Miyamoto hoped to "destroy" his past

Nintendo talisman Shigeru Miyamoto has admitted that at one time he intended to try and "destroy" the game genres that he had helped create.

Speaking in a lengthy, fascinating interview with The New Yorker, the Mario creator explained how he watched on with admiration as his favourite manga artists created a brand new genre from nothing and then later completely subverted it.

"When they became much older, they started to destroy the style they themselves had created," he explained.

"When I started working for the company, I thought that someday I would like to do the same. I wanted to destroy the styles that we ourselves created.

"I don't think we can do so completely, but I think that in the way that we are making video games today we might be getting closer to my idea of destroying the original style.

"Because we ourselves have created the original format or style of video games," he continued, "we understand why we had to do it at the time. Because we understand that, we can also understand why some of them must be kept intact and why some of them we can destroy."

Once famously banned from talking about his current hobbies by Nintendo top brass out of fear competitors might steal his game ideas, Miyamoto also shed a little light on what currently floats his boat outside of the office.

"I like changing the interiors of the house, or sometimes even the exterior of the house. Sometimes I'm called the Sunday carpenter," he revealed.

"Even at midnight or at some early hour in the morning, I will change the location of the sofa in the living room. That's me. Something tells me that by changing it my life is going to be more enjoyable. At least it's going to give me some fresh feeling."

Elsewhere in the piece, Miyamoto offers insight into perfectly balancing difficulty in his games, why he's not interested in photorealism and who he most admires in the games industry. Have a read.