“A delayed game is eventually good. A bad game is bad forever.” Shigeru Miyamoto needs no introduction, and neither does the memorable quote that he is regularly associated with.
Seen as reflecting Nintendo’s pursuit of perfection, it places importance on allowing games the necessary time to complete development sufficiently rather than rushing the process in order to meet an overly ambitious release date.
His quote has resurfaced in recent interviews about Star Fox Zero, relating to the fact that Miyamoto chose to delay the Wii U exclusive to allow more time to hone the control scheme while polishing the level design and cut scenes.
“I didn’t mean to say a bad game is always bad, what I meant to say is if you release a game in a bad state you will always regret it,” Miyamoto explained when asked by TheJWittz.
Then, when speaking to That One Video Gamer in a later interview, he expanded on such thoughts: “People really like that quote! [laughs] I think I really meant to say was that when I make a game, and if I rush to get it out on time but it’s still not done the way that I want it to be and I put it out in a state that I’m not satisfied with, I’ll never be able to take it back and I will regret it for a very long time. I never had an intention of telling anybody that they’ve made a bad game, and that it will always be bad.”
Star Fox Zero will launch exclusively for Wii U in Japan on April 21st, and worldwide on April 22nd.
