In a recent interview with sfgate.com, Nintendo game designer Shigeru Miyamoto discussed how his work has changed over the years, how he caters to both hardcore and casual gamers, and why he considers Wii Music to be his life's work.

(Go to the source for full interview)

Q: How do you balance the needs of hard-core gamers and all these new users?

A: We'll see the video game industry continue to provide games to both groups. But what we'll see that's different is there is an idea that there are individual products that can cater to both audiences, I would argue. Even now we're seeing that with a game like Wii Music. While there are so-called casual gamers who are enjoying the game very much, there are so-called core gamers who have become very big fans. What is very important for Nintendo is to continue to broaden the possibilities of all audiences.

Q: Your latest game, Wii Music, has been described as your life's work. What are the origins of the game and why is it so personal to you?

A: Typically in designing and developing games, I've found ... it's my own personal experience that gives birth to ideas of games. Wii Music has been a different process. I've been a fan of music for many years. For a long time, I've thought about an idea of creating a game about music but I've never been able to find the right idea to turn it into a game. But then we started developing on the Wii console, and we had a premise that it would be a central hub in the living room that everyone could relate to. For that to happen, we needed some key themes. One of those key themes was music, so in the development process, we started looking at ... what can we do with the Wii Remote that can allow us to create a music experience and we worked from there. In looking at the game after we completed it, I felt like, wow, all these years I've been thinking about creating a music video game and without realizing it, through the development process, we ended up creating the type of experience I was longing for all these years.

Q: How have you seen your career at Nintendo change over the years, from the early days of Mario to today with the latest games on the DS and the Wii? What of kind of personal maturation or evolution are you most proud of?

A: I have a much greater degree of freedom. In the past, I would develop a game and then finish it and the next question is always: What is the next game we would create? In recent years, I've really found that with this idea of applying the structure of video games in a variety of ways, I've found anything can be a video game, and I've found a greater degree creative freedom in what I want to do next and explore.

Miss Razz via sfgate.com »