Sayonara, Satoru...

[JadePharaoh]

As I'm sure most of you are aware by now, Satoru Iwata, Nintendo's global president, passed away last weekend from cancer at the relatively young age of 55.


I can't remember the last time, if ever, I have felt so saddened - so heartbroken - by the death of a person I have never met. The entire gaming world is in mourning as well; even rival companies like Sony and Microsoft and their fans. This just shows what a profound impact Iwata has had on all of us. He wasn't just a game developer. He wasn't just an executive for Nintendo. He was one of us. His passion for gaming has brought us a great deal of games that we have enjoyed our entire lives. Starting off as an employee of HAL Laboratories, he worked on a number of games, most notably, Balloon Fight, the localization of Dragon Quest/Warrior 1, the Kirby games, EarthBound, the Pokemon and Super Smash Bros. games. His passion for the industry and selflessness is apparent as well. When development of Super Smash Bros. Melee was falling behind schedule and was going to miss its deadline, Iwata personally stepped in and worked long hours over the next several weeks to ensure it would make deadline. When the Wii U was selling poorly in the beginning of its lifespan and causing Nintendo to lose money, Iwata cut his own salary in half rather than lay off his employees. Execs that would do something like that in today's corporate world are very few and far between. Even on his Nintendo Directs, he speaks to us like an old friend rather than as the president of the company.

The news of his death last Monday came as a shock. I heard he was having some health issues, which was why he missed 2014's E3 event. When I saw him back on Nintendo Direct though, I thought he was okay again; I even noted then that he lost some weight. Now I wonder if that was the cancer's doing. I also think back to 2015's E3 last month, where Iwata, Reggie, and Shiggy did a series of sketches as muppets, rather than appearing in person. I now wonder if they did that in order to hide Iwata's failing health...

Speaking of last month's E3, there's something I can't let slide that just makes his death even more sad. On another thread here I talked about the fan-dumb reaction to it and this just adds a very bitter layer to that. After all he's done for the game industry and the fans, imagining him there on his deathbed reading the torrent of hate mail about how horrible their E3 was and how Federation Force wasn't the Metroid they wanted, only to reply with "Thank you for your feedback. We hear you and we are committed to continuing to meet your expectations.", is truly heartbreaking. I wonder how many of those people feel like colossal jerkasses right now. I've spoken before about a culture of entitlement among many fanbases; it's easy to forget that these creators/developers that they badmouth are people too. It shouldn't take the death of one of the greatest people in the industry to teach people to have a little empathy.

Enough of that, though. I'm not sure what plans Nintendo has now, or where they plan on going without Iwata. I have every faith in them to continue to strive forward, but it probably won't be overnight. He was one of the greatest in this industry, taken from us far too soon. Farewell, Iwata-san.

"On my business card, I am a corporate president. In my mind, I am a game developer. But in my heart, I am a gamer."

[Jason]

I to felt really sad to hear the news and to read about all that transpired in the few short months before his death.

While we never met the man personally, we knew him though the games he made. That, in some ways, made us very very close.

[MephistoZX]

I was actually very saddened as well, and I wasn't really sure why, as he wasn't the most prominent Nintendo creator/leader in its history. He was, however, very personable. In the Nintendo Directs, he was very friendly and presented a warm aura about the news he was presenting. He was the perfect embodiment for Nintendo.

Also, I will always love the man for personally saving Mother 2 (Earthbound). When it was stuck in development hell with the programming, he single-handedly reworked it with his abilities. From pocketgamer:

When APE and HAL were working on the sequel to Mother, the development team was running into all kinds of trouble. Iwata, then president of HAL, looked at the code and said "I don’t think you’re going to be able to finish if you go on like this".

"I can help you if you would like but there are two ways to proceed," said Iwata, recalling the story in 2013. "If we use what you have now and fix it, it will take two years. If we can start fresh, it’ll take half a year".

The boss took what the team had, toiled away for a month, and came back with clean, rewritten, working code that would power that cult classic, Earthbound.