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[nynt9]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9GpCCZ6NAE

Edit: Some of these claims may be dubious. Please look at this compiled list of posts and take everything here and there with a grain of salt. http://m.neogaf.com/showpost.php?p=227346768

For gaming's most loved creator, Shigeru Miyamoto has kinda been a dick over the years, leaving a trail of angry developers in his wake.

Talks about how there have been conflicts between him and second party developers, how he cancelled projects and forced his vision onto them, and screwed over developers in general.

I know Miyamoto is dear to many (and I respect his creations too), and the title is inflammatory, but I'd like to have some discussion about these, as I've never heard these claims before and I don't know how true they are.

1.

Spoiler

Gets into a pissing match with Rare
--How he got into an ego conflict with Rare over Donkey Kong, staled Dinosaur Planet development and more.

2.

Spoiler

Cancels Star Fox 2, then steals its code and assets for other games
--Canned SF2 and used its code for SF64 without attribution or royalties to Argonaut.

3.

Spoiler

Steals the concept of Super Mario 64
--Argonaut were developing a Yoshi game, they got let go and they used the code for Croc, to be the first 3D platformer, and Miyamoto harnessed their ideas and SF2/Yoshi code and got to market first, then said "too bad" to Argonaut and denied them royalties.

4.

Spoiler

Bankrupts the developers of GTA 3
--Body Harvest was being developed by DMA Design, but Miyamoto created a lot of hurdles for the development, causing many delays. Eventually this lead to them going bankrupt, and being acquired by Take Two and merged into Rockstar. These are the people who created GTA 1-2, and their remnants developed GTA3.

I'm paraphrasing a lot, so you'd better watch the video before commenting.

edit:

The thing about Croc/Super Nario 64 was explained by the founder of Argonaut in 2013.

It originally started as a Yoshi game.

"Miyamoto-san went on to make Mario 64, which had the look and feel of our Yoshi game - but with the Mario character, of course - and beat Croc to market by around a year. Miyamoto-san came up to me at a show afterwards and apologized for not doing the Yoshi game with us and thanked us for the idea to do a 3D platform game. He also said that we would make enough royalties from our existing deal to make up for it. That felt hollow to me, as I'm of the opinion that Nintendo ended our agreement without fully realizing it. They canned Star Fox 2 even though it was finished and used much of our code in Star Fox 64 without paying us a penny."

 

[Omega Kirby]

Can't make it to the top without pissing off a few people

 

[chubigans]

I love Larry, can't wait to watch this.

 

[DragonKnight]

I always find it best just to assume my favorite people are assholes or outright terrible people.

 

[HStallion]

I always find it best just to assume my favorite people are assholes or outright terrible people.

The cult of personality is a bitch

 

[KZXcellent]

Love Larry's videos.

Always found Miyamoto's salt over DKC to be pretty hilarious.

 

[Platy]

I can understand 1 and 2 since it is related to games he had access but 3 and 4 doesn't make any sense

specialy because :
1) Mario 64 was not the first 3d platfomer
2) body harvest didn't had any chance to work on the n64. it was the jurassic park trespasser of it's time

 

[Inuhanyou]

Pretty unsurprising. Especially how he considers how he could have created every concept in gaming but says he just didn't want to at the time.

The Nintendo CEO that helmed Nintendo before Iwata, apart of the original family, was a complete douchebag himself, and not even a small one either, basically everything he said was an insult

 

[nynt9]

I always find it best just to assume my favorite people are assholes or outright terrible people.

The cult of personality is a bitch

I mean, the resulting games he made are great. More polished than the games he stole code from (allegedly), but still. Argonaut deserve props for the tech they developed that was used in some of the most famous games of all time.

I'm not gonna say the claims he makes aren't true, but accusing Miyamoto of stealing the core concepts that made Mario 64 work as a 3d platformer will not be met well by most people.

I think there's a bit of both. If you compare SM64 to Croc, the tech is similar, but SM64 is a lot more polished gameplay wise. So he might have taken code, but Nintendo also added a lot of polish and good gameplay design to that.

 

[DerekOfTheDykes]

I'm not gonna say the claims he makes aren't true, but accusing Miyamoto of stealing the core concepts that made Mario 64 work as a 3d platformer will not be met well by most people.

 

[ar4757]

How about made Paper Mario a shell of its former self

 

[gdt]

Woah that 3D Mario accusation is serious.

 

[Fularu]

Croc came out about 15 months after Mario 64 so the notion that Miyamoto stole the idea and made the game so far ahead of Croc's release leads me to take this with a huge grain of salt (more like a huge mound).

The DKC thing is known though, but it led to Yoshi's Island, which was the far better game.

 

[Halabane]

Lead follow or get out of the way. Sorry but you don't build things without pissing someone off who **also wants to lead**. Creative people have visions. Going to clash when you put more than one of them in a room. Steve Jobs was a huge ass to some people. Loser always feels bad when their vision gets wrecked.

Next.

Water is wet.

 

[Qblivion]

I don't doubt that he has done some some shady shit, who hasn't, but is there much hard proof for these particular examples?

