Iwata Asks is a series of interviews conducted by former Nintendo Global President Satoru Iwata with key creators behind the making of Nintendo games and hardware.





Iwata Asks - Mario Kart Wii

It Started With A Guy In Overalls

Iwata

Today, I would like to ask three individuals who were in charge of the development of Mario Kart Wii. Many Mario Kart games have been released over the years, and this will be the sixth game in the series. Super Mario Kart1, which was the first in the series, went on sale 16 years ago, back in 1992. At the time, even though I was so busy at HAL Laboratory with my work that I could barely go home, I remember on the day the game was released, I went to the store and purchased a copy, and then making time so I could play. Let’s begin with a self-introduction by Konno-san.

1. Super Mario Kart: The first game in the Mario Kart series. Released in North America on September of 1992 for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.

Konno

Hi, I’m Konno from the Entertainment Analysis and Development Division’s Software Development Department. I was worked as producer on Mario Kart Wii.

Iwata

Konno-san has been developing games since the days of the original NES, but this is his first time to appear in Iwata Asks.

Konno

I’m pretty nervous. (laughs)

Iwata

It’s hard to believe that you haven’t appeared here before. And then there’s Ashida-san. You appeared last time in the Wii hardware session of the Iwata Asks interviews.

Ashida

Right, I’m Ashida from the Product Development Department of the Integrated Research and Development Division. I was the project leader for the Wii WheelTM.

Iwata

Miyamoto-san is also here.

Miyamoto

Um…my name isn’t on the credits for this one, but is it all right if I join in?

All

(laughs)

Iwata

Aren’t you listed at the very top as General Producer?

Miyamoto

When I’m listed as General Producer, it usually means I hardly even opened my mouth to have a say on what went on during the development process. But this time I gave little inputs regarding new aspects of play such as the Wii Wheel and battles over the Nintendo Wi-Fi connection.

Konno

Your inputs sure didn’t sound like it was "little", though! (laughs)

Iwata

Konno-san, how long have you been involved with the Mario Kart series?

Konno

Ever since the first game. I worked on the three games for the Super NES, Nintendo 64 and Nintendo DS.

Iwata

So you didn’t work on the games for the Game Boy Advance and the Nintendo GameCube?

Konno

I was around to give advice, but for the most part was not involved in the actual development.

Iwata

What kind of a position did you hold during development of the first game?

Konno

I worked on it as director along with one other staff member.

Iwata

When the first game was released for the Super NES, it gave me quite an impact. Like I said earlier, even though I shouldn’t have been playing video games at that time, I ran out to buy one the day it came out! (laughs)

Konno

Thanks for buying one.

Miyamoto

During the early days of the NES, staff members within Nintendo associated HAL Laboratory with cutting-edge technology and thought of Nintendo as developing its products steadily but surely. But from around the time before we released the Super NES, a lot of brilliant programmers came in to Nintendo and we were able to make games like F-Zero2 on our own.

Iwata

At HAL Laboratory, we dropped everything to compete in the time trials when F-Zero came out, too. It may be because I was once in charge of developing "F1 Race" (a Formula 1 game) in HAL Laboratory, that I was attracted to these kinds of games.

2. F-Zero: A racing game set in the near future. Released in North America on August of 1991, simultaneously with the Super NES.

Miyamoto

Iwata-san, did you buy that game and Mario Kart on the release date to check the code? (laughs)

Iwata

(laughs)

Konno

Originally, the development of Super Mario Kart began with the idea of creating a two-player racing game in contrast to the single-person gameplay of F-Zero.

Miyamoto

Just so there’s no confusion, however, I should point out that we didn’t set out to create a two-player version of F-Zero. We set out to make a game where we could display the game screen for two players at the same time.

Konno

With more than one player, it would have been impossible to illustrate the high speeds of F-Zero.

Iwata

Why did you decide on using Mario?

Konno

Well, in the very first prototype, there was a guy in overalls sitting in the kart.

Iwata

Wait just a minute! I can’t let that slip by. Did you just say a guy in overalls?

Konno

Sounds like Mario, doesn’t it? It wasn’t like I forgot to put Mario’s beard on him or something, though… (laughs)

Miyamoto

For F-Zero the characters were seven heads tall, but for Super Mario Kart, we decided on three heads tall characters in order to suit the design of the karts.

Iwata

How long was it before Mario himself actually appeared in the karts?

Konno

It was about three to four months after we started development, when we had created a prototype involving two karts racing simultaneously.

Miyamoto

At first, no racing was involved. It was just two karts moving around freely. Then we noticed that it looked neat if you stopped one car and looked at the other car flying by. We decided to see what it would look like with Mario in one of the karts, and everyone thought that looked even better. Who knows, maybe the designer who drew the overalls on the earlier guy intended that it be changed to Mario all along! (laughs)

Konno

Back then, instead of a banana peel as an item, there were little oil cans. If you threw one out, the oil would spill, sending the karts spinning.

Iwata

How did you come to make the race and battle modes?

Konno

We had decided from the start that there would be races, but we thought that it would be good if the game served as a communication tool in which one-on-one battles were possible via some other kind of gameplay rather than simply competing for rank, and someone had the idea of popping each other’s balloons.

Iwata

Super Mario Kart was being played by people all over the world. When the time came to make a sequel for the Nintendo 64, what did you have in mind?

Konno

While we were working on Mario Kart 643, Miyamoto-san was busy next door working on Super Mario 644. Like their team, we were hoping to get our game ready for simultaneous release with the game console, but...

3. Mario Kart 64: The second game in the series. Released in North America on February 1997 for the Nintendo 64.
4. Super Mario 64: A 3-D action game released in North America on September 1996 simultaneously with the Nintendo 64 game console.

Iwata

But Miyamoto-san left you stranded because he was immersed in Super Mario 64?

Konno

Right! (laughs)

Iwata

Did he also take your staff and put them on the Mario 64 team?

Konno

He sure did! (laughs)

Miyamoto

Did I do that? (laughs)

Konno

So we enlisted support from other departments and continued development. The biggest difference from the Super NES game was the 3-D graphics. At the time, I didn’t know much about 3-D imaging, so I had a very hard time.

Iwata

The software design was incredibly practical, wasn’t it? The tracks are in 3-D, but the characters were drawn on boards...

Konno

To tell the truth, putting the characters in 3-D isn’t, strictly speaking, impossible, but it slows down the game, and eight characters won’t be able to race all at once. So we first drew images from various angles to be able to show the karts from various angles. Then we put them on boards so they could be animated.

Miyamoto

The method using the boards are technically known as billboarding. In Super Mario 64, there’s a black ball that appears. That, too, was drawn on a flat board, but no matter which angle you view it from, it always faces the player, so it looks like a sphere. The Bob-ombs and Wigglers were all drawn on these flat billboards. That’s why they look shinier compared to Mario, which was drawn in 3-D polygons.

Konno

Back in the days of the Nintendo 64, there were restrictions on the amount of available memory, so billboarding was a good idea to save more memory and be economical. (laughs)

Miyamoto

Necessity is the mother of invention. I love solving things like that. Because there wasn’t enough memory, thinking of an economical way to make the movements look right was like solving a puzzle, and I had a lot of fun.

Konno

The four-player battles in Mario Kart 64 were also made possible with billboarding.

Iwata

At the time, I was more envious of your creativity than admiring it. When the Nintendo 64 came out, Miyamoto-san said that even though the gaming world was heading towards online gaming, we should make games that could be played face-to-face with four of your friends before those days came, and the first four-player game, Mario Kart 64, was released.