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Miyamoto: Mario Galaxy was "conservative"

And there was "something missing" from Twilight Princess, says Miyamoto
Shigeru Miyamoto has said that the Wii editions of Nintendo's two biggest mascots, Super Mario Galaxy and Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, were good but not quite the games he wanted them to be.

"What I've been saying to our development teams recently is that Twilight Princess was not a bad game, by any means. But, still, it felt like there was something missing," admitted Miyamoto. Even though we, along with the rest of the world, absolutely loved it. We knows what he means though.

Miyamoto went on: "And while, personally, I feel like Super Mario Galaxy was able to do some things that were very new and were very unique, at the same time, from another perspective, certain elements of it do feel somewhat conservative in terms of how far we branched out with design. And so this is something I've been talking to both of those teams about."

Sounds like Miyamoto's been up-ending some desks.

"Of course," he went on to tell MTV, "as is customary with Nintendo, it's very rare that we are able to announce any games until they're ready for release, but I can say that these are themes that both of those teams are taking into account and the hope is that for both of those franchises, when we do release the next installments of the Zelda [franchise] or maybe the next Galaxy, hopefully they will feel newer and fresher than their most recent versions."

We thought Galaxy was incredible, too. Still playing it, in fact, as the other character (no spoilers here, in case you haven't played it).

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Posted by Mogs
Not played Zelda. Mario was a very solidly made game and good for what it is, but it's not really my kind of thing & I got bored with it after a while.
Posted by duffhead1010
I agree with him there.
I don't think they packed the same punch as their N64 brothers and I still prefer them, even now.
Release Majora's mask on VC damnit!
Posted by kimoak
I see what he means. I was a little underwhelmed by both games. They are still great mind, just I felt that they could have done a little more.
Posted by a3HeadedMonkey
Galaxy was fantastic. The only thing it could have used was more power to give it even more scope & even prettier visuals.

The only thing missing from Zelda however is Miyamoto himself. That guy needs to be lead director. Eiji Aonuma just doesn't cut it imo.
Posted by ginsin
I absolutely loved Twilight Princess. But I hear what he's saying, there was just that little something missing from it.
Posted by Wozzakl
Vastly overrated, as well as conservative.
Posted by mfnick
I found both TP & Galaxy underwhelming. Still better than Sunshine & Wind Waker though.

But the N64 ones rule.
Posted by Dajmin
He's already gone on record saying that a lot of stuff planned for Galaxy either didn't work or was too confusing/ambitious.

I think they tried to keep the control simple, and that limited what they could do with the engine. It's still a great platformer though.

Twilight Princess was one of the first games I got for my Wii and while it was alright, it didn't suck me into the story. As a result I never ever bothered finishing it. But then I'm pretty tired of the standard Zelda-by-numbers formula these days.
Posted by roger4000
i'm re playing zelda as we speak and it's amazing. the only thing that lets it down are the fuzzy graphics even in 420
Posted by svensk101
I think Galaxy was amazing, certainly one of the best games this gen, but the purple coin levels were a bit shit in my opinion. More of a chore than anything else.

TP is still one of the best adventures I've played but I agree it needed fresher ideas. I am just praying that new ideas according to Miyamoto don't equate to minigames, swinging the remote around like a fool and a general dumbing-down to make it more 'accessible.'
Posted by mfnick
Probably done to keep the casual crowd happy.
Posted by PMIKE5
I think he's being too harsh on the great games and too lenient on the casual games. Why do we never hear these sort of stories for Cooking Mama or Pokémon Ranch?

The truth of the matter is that Nintendo didn't advertise Mario Galaxy as well as it should have. As for Zelda, well, everyone else was too busy saying it looked last gen to actually realise that it was a beautiful game. True Ganon appearing in it seemed totally random and Vant's fight was terrible, but so much of the game was gold.
Posted by RumbleThunder
I think Zelda: TP got a lot of undeserved stick to be honest. I'm playing through it again (I'm not quite sure why) and it's really nice. A lot of solid gameplay. The dungeons are good as well.

Oh, and I really don't think that Super Mario Galaxy was overrated. At all. Especially when you compare it to some of the more recent big budget games.
Posted by _Marty_
I sort of agree with Twilight Princess. Great though it was, it lacked the spark that OoT had - and still has. However, I wonder how much of it was down to the delay, and them shoe-horning Wii controls into it...

Super Mario Galaxy, on the other hand, was awesome. He should be proud. So much better than Sunshine, it makes it look like a shit mobile phone game.
Posted by seancuk23
Mario and Zelda for the were brilliant, but Zelda was defiantly an add on to Ocarina of Time, Miyamoto's interview bodes well for the future of both these franchises!
Posted by Spoon-man
The next Galaxy? Well, that just about confirms Super Mario Universe. Thank you Miyamoto!
Posted by Biggwedge
They are both amazing games, and if Mario Galaxy was conservative, it bodes well for the next one on Nintendo's next console.

Twilight Princess was a Gamecube game, and there are very few games from the last generation that could match it on both a technical and artistic level. The only thing missing was the fact that TP wasn't groundbreaking like Zelda games usually are, it was fan service and a bloody good one too.

Enough with the Mario Sunshine hate, it was the joint highest rated platformer last gen for a reason.
Posted by _Marty_
That reason was hype.
Just the same way Halo 3, MGS4 and GTAIV scored 10s too.
Posted by Biggwedge
I disagree, Mario Sunshine was never proclaimed to be perfect despite having obvious flaws like GTAIV for example.