 

[Schopenhauerian]

I thought this was a nice exchange:

http://shmuplations.com/miyamotoxnaka/
Yuji Naka: Hmm, well, this is true even now, but I feel like Miyamoto is someone I’m always trying to catch up to... Since the beginning, Sega has been saying “we need to beat Nintendo!” But my intention wasn’t really to “beat” Nintendo, but to make games that could stand shoulder to shoulder with theirs. If you try to make the exact same thing you’ll never win; you’ve got to pursue a different path. That was our thinking when we made Sonic… but of course, when Miyamoto showed me new games like Mario 64, I realized we were lagging behind again! Just when I thought we were on par, he goes and puts out an amazing game like that.
Miyamoto: ...After we made Mario, a lot of games came out with characters imitating that jump-action platformer system, right? Of all those I think Sonic had a certain uniqueness. “This game has real personality,” I thought. “The creators are young and it’s a little rough around the edges, but I can tell it was made by people who understand what the joy of games is all about.” Although I was pretty young too, back then. (laughs)...
Miyamoto: If one of Naka’s games is successful, he immediately wants to get started on the next project. That kind of work ethic is great. All I wish from our game developers is that they work hard and enjoy their work. That’s all. The more good studios we have, the more the industry itself will be invigorated... There’s one other thing I want to say about Naka. If you think of games as fashion, then 10 years from now, what is popular today will be outdated. But if you think of the inherent value and quality of a game—that doesn’t change much in 10 years. When a high-quality game is made, it sets a standard, and I think Naka is one of those rare people who can create the standards by which other games are judged.
Naka: That really means a lot to me, to hear you say that.
Miyamoto: Of course, as a creator myself, I don’t intend to stop competing with him! If people start thinking “Sega makes better games than Nintendo!” I’ll have gotten us into quite a mess! (laughs)

 

[nynt9]

Woah that 3D Mario accusation is serious.

It's also the most complex of the situations so my paraphrasing is inadequate so you should watch the video for more context.

Lead follow or get out of the way. Sorry but you don't build things without pissing someone off who **also wants to lead**. Creative people have visions. Going to clash when you put more than one of them in a room. Steve Jobs was a huge ass to some people. Loser always feels bad when their vision gets wrecked.

Next.

Water is wet.

"Visionaries will be visionaries" and "stealing code" are kind of different things though.

 

[DecoReturns]

Wasn't the DCK comments untrue or mistranslated?

I've heard different stories on both sides for so long I don't even know who's right.

 

[Giraffe Keighley]

I can honestly say I've been an asshole at least 4 times in my life

 

[NateDrake]

The Star Fox 2 bit is fairly well known. Dylan Cuthbert said this about the cancellation of SF2:

They canned Star Fox 2 even though it was finished and used much of our code in Star Fox 64 without paying us a penny.

 

[Timeaisis]

"steal".

Which games were released, again? Let's be honest, every developer borrows winning ideas from every other developer. Ideas are a dime a dozen. Implementation is everything.

The only issue I take is the Argonaut snub, but still, Nintendo owned the code to SF2, so they didn't steal anything. Accreditation is the problem there.

 

[Boards of Canada]

Jez San comes across as bitter in most interviews. Not sure I buy his version of events.

 

[FalsettoVibe]

I can honestly say I've been an asshole at least 4 times in my life

Same..

 

[jholmes]

Interesting how all the devs mentioned in here are based in the U.K. (unless I'm missing something).

 

[fernoca]

The thing about Croc/Super Mario 64 was explained by the founder of Argonaut in 2013.

It originally started as a Yoshi game.

Though the part of Miyamoto apologizing and even mentioning shares seems a bit weird.

 

[Jamix012]

Number 3 is not exactly accepted as fact, and I haven't heard 2 and 4 though those are possible. 1 kinda sucks.

 

[DeaconKnowledge]

Miyamoto being an asshole gave us Yoshi's Island.

Miyamoto needs to be an asshole MORE, not less.

 

[nynt9]

Interesting how all the devs mentioned in here are based in the U.K. (unless I'm missing something).

The video creator is in the UK, so he might have more access to the developers in his region.

 

[NoFaceNico]

I love Larry. I've never been more proud to be making content on YouTube than the day I found out Larry regularly shows up in my comments.

 

[KZXcellent]

Interesting how all the devs mentioned in here are based in the U.K. (unless I'm missing something).

Larry deals primarily in UK gaming stuff so I'm not too surprised.

 

[jholmes]

The video creator is in the UK, so he might have more access to the developers in his region.

I'm aware and certainly you gotta write what you know. But like I said, it's interesting.

 

[Ninjimbo]

Couldn't get past the annoying voice.

I do find it funny that Star Fox is in the middle of two of these messes. I'm glad that franchise is dead. Miyamoto needs to forget it about already.

 

[Platy]

Also, most of these looks more like "Hiroshi Yamauchi was an asshole", not miyamoto.

He was the president so he chooses who gets paid for what

 

[Strings]

I thought this was a nice exchange:

That was actually lovely. Good reminder that he doesn't exclusively talk about how stories suck, DKC sucks, F-Zero sucks...

I've been pretty down on the guy for a while now, but yeah, this particular exchange is super nice.

