Nintendo's Sakamoto: True Collaboration Essential To Great Games

The 28-year Nintendo veteran and Metroid maestro believes that the key to successful collaboration lies in identifying the essential elements of your project and working toward them -- even if "unilateral, top-down control over every aspect of the project" would be "easier". In Japan, developers who work on established franchises usually have very little control over the games that they develop. This makes the recent iterations of the Metroid franchise -- at developers like Retro Studios and now Team Ninja, with the forthcoming Metroid: Other M for Wii -- very surprising. Speaking as part of Gamasutra's latest feature, The Elegance Of Metroid: Yoshio Sakamoto Speaks, he said "I'd have to say that, if you wanted to maintain some sort of unilateral, top-down control over every aspect of the project, that's probably easier to do in the long run, but that's not something that I've ever wanted." He added: "I don't feel like that's something that yields the best results." Sakamoto is the game's producer and a veteran of the series dating back to its first installment for the NES, originally released in 1986. "The best way to accomplish that, to find that sort of firmament that you can then put different arranged elements into, is to find the things that you can't budge on -- find the things that are essential, important, and you don't want to change," Sakamoto continued. "Once you've got that established, you can bring in all sorts of talented people and let them collaborate and contribute to what you have there." Sakamoto had kind words for the Metroid: Other M's director, Yosuke Hayashi, who works for Tecmo's Team Ninja and who first came into the public eye due to his work on Ninja Gaiden Sigma. Said Sakamoto, "When we first brought him on, I didn't just hand him a pile of documents and say, 'Here you go. Please make this game.'" "Rather, we talked about what was essential and what was good in the Metroid series and tried to figure out how best to use his arts background and know-how to really push those goals forward." He concluded: "One thing that I really appreciate about him is he can really say some unexpected things every once in awhile that seem to come out of left field, but, since I know that we have the same end-goal in mind, even if we occasionally disagree or are surprised by each other's means or routes of getting there, we know we're going to end up in a good place. It's the right kind of conflict, and our individuality comes out in the best way possible." The full interview, The Elegance Of Metroid: Yoshio Sakamoto Speaks, is now live on Gamasutra.