Keita Takahashi

NextGen’s Top Ten Years In Gaming History

  • Reading time:30 mins read

by [name redacted]

Originally published in some form by Next Generation. I was asked not to include 1999 or 2000, because the Dreamcast was perceived as a low mark in the industry rather than a high one. I was also asked to include the previous year, to suggest that we were in the middle of an upswing. So… that explains some of the selections.

In videogames, as in life, we tend to get things right about a third of the time. There’s one decent Sonic game for every two disasters; one out of every three consoles can be considered an unqualified success; the Game Boy remake of Mother 1 + 2 was released in one out of three major territories. With the same level of scientific accuracy, one can easily say that, out of the thirty years that videogames have acted as a consumer product, there are maybe ten really excellent milestones, spaced out by your 1984s and your 1994s – years maybe we were all better off doing something out-of-doors.

It kind of makes sense, intuitively: you’ve got the new-hardware years and the innovative-software years, spaced out by years of futzing around with the new hardware introduced a few months back, or copying that amazing new game that was released last summer. We grow enthusiastic, we get bored. Just as we’re about to write off videogames forever, we get slapped in the face with a Wii, or a Sega Genesis – and then the magic starts up all over again, allowing us to coast until the next checkpoint.

Spore: Pre-Production Through Prototyping

  • Reading time:2 mins read

by [name redacted]

Maxis Senior Development Director Eric Todd shifted foot to foot as Namco’s Keita Takahashi slowly gathered up his notes and folders, grin plastered to his face, slowed by the occasional autograph hunter. It seemed like every time Takahashi thought he was ready, he realized he had failed to retrieve something else. Eventually he cleared off the podium and exited stage left. Just as Eric Todd stepped forward, to belatedly start his lecture, Takahashi swooped by again to collect one last article before dashing to the hall doors, seeming suddenly preoccupied. Todd blinked at the audience and introduced himself.

“Prototyping”, Todd declared, “is the heart of a virtuous pre-production cycle”. He explained the premise of the lecture – that he would be discussing the value of experimental models before dedicating one’s self to any one approach to a software problem. He then explained that the following would be an “advanced” talk, that would assume you already knew what he was talking about – so he wouldn’t hold back in his explanations or references. Todd rattled off a list of books that the audience might do well reading, to better understand what he was about to say – none of which, it turned out, were altogether necessary.

( Continue reading at GamaSutra )

The Art of Selling Out

  • Reading time:3 mins read

by [name redacted]

Originally published by Next Generation.

Katamari Damacy ends with the player roaming the Earth, ripping up all of its nations and rolling them into a ball. Hard to follow up on that.

The sequel is, therefore, the exact same game as the first. It had to be, really; that’s how sequels work. You capitalize on the investment of the first game by recycling your work and cashing in on the good will the first game bought you. The curious detail is that this sequel knows what it is; it was made with knowledge of the first game, and of the success of that game – for without that success, there would have been no sequel. And more to the point, it was made knowing just what people expect in a sequel.