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Miyamoto ''grateful'' for Luigi's Mansion fans, working with Next Level Games
Even more from the GameSpot interview with Shigeru Miyamoto...
GameSpot: Going back to Luigi's Mansion, the franchise is one that has seen a dedicated following throughout the years. Why do you think that is?
Miyamoto: The first thing I want to say is I'm very grateful to everybody who feels that way. There are actually quite a number of Luigi supporters internally, as well. And in fact the reason that we were able to do the Year of Luigi this year is because there were so many people who wanted to work on Luigi titles and it just, by coincidence turned out all of the projects they were working on ended up releasing this year.
When you have a meal in front of you, and you have people who eat meat or you have people who eat vegetables, there's sort of the main dish and then you might have a dessert or a salad. Luigi is green, so maybe he's kind of like a salad and right now it seems like people tend to like lighter fare. [Luigi] is a little weaker and timid and maybe people like timid things these days. I guess Link's green, too [laughs].
On the other hand, I do think that the world of Luigi's Mansion and sort of the kind of "scary feel" to the mansions and whatnot is something that has a big contrast to the Mario games, which obviously are very bright and more action-focused. So having that nice story that wraps around the Luigi games is something that perhaps lingers with people a little bit longer and when they think back and remember it, they think 'Oh, I want to experience that again.'
GameSpot: Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon was a co-development between Next Level Games here in the West and Nintendo's studios in Japan. Can you talk about what that relationship was like, working across the world?
Miyamoto: The background for that is we've worked with Next Level Games for a number of years now and there's another producer internally at Nintendo who I've also worked with for a long time: Kensuke Tanabe. And he's been working with Next Level Games and has also worked on the Donkey Kong series. He was able to find Next Level Games and start working with them originally and help build that relationship that allowed us to work with them all these years.
GameSpot: Going back to Luigi's Mansion, the franchise is one that has seen a dedicated following throughout the years. Why do you think that is?
Miyamoto: The first thing I want to say is I'm very grateful to everybody who feels that way. There are actually quite a number of Luigi supporters internally, as well. And in fact the reason that we were able to do the Year of Luigi this year is because there were so many people who wanted to work on Luigi titles and it just, by coincidence turned out all of the projects they were working on ended up releasing this year.
When you have a meal in front of you, and you have people who eat meat or you have people who eat vegetables, there's sort of the main dish and then you might have a dessert or a salad. Luigi is green, so maybe he's kind of like a salad and right now it seems like people tend to like lighter fare. [Luigi] is a little weaker and timid and maybe people like timid things these days. I guess Link's green, too [laughs].
On the other hand, I do think that the world of Luigi's Mansion and sort of the kind of "scary feel" to the mansions and whatnot is something that has a big contrast to the Mario games, which obviously are very bright and more action-focused. So having that nice story that wraps around the Luigi games is something that perhaps lingers with people a little bit longer and when they think back and remember it, they think 'Oh, I want to experience that again.'
GameSpot: Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon was a co-development between Next Level Games here in the West and Nintendo's studios in Japan. Can you talk about what that relationship was like, working across the world?
Miyamoto: The background for that is we've worked with Next Level Games for a number of years now and there's another producer internally at Nintendo who I've also worked with for a long time: Kensuke Tanabe. And he's been working with Next Level Games and has also worked on the Donkey Kong series. He was able to find Next Level Games and start working with them originally and help build that relationship that allowed us to work with them all these years.