, once every few months…

The dreaded progress report! (laughs)

“Dreaded” is exactly the right word! (laughs)

He makes each person stand for an hour.

He makes you stand? (laughs)

(laughter)

In order to explain games currently in development in front of Miyamoto-san…

He gets you to stand up to give these explanations.

Yes, he certainly does. (laughs) Each person has to go through about an hour with Miyamoto-san saying “That’s no good” and us saying “I see… I see…”

And with 12 sports and 24 modes, it's a hugely time-consuming process.

It certainly is. After I was put through an hour and a half of this…

After you “were put through this”… (laughs)

The planner responsible for archery... I'm not going to name the person in question, so let's call him H-san to preserve his dignity...

Okay, H-san it is.

Anyway, as H-san was overseeing archery, he was incredibly good at it. Normally he would have no problem in hitting the bulls-eye time after time.

But during the progress report meeting, when he was demonstrating archery, he was shaking really badly.

If you looked at the screen, you could see that he wasn’t able to hold it steady at all. I’d never seen anyone shaking so bad before when playing the game so I said: “You’re shaking!” He replied: ”It’s nerves!” (laughs)

(laughter)

Then after having it pointed it out to him, the shaking got even worse.

The arrows were flying all over the place. I wonder if the Wii MotionPlus is the world's first device that's able to detect whether someone is nervous.

(laughs) So did he get through that nerve-wracking presentation without Miyamoto-san giving him the thumbs down?

On that occasion…

As you might be able to guess, Miyamoto-san did indeed give him the thumbs down!

(laughter)

But following that, it improved greatly.

I suppose it’s these strict checks which form the basis of EAD¹¹ software’s quality. Thank you all very much for taking the time to join me today.

11	EAD is the acronym for the Entertainment Analysis & Development Division of Nintendo’s headquarters in Japan.