Miyamoto Talks Shop with CNN's Talk Asia

Before the launch of the Wii, Nintendo mastermind Shigeru Miyamoto sat down with CNN's Talk Asia news show and spoke with host, Anjali Rao, about his long career in the games industry. Several months later, this interview has now been translated into English and posted on CNN's website. It's a really terrific interview and they discuss a variety of subjects including video game violence, women gamers, his childhood obsession with manga and one question everyone has been asking for a while; Why did they change the name from the very appropriate Revolution, to the much ridiculed (in the beginning) Wii.

Japanese people have a funny habit of abbreviating names. For instance if you have a "Family Computer," people call it "Famicom". We at Nintendo had thought of giving it a name that can not be abbreviated. It is a very short official name, and we wanted to add other words to create a new additional name. Such as "Wii Sports" "Wii Play" and so on. We debated how the Wii might be thought of in the English speaking countries. And we came to a conclusion that there is no other choice but to use this short, appealing name.

Of course, what Mr. Miyamoto and his associates didn't count on was the immaturity of some western minds that would eventually turn their "short official name" into an endless stream of penis jokes. That aside though, it certainly didn't take long for people to get over their initial reaction to the name and embrace what is an extremely innovative system.

As always in interviews, Mr. Miyamoto is relaxed, polite and extremely honest in his answers. At one point, the interviewer asks Mr. Miyamoto what he thinks of gamer's opinions, especially blogs, and his answer was one that I have to say I highly respect and agree with.

People generally have different views and opinions about anything. So I would only listen to whatever information is useful for me. It is interesting to hear what other people say. But instead of reading the blogs, I would rather stand behind a person playing the games and sense how the player is reacting to the game -- whether he is unhappy with the games, or if he is having fun. I can feel all of that directly. It is more useful for me to do that than to read what he thinks of it.

Blogs are, by nature, a collection of opinions and certainly don't mirror the thoughts and opinions of everyone who reads them. And for this reason I think Mr. Miyamoto is wise to stick to reactions he can gauge personally rather than ones he can only read about.

If you have some spare time today, be sure to check out this interview with one of the greatest minds in the history of gaming.

Shigeru Miyamoto Talk Asia Interview [CNN.com]