Rest Well, Master Iwata

I read the unfortunate news yesterday while on a day outing with my parents.

Mister Satoru Iwata, the CEO and president of Nintendo had passed away at the age of 55.
Normally, I wouldn't write about the passing of someone in my blog, but, as I thought about it more and more - and saw various tributes to him - I decided to do my own little thank you.

A bit of background. Mr Iwata was the fourth president of Nintendo, once a former programmer and (masterful) designer. There are many stories of him swooping in to save the day on various projects like Earthbound and Pokemon Gold and Silver. Perhaps the most interesting is how many have remarked that he led the company through its highest peaks and darkest valleys - the Wii and DS, and the Wii U and Gamecube respectively. He had a major hand in the company. Over the last few years, when the company faced its valleys, he chose to slash his salary rather than see a single employee get fired.

Regardless if I mentioned it before, but many of the games that influenced my writing style were Nintendo games. I don't mean older classics like Metroid of the original Legend of Zelda. I'm talking about more recent role playing adventure games like Tales of Symphonia, Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Pokemon, and the fighting game, Super Smash Brothers.

All of the adventure games were, when I was younger, very liberating to me. Tales of Symphonia had great characters, good humor, kick-butt action parts, great narrative twists, and, my favorite part, a HUGE open world with lots to discover.
It was all so dizzying to me as a child. Similar to when I played Legend of Mana (PS1) and faced the large number of plot lines, I now faced a large, open world filled with monsters, fear, and a boy playing god. To this day, I still adore that game as a close second favorite behind Legend of Mana. Zelda: The Wind Waker has a similar premise behind it, but the story wasn't super griping for me. It was mostly the wide open seas and the freedom! (Yarr!)

I never really thought about it much until today, but how different could that all be without Mr Iwata?
Similar to how I hold the song 'Storytime' as a major inspiration, I hold those Gamecube games near and dear.

Without trying to ramble much - and I think you get the point - I just want to extend my sympathies to the friends and family of Mr Iwata (despite that they may never read this.)

And... Thank you, Mr Iwata, for all your years of service to Nintendo. Thank you for all the memories.

Thank you for all the fun. :)