 

[visiblemode]

Can't make it to the top without pissing off a few people

Bingo.

So hard to get the full stories, and there are always winners and losers in business. Every person of note has people with grudges who can't wait to tell you how lousy they are.

Not defending him, because I don't know the full stories, but that's kinda my point. Few do, and those that do have their own biases.

 

[InfiniteCombo]

The cult of personality is a bitch

If the perpetrator was someone other than Miyamoto, that mofo would be getting crucified right about now.

But this thread is instead going to be full of excuses for the guy.

 

[DecoReturns]

Couldn't get past the annoying voice.

I do find it funny that Star Fox is in the middle of two of these messes. I'm glad that franchise is dead. Miyamoto needs to forget it about already.

Miayamoto said he wishes Star Fox was more popular and had plans for its future. (Hopefully movies or cartoons, I think these would work).

He said the seem about Pikmin too.

 

[TheRedSnifit]

Cancels Star Fox 2, then steals its code and assets for other games
--Canned SF2 and used its code for SF64 without attribution to Argonaut.

How does one steal something they own? The problem is them not being properly attributed, which I highly doubt a designer is in charge of.

Croc came out about 15 months after Mario 64 so the notion that Miyamoto stole the idea and made the game so far ahead of Croc's release leads me to take this with a huge grain of salt (more like a huge mound).

Yeah, this is kind of weird. I guess Nintendo has the world's fastest development team.

 

[IISANDERII]

I always wonder what famous people are truly like. I never assume anything, you never know what forces are in play.

 

[Platy]

The cult of personality is a bitch

Cult of personality is why we think a designer is the only responsible for an entire company not paying someone.

Hiroshi Yamauchi is a better person to blame on pretty much all these cases

 

[SRTtoZ]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ez-NsShMK74

 

[privitsan02]

As usual, most of these things get shoved under the rug. I had a feeling that he thought a bit too highly of himself especially after how he treated Rare and Retro Studios before Prime was a success, but I didn't know about the Croc or Star Fox 2 code stories at all.

DMA Design story though, must sting him sometimes at night.

Best wishes.

 

[LelouchZero]

Wow this is really interesting stuff!

 

[Ridley327]

As usual, most of these things get shoved under the rug. I had a feeling that he thought a bit too highly of himself especially after how he treated Rare and Retro Studios before Prime was a success, but I didn't know about the Croc or Star Fox 2 code stories at all.

DMA Design story though, must sting him sometimes at night.

Best wishes.

Wasn't Retro a well-known disaster zone before Nintendo cleaned shop? It's been talked about in great detail already about how much of a mess they were and how close to the brink of complete destruction before NCL came in to personally handle their affairs.

 

[Ninjimbo]

Miayamoto said he wishes Star Fox was more popular and had plans for its future. (Hopefully movies or cartoons, I think these would work).

He said the seem about Pikmin too.

Pikmin deserves to live on in some form. It's unique gameplay hasn't even been imitated.

I honestly have no idea what the hell is up with Star Fox. It's been so weird since SF64 and its gameplay was modernized big time through Kid Icarus Uprising. I honestly wish Nintendo would stop pursuing Star Fox or give the series to Sakurai if he's still with Nintendo.

 

[NathanS]

The whole "...mediocre gameplay..." line has been debunked for fucking years. Fucking fact check Larry!

The first point that I want to make is that I actually worked very closely with Rare on the original Donkey Kong Country. And apparently recently some rumour got out that I didn't really like that game? I just want to clarify that that's not the case, because I was very involved in that. And even emailing almost daily with Tim Stamper right up until the end.

http://www.ign.com/articles/2010/06/17/e3-2010-shigeru-miyamoto-likes-donkey-kong-country-after-all

 

[StarPhlox]

I think most people who have followed Nintendo over the years can come up with even more egregious missteps by Miyamoto if they can take off the rose-colored glasses. However, these sections by Bundy are quite iconoclastic as DK and Star Fox are nearest and dearest to my heart. DKC has at least experienced a magnificent renaissance but Miyamoto continues to keep Star Fox on the lower rung when it could probably be their biggest franchise.

 

[Dr. Feel Good]

As usual, most of these things get shoved under the rug. I had a feeling that he thought a bit too highly of himself especially after how he treated Rare and Retro Studios before Prime was a success, but I didn't know about the Croc or Star Fox 2 code stories at all.

DMA Design story though, must sting him sometimes at night.

Best wishes.

Wasn't Prime going through development hell and needed tight Japanese oversight to see its completion?

 

[DecoReturns]

Wasn't Retro a well-known disaster zone before Nintendo cleaned shop? It's been talked about in great detail already about how much of a mess they were and how close to the brink of complete destruction before NCL came in to personally handle their affairs.

I recall that Miyamoto also give Retro the task of doing Metroid Prime and supervise the game. I would think he would be prove of himself for that honestly.

 

[TheDinoman]

but Miyamoto continues to keep Star Fox on the lower rung when it could probably be their biggest franchise.

Star Fox could definitely be treated better but I don't really see it ever being their "biggest franchise". Mario, Pokemon and Zelda all have that on lock already.