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What to Make of Keita Takahashi?
Edge Online has a piece looking at the rise of Keita Takahashi, the creator of Katamari Damacy. From the article: "But just how do you accelerate from unknown newcomer, through cult hero, to toast of the establishment in the time it takes most developers to produce a single game? Back in 2003 Katamari Damacy was unknown, a demo disc given away at the Tokyo Game Show which was dismissed by many as a one-note wonder - a novelty game which no one would play for more than ten minutes. Then, some neat timing: just a fortnight after the game's release in Japan, and the early flurry of word-of-mouth from those whose interest had been piqued at TGS, Takahashi presented the game at GDC's experimental game workshop."
Really, he could be the saviour of the games industry or he could be a one hit wonder, he could be a nice guy or an asshole. It's all irrelevant - he produced a superb work of art and should be applauded for it. Everything else is just pointless punditry.
Look, Takahashi made his name by creating a cool, unique videogame like no one had ever seen before.
Therefore, in order for us to make cool, unique videogames, we need to copy absolutely everything about his game, except for a enough small parts to let us say, "hey, here's a *new* game." The job of videogame makers is to find out what is the smallest quantum of change needed to constitute a new game. For example, in Madden 2006, you'll notice the box has a "6" on the front, where Madden 2005 had a "5." This constitutes one quantum of change.
Duh.
Wikki wikki zip zip wikki zikki zikki wip wip, wizzzip!
...that he gave up creating games and went on to design childrens playgrounds in Japan. Was that just a rumor or something?