Geoff Keighley recently did a Q&A with Shigeru Miyamoto about the Nintendo visionary's take on things as eclectic as Halo, movies and exercise.

It's a short, though pretty interesting read. My favorite questions for Miyamoto have him talking about social messages in games, how he could have made Halo if he felt like it and why, gasp, Zelda isn't doing well in Japan.

Do you ever think about challenging yourself to design a game that addresses a real-world topic or carries a deeper social message? Maybe if I were to come across a problem in my life that affected me I would think about that. A game like that would be very interesting to make. At the Independent Games Festival at the last GDC [the Game Developer's Conference] I saw a game, Defcon, which is about thermonuclear war — the whole world is destroyed. That's a very powerful message to put in a game.

You mentioned social issues in Japan. But games are a global business — and the youth of America have a host of unique issues in front of them. The reason I mention this is that one criticism of Nintendo's games is that they are very Japanese-centric. American gamers have bought more copies of Halo than they did of Metroid, for instance. Do you ever worry that you're losing touch with what young American players might want to play?
I could make Halo. It's not that I couldn't design that game. It's just that I choose not to. One thing about my game design is that I never try to look for what people want and then try to make that game design. I always try to create new experiences that are fun to play.

Why do you think Zelda isn't doing well in Japan?
Well, I think a lot of people who bought the Wii are not necessarily the types of people who are interested in playing that kind of game. And a lot of the people who would want to play it [due to chronic shortages of the console] can't find a Wii! But mostly, I think it's that there are fewer and fewer people who are interested in playing a big role-playing game like Zelda.

Holy crap, did Shigeru Miyamoto just say that the number of people interested in playing Zelda is dropping? Hey, I think I said something like that back when the game first hit the Wii. I know I'm going to regret asking this, but has Zelda jumped the shark?

The Man Who Made Mario Super [Entertainment Weekly]

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