Legendary Star Fox and Zelda developer says "having a big, huge budget" doesn't guarantee you'll make a "great game," as the best ones "are down to the best ideas"

Nintendo veteran Takaya Imamura doesn’t think a game having a massive budget is a guarantee that it’ll actually be fantastic, as he believes “the best games” happen because of “the best ideas.”

Imamura, who left Nintendo in 2021 after over three decades at the company, is credited with some very notable games, from being the art director of The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask and Star Fox 64 to supervisor on a number of F-Zero titles. Now, he’s getting ready to release Omega 6 The Triangle Stars – a retro-style sci-fi adventure based on his own manga. Needless to say, he knows his stuff when it comes to game development, and talking to GamesRadar+ in a recent interview, he mentions how budgets for AAA titles in Japan are comparatively “a lot smaller” than they are in Europe and the United States.

“So compared to EU and the US, the budget for a so-called AAA game over here in comparison, is a lot smaller,” he explains. “The same for films as well.”

Some could consider this a limitation, but Imamura doesn’t believe that huge budgets necessarily go hand in hand with producing “great” games in the first place. “I don’t think that necessarily having a big, huge budget means that you can make a great game,” he continues.

“I really do think that games, the best games, are down to the best ideas, and I think Japanese game creators are able to work within those restraints as they were, but they can come to play, so to speak, with ideas that can trump the bigger budgets.”

He definitely has a point – even setting aside the differences in game budgets between different regions, it’s not exactly rare to see smaller indie projects be received more positively than pricey AAA releases. There’s a lot to be said about creativity, and it’s no wonder that an artist like Imamura values it so much.

Zelda and Star Fox legend Takaya Imamura would “love” to make a Star Wars game with The Witcher 3’s CD Projekt Red – and now I’m desperate to make it happen.

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