Miyamoto: Skyward Sword Took Three Years To Develop
According to Zelda creator Shigeru Miyamoto, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword took three years to develop but has been in the planning stages for more than that.
Speaking in an interview in this week's issue of Japanese video games magazine Famitsu, Miyamoto said;
“I did say it was five years, but the first two of those were spent with assorted experimentation, so essentially it was three years. We went through kind of a long experimentation period, I suppose."
Even though the game took a while to finally be released (as the Wii is fading rather fast), Miyamoto does not feel that those year of planning and development were wasted.
“When you have a development period of five years, it’s often the case that around two of those years wind up being completely wasted effort. With this game, though, I think all the work that everyone put into this project gets fully seen in the final product,” he said.
Miyamoto did confirm that the development staff felt a need to take things slower with Skyward Sword as to not grow tired of the characters within.
“It’s occasionally the case during game development that the project doesn’t proceed along as planned or doesn’t turn out as fun as expected when you make it. This Zelda had some of those problems,” he admitted.
“We ran into this issue of people wondering who really wants to make a Zelda sequel – whether a sequel was necessary from the company standpoint, or whether it’s just me saying ‘Let’s do it.’ A game really gets its start when you have someone who says ‘I want to do something like this,’ but sometimes it’s born simply because it’s a series title or there’s more story to cover.”
Miyamoto then stated that he would much rather work on Nintendo's best titles rather than waste his time on something that might not pan out.
“For us games provide a structure for play, and if you’re making a sequel, you have to have that desire to improve, strengthen, and expand things right at the core of the project,” he said.
“To put it in an extreme way, the ideal for me is to build the play structure up to a certain point, then decide whether to make it Zelda or Mario. It’s like building up the engine and chassis, then deciding later what sort of car you want to use it on.”
The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is out this week in both Europe and the US exclusively for the Nintendo Wii.
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