Miyamoto on creating a better environment for games and gamers

Sometimes, game designers receive criticism when they attempt to do something new. Such appears to be the case with Nintendo’s Wii Fit and designer Shigeru Miyamoto.

Nevertheless, the designer has his priorities, criticism notwithstanding. Read more about them in the full article, right after the jump.

Would you say that games like Nintendo’s Wii Fit signals the doom of core gaming? Some think so, but Shigeru Miyamoto has a different perspective on things. For him, the important thing is to try and create a better environment for games, and ultimately for the players themselves.

According to Miyamoto, Nintendo isn’t abandoning the core gamers for the more casual market. The principle behind creating games like Wii Fit is to give everyone, core and casual gamer alike, the chance to experience something new.

Besides, Miyamoto acknowledged that Nintendo is still striving to make enhanced versions of the games that long-time fans have grown to enjoy. Case in point: the Legend of Zelda team is reforming to work on new games again.

The bottom line for Miyamoto is being able to take games in a new direction in order to make them enjoyable. To him, there is no hard and fast distinction between casual and core gaming. As he put it:

I think it’s easy to take an existing game or style, make it more fun, and sell it. But I think it’s better to think of new ideas, new styles of games that people aren’t expecting, and find a way to bring that to them. I don’t really look at it in [terms of casual versus hardcore] when we’re creating software.

As a designer, I’m always focusing on what is fun — ideas that people can enjoy. For me, I’m trying to entertain as many people as I can, creating games that the widest number of people can enjoy.