Satoru Iwata Saves The World (Chapter One)
A downloadable game for Windows
"I like flying down with a parachute to where people seem lost."
Once upon a time, an eager programmer turned company president revolutionised the video games industry.
Satoru Iwata is widely regarded as one of the most influential figures in the history of video games. His gently guiding hand helped save HAL Laboratory from bankruptcy, and helped Nintendo to reach beyond the established young male gamer demographic to make video games amore inclusive and invisint medium for everyone. His personal contributions helped ensure the success of both the Nintendo Wii, Nintendo DS, and Nintendo Switch consoles, among others.
What's more, Iwata's friends and colleagues have told many stories of his triumphs as a programmer. How he was able to save Earthbound from a nightmarish development quandry. How broke down and memorised the code for the Balloon Fight arcade game so that he could recreate it for the NES. How he fixed coding issues within a variety of troubled Pokémon games.
Satoru Iwata Saves the World is an endeavour to tell the story of this legendary game developer, starting at the beginning.
In the game's first chapter, we learn of how Iwata began making his first few computer games, using nothing more than a pocket calculator, and how he experiences playing volleyball taught him the importance of teamwork and cooperation.
Researched from first hand accounts from those who knew Iwata well (not least himself), Satoru Iwata Saves the World - Chapter One aims to provide a better understanding of this origins of this iconic video game hero.
His story is presented as a low-stakes, relaxed 2D platformer - a game genre that he was influential in shaping, and which reflects the personal love of jumping that inspired him to join his high school volleyball team in the first place.
The first chapter, when finished, will take between six and ten minutes to complete, and will constitute one full level of the completed game.
Download
Install instructions
Hi! Just to let you know, this version of the game is a WIP draft that is still a little rough around the edges. The music isn't finished, there are no sound effects, and the menu system needs a coat of paint.
Also, the space bar breaks the game right now. Not in a bad way, it won't crash or anything, but it causes the action to pause weirdly. Try using X for jump, or reassign a jump control that works for you. There is gamepad support.
Also also, there are some performance issues. The game doesn't run great on some hardware, including the Steam Deck.
Please please please feed back any thoughts you have on the game, we're desperate to know what works well and what needs to be improved. We're especially desperate to know how well you feel the game approaches its subject matter, in particular, whether you feel the game is respectful. The last thing we want to do is offend anyone.
Thank you for playing!
Development log
- Psst! There's a Draft Demo Available NowJun 19, 2022
- Satoru Iwata's Hips Don't LieFeb 12, 2022
Comments
Log in with itch.io to leave a comment.
I enjoyed this little demo, I enjoyed the story that was told and overall had a pleasant time with it!
Now for some feedback:
I liked the physics of the game and the character movement felt good! I do wish the movement speed was a little faster and I think that the overall platforming aspect is a bit easy. The background and props went along with the story nicely and the color scheme wasn't bad although the outline of where the moving digits would go is a bit hard to see. Finally, I would like to know how Iwata ended up in the calculator space, but that's about all I have to say for feedback
Bugs:
When space is pressed it stops Iwata in place, if you hold space while on the ground Iwata just freezes, and if he's midair than he freezes in place
When the narration bubbles pop up, it'll sometime clip into the background.
That's about all I found!
Thanks very much for playing, and thank you so much for your feedback! I think you're right, the backgrounds need work to help make everything stand out a bit better, and the gameplay is a little overly simple. I'll definitely bear this in mind for the future, thank you!
No problem! I'm really looking forward to it, keep up the good work