With the amount of videogames out there featuring giant robot suits that kick the crap out of each other, you'd think that Gundam creator Yoshiyuki Tomino would appreciate the medium. Dismayingly, however, he actually hates videogames, thinks they're a waste of time and that they are, quite simply, evil.
"I think that video games are evil," he says in his CEDEC keynote. "[Gaming] is not a type of activity that provides any support to our daily lives, and all these consoles are just consuming electricity! Let's say we have about three billion people on this planet wasting their time, bringing no productivity at all. Add 10 billion more people, and what would happen to our planet? Video games are assisting the death of our planet!"
"The video game industry is now 30 years old. It is just the right time for the business' company structure and many other elements to become solid. But at the same time, it is also a point where there is uncertainty in its future. In order to overcome this uncertainty, it is important for experienced creators such as myself to talk about their experiences.
"You have to find the median -- that games are not evil, perhaps not necessarily good either, but something that can be considered a pastime. What would make people enjoy a game? How do you make them feel like it is not just a waste of time? ... Has there been anything better than Tetris since it first came out? How many years has it been? This is what I want to tell you: I want you to create a game that does not negatively affect our daily lives and is something that is considered more productive."
I find this man's statements particularly ironic, because I tried to watch Gundam once, and found it to be a most peurile, unproductive and ridiculous waste of time, myself. I'm hoping a lot of this was said with a tongue in cheek, because a man who works in anime stating that videogames are unproductive is hypocrisy of the highest order. Even if some of what he said was lighthearted, he's really in no position to cast judgement on the merits of other forms of entertainment.
Contest:
10:40 AM on 09.03.2009
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Gundam rots brains confirmed.
Maybe they don't particularly contribute to society in significant ways but neither does an anime whose followers spend all their time watching, and if not, then talking about the show (I've met a couple) rather than something that can at least have a social context to it.
Same goes for movies, television.
The dude did not think that one through.
I wouldn't say that Gundam is evil though, just not necessarily good.
Fair enough. Some video games do this, too.
Pilot is better than rest of team, Pilot is deemed sole hero compered to the waves of idiots in other robots, FIGHT!
And has a francise of toys, clothes and video games themselves, just called video games a waste of resources. I live in the UK, a place where everyone is really anal about recycling and saving the planet and you can't watch TV without seeing someone whine about it, yet even I don't think I can up and call a whole industry a waste of resources. What a dick!
@dmgi
That's only the really crazy ones and usually the rest of them try to place themselves as ar away as those "Japanimation!" loving freaks. They're the reason that I finally decided it was time to stop reading manga before I became one of them but please don't sink to is level and start sterotyping whole groups of people. We're better than that.
This is what the creator of Gundam makes when he strays from his one trick pony.
1) Simon Cowell
2) Another CSI spinoff
3) Bits of popcorn that get stuck in your teeth
4) A "Carrot Top" movie
5) Kellogg's Sugar Frosted Crack Flakes
6) A Judd Apatow movie without Seth Rogen
I'm gonna throw something for this statement at Tomino when I see at the upcoming NYAF!
Hey! Walk Hard kicked ass. Judd Apatow doesn't need that Jew to kick ass!
Obviously, the creator of Gundam is not telling anyone to stop producing entertainment. He's not even saying video games shouldn't exist. What he's doing is looking at a young media industry and saying "You can do better.". He's looking down on all the games that fail to speak to the human condition on any level. This is the exact same attitude he has towards animation, possibly towards all media, and the reason he created Gundam in the first place.
Any argument that starts with "What does he know, they've made tons of shit Gundam games and anime" doesn't confront his arguments (and if you're really going to think or say something like that, please grow up). Tomino doesn't own Gundam, and it's not at all his fault that, without his involvement, Bandai and Sunrise have transformed it into a soulless marketing juggernaut. This doesn't change the fact that his original Gundam was something beyond the typical cartoon show and really does give him the experience to say "Your silly toys can still be silly, but at the same time can be so much more."
Are you seriously going to argue that Tomino is not an accomplished creator? That he actually has no idea what he's talking about? Even if you don't like something (or everything) about the shows he's directed, the man has consistently tried to create a product that is above mindless entertainment. Also, "Well I thought Gundam was shite" is not a counter argument.
So come on people, stop being so blindly offended by his comments that you fail to see his argument. If you value games like Ico over Gears of War, you probably agree with him.
Is he? I didn't even know...does it matter? I guess....Maybe?
@relucatant playtpus
I take Ico over GoW but I still know that it was a really stupid statement.
Remember the movie "Titanic"? Now that was a waste of time.
Now I love anime, but c'mon Tomino-san, quit being a dick. Or is he upset more people play games then watch his show?
A is also a perpetrator of X
B is exonerated
whoops like you Tu Quoque'd, destructoid.
that's okay, it happens.
in brief: hypocrisy on his part doesn't make what he says wrong.
does anybody want to make a case for video games NOT consuming massive amount of power and contributing nothing constructive to society, or are we just playing the smacktard because we know he's right?
videogames are like beer, porno, and summer blockbusters we don't need to excuse them as culturally sound
but we also don't get to pretend they are if they're not
Mobile Suit Gundam, Zeta Gundam, Double Zeta, Victory Gundam, Gundam F91, Char's Counterattack, and Turn-A are the only series he has ever directed (which are arguably the most intellectual series of the entire franchises). So whatever "shit" series you watched, chances are that Tomino had no involvement in them. And as someone pointed earlier, he's not stating that video games shouldn't exist, but rather should improve.
And considering that he lives in Japan, which is swamped with date/sex/rape sims and cheesy JRPGs, I would bet that he is making these statements more towards the Japanese market.
But more importantly, there is more to what he said that was not posted:
"If finding answers to these questions were easy," continued Tomino, "then something better would have been out by now. Has there been anything better than Tetris since it first came out? How many years has it been? This is what I want to tell you: I want you to create a game that does not negatively affect our daily lives and is something that is considered more productive."
Why Jim omitted this part of it is dubious.
We get only so much space allowance on the front page.
You called G Gundam an atrocity and Victory Gundam good, your argument is officially jibberish no matter how legit it may actually be.
Gundam is serious business.
This is a completely nonsensical statement that has nothing to do with Tomino. It is completely unhelpful in every possible way and does nothing to further the article. Keep your childish bullshit out of here.
That said, the entire message isn't him calling videogames blatantly evil. He's saying that games are still at their basest levels, where a game is nothing more than a time waster, hence why nothing has been better than Tetris. When Tomino first wrote his UC Gundam series, they had a point, that being a realistic take on how people would be treated when the colonization of space took place and how a war over Earth and Space would happen. It created the entire Real Robot genre. He wrote his series to have an actual point, something videogames have yet to be able to say about themselves.
And so yes, what he's talking about is completely valid.