Many people were surprised by Masahiro Sakurai when he announced his Creating Games YouTube channel. Here was a master of the craft with decades of experience willing to impart his knowledge to the world. He promised that the videos would be concise and not get too complex, ensuring that you could watch one and then move on with your day. So far, apart from his intro video for the channel, Sakurai has made 16 videos covering a wide array of topics. Soon though, these topics required him to make a Community Post for the first time.
Why is that? While many of his videos could be seen as general game design tips and beliefs, a few could be seen as taking shots at certain developers. For example, his most recent video at the making of this article was on the topic of “Just Let Them Play!” In it, Masahiro Sakurai talked about how he believes gamers should be doing gameplay elements within the first three minutes of starting the game. He acknowledged in the video that genres like RPGs don’t do this because of opening cutscenes. But he also felt, in his opinion, that video games should get right to the gameplay so that players don’t get bored immediately.
Not surprisingly, after this video, many YouTube comments called out past video games and franchises that didn’t adhere to Sakurai’s thoughts. Thus, Sakurai posted in the Community tab and asked players to not slander other developers on his channel.
“I personally owe a lot to a great many games, and I’m working hard to make this channel a positive influence on the gaming community as a whole, so I’d appreciate your help in keeping this a positive space.”
That shouldn’t be too hard of a request, because Sakurai is making his YouTube channel a place where a lot of fun and discussion can be had. There’s no need for slander on it, especially since the rest of the internet still exists and you can find plenty of it there.
Another thing that needs to be noted here is that while it’s true that Sakurai is a legend, and has made many video games over his career, he’s still only one guy. One who has an opinion that he shares with you in his videos. Like all advice columns, these desire to take it or leave it pieces, meaning that you can fully take the advice or ignore it. His words are not gospel. They are his beliefs acquired over a long career. We can all name game designs that Sakurai called out yet are highly successful. Because in video games, there’s no one way to make everything, and Sakurai knows that.
Source: YouTube
