The official translation for Nintendo's Q&A session during its latest financial briefing is now available online, holding some interesting, if not altogether surprising, tidbits of information regarding the company's plans for the next fiscal year.
Shigeru Miyamoto was of course in attendance, alongside Shuntaro Furukawa, Shinya Takahashi, Satoru Shibata, Ko Shiota, and Hajime Murakami, with the former offering up his thoughts on the upcoming Super Mario Bros. Movie and, more specifically, why he thinks audiences will respond well to it:
"For The Super Mario Bros. Movie, I have been working together with Mr. Chris Meledandri, the founder and CEO of Illumination, from the start, through seven years of planning and six years of production. During that time, we have thought a lot about the appeal of transforming games into films and about what audiences are looking for.
"With novels and comics, people have already enjoyed their stories, so I think movie adaptations guarantee a certain amount of enjoyment. But with video games, it is the gaming experience that makes them compelling, so a movie that adheres to the story of a game will not necessarily be interesting. Moreover, people who have played the game will expect a movie experience that is faithful to their memories of the game, while those who have never played the game will expect a movie that is enjoyable as an independent piece of entertainment.
"We spent a significant amount of time trying to figure out how to overcome these two challenges. While it is a bit presumptuous to say so myself, I think we managed to get it right, so I hope you will enjoy the movie."
While it's hardly surprising that one of the creative talents behind the movie thinks it's going to wind up being good, Miyamoto's reasoning is actually pretty sound. Video game adaptations in the past have frequently been guilty of simply retelling narratives that gamers are already familiar with, so it seems that the Super Mario Bros. Movie will be heading in a decidedly different direction.
Here's hoping it all works out!