It was just a damn good game, and some people just couldn't handle that it wasn't Mario 64 reborn.
Posted by _Marty_
Perhaps - but it was a first party Nintendo game, featuring their iconic mascot - it was ALWAYS going to be looked at well...


...And it was always going to compared to Mario 64 too.
And I agree, Sunshine was a good game (not sure I'd say 'damn good' mind), but I just don't think it can hold a candle to either 64 or Galaxy, nor is it especially fun to revisit now the years have passed. Mario 64 still is, and I strongly suspect Galaxy will be too.
Sunshine, in my eyes, was an 85% game.
As was Wind Waker, IMO.
Posted by randomhero2
I think zelda needs to be taken back to basics and rebuilt for the wii with a decent storyline (maybe showing how hyrule was washed away in the first place).

all mario needs is more to do with maybe a real reason for you to want to care about saving the princess
Posted by mfnick
Mario Sunshine is one of Nintendos worst ever core games IMO.

The camera was awful, the controls were fiddly, Fludd was an annoying little thing, the hub area was boring, the missions were boring, it only had a handful of levels, bosses were repeated & some areas were just incredibly frustrating.

Galaxy was a great return to form.
Posted by _Marty_
Didn't they do some Kirby game on the cube too? That was f**king abysmal too.
Posted by mfnick
I think you mean Airride. Yep, that was abysmal.

The GC seemed to play host to most of Nintendos worst games. Not including its casual stuff on Wii & DS obviously.

Im not a huge fan of the Wii as anyone will tell you, but I believe its already superior to the GC.
Posted by _Marty_
»
Yup, air ride. Knew it was some kind of racing game - but wasn't sure enough to put it in print and get ridiculed for being wrong :)

And I agree about the Wii/GameCube. Though I thinkt he GC had the best pad of last generation BY FAR.
The Xbox pad was laughable.
Posted by WHERESMYMONKEY
did anybody here actually bother playing wind waker?

its explained in it why everything got washed away.

It was the kings wish to have the currupt world taken. thus everything got flooded.l
Posted by mfnick
I dont care why, they could have easily come up with a different story & had it mostly on land. It was boring sailing everywhere, the stealth sections were awful & dont even get me started on that fetch quest. Apart from that it was a good game.
Posted by svensk101
:lol: Have to say that is the most accurate summing up of Wind Waker I have ever read. The graphics were the best thing about it. And re Sunshine, if people didn't know it was a Mario game then they wouldn't make excuses for it. I still think its overrated now and not a patch on 64 or Galaxy. The only Mario game I never completed.
Posted by milky_joe
TP and Galaxy were both really, really good, near enough brilliant for me. In fact I actually completed them both, which I didn't do with WW and Sunshine...

But there was definitely something that could have been added to both which would have taken them to an even higher level of quality.
Posted by kimoak
This is where I differ from most of you guys. I actually really enjoyed Sunshine and WW. WW was strange at first what with the sailing around, but I started to really like that way it was. Not entirely sure why.

As for Sunshine. I didn't have any problems with it at all. The Island environment really appealled to me. I think it was because I played it in the summer and the game has a very summery feel to it. Just a feel-good game. Mario Galaxy, I have completed it, but I have not gone through the last galaxy in it yet. I'll go back to it sometime, but once I finished it (I maticulously got all the shine sprites at the beginning) I put it away and have not played it since.

I guess it is something in each of the games that struck a certain chord in me. We can't all be the same :)
Posted by The Sandbag
mario galaxy and twilight princess were some of the best games ever made. galaxy especially, as it made the platforming genre evolve. twilight princess, even though it was really an update of ocarina of time, was still excellent. i agree with both games that there was something missing. twilight princess was the lack of originality, as the series had not evolved. mario galaxy, however, i do not know. there was definitely something missing that was not missing in mario games in the past
Posted by UltraVioletZero
Absolutely loved Galaxy. I got all the stars as both characters and even now I want to boot up my Wii and play it again. It firmly sits alongside Super Mario 64, Super Mario Bros 3 and Super Mario World. I've been trying to decide how I'd rank the four of them, but in the end they're all awesome.

Twilight Princess on the other hand disappointed me a lot. I think the Wii controls killed it. Too many awkwardly placed buttons on the Wiimote. And that horrible immersion shattering message about pointing the Wiimote at the screen every time I took out the bow. I honestly wish I had played it on the Cube.
Posted by Balladeer
They're both great games, but ironically I far prefered TP's OoT fan-service to SMG's incredibly linear structure.

But that's enough of that. Don't give me excuses, Miyamoto. Give me results! (slaps him)
Posted by Vampyre
I think Miyamoto is being a little harsh. The problem with TP was that it didn't do anything any better than Ocarina nearly 20 years before.

Galaxy on the other hand bettered Mario 64 in nearly every way (IMO). I'd say it's the greatest platform game ever released and that's seriously saying something with the awesomeness of Mario 64.
Posted by Tonyb
Totally agree on the "Mario Sunshine" comment, for me it was a fantastic "platformer" with massive replay value but was wrongly, critically compared to what was a pioneering prequel in SM64!
Posted by erp
Holy shit some people are never satisfied. :shock:

Both these games were incredible. Galaxy in particular was easily one of my favourite games from the past few generations.
Posted by cjw101
:shock: Ocarina only came out in 1998... :?
Posted by Wozzakl
Sunshine's warp levels (the pure platform sections without the jetpack) are far superior to the entire Galaxy game.
Posted by Dinalfos
Galaxy was a great game, but yeah, it was a bit conservative. It's good to see some self-reflection.
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