Miyamoto talks development style, work life, new hobby

Among other things, the developer compares the way Nintendo approaches their traditional and more casual game titles

As if we havent had enough interviews with Nintendo execs, Shigeru Miyamoto has now made three pages worth on Edge, which you can read here. Of course we wont write all that up again, but you can find some of the highlights below.

Miyamoto believes that Nintendos history of developing traditional titles, like the Mario franchise, has helped them now with their recent focus on my casual or, as he puts it, useful games. "The reason I say that is that when the companies who already make real sporting equipment are trying to make something similar to us, maybe the approach has been blending a little," he explains. "You might think of sporting programs as practical and nothing more, but as an entertainment company that makes Mario, we could be bringing something different to the area, I think."

Even with the aforementioned useful games of late, he doesnt think that his game creation style has really altered as time has gone by. In fact, he feels it is actually in the hardware area that his role has changed the most. "A long time ago," he says, "my role in designing the actual hardware was really limited – mostly it was down to designing the controller, or the controlling interface, or some of those special features that you want the hardware to include on the software side, to make design and development more efficient. It was all about simply making better software. But I think, probably from around the time of the DS, my involvement in hardware has significantly changed. With that project and onwards, I’ve been able to significantly oversee the overall development of the hardware as well as keeping an eye on the software side of things."

Something else that hasnt changed with time is how hard he works. Even how, he frequently works from 9am till 10pm, and sometimes midnight. He always leaves Tuesday evening available for swimming, a hobby he hasnt shared with the world before. Wii Swim, anyone?

Again, theres plenty more in the interview, so be sure to check it out on Edge Online.