Not surprised at all that Miyamoto isn't aware of games other than his own. I think they keep him in a cave, in total darkness, where he designs games based off of his mushroom inspired "visions".

+1 skullivan

Thats impossible. Ratchet and Clank is popular in Japan. I know this. Just look at all the Ratchet and Clank Japanese commercials. There are SO MANY. Ok thats not a feasible explanation for why it's popular but I think the man is BSing when he says he hasn't heard of Ratchet and Clank.

Grapefruit Juice, I don't get it: what does that picture have to do with Japan?

WTF is Ratchet and Clank? Its is like a copy of Jak and Daxter?

Either it IS a lie...or He's too busy trying to get Luigi another starring role in another horrible game. 'Luigi's Gadget Paradise' sounds like a winner.

Ummm it's not a lie, the spherical worlds is an idea Nintendo had since back on that Mario 128 Gamecube demo, it says as much in the interview about SMG. And honestly I wouldn't expect a guy like that to play a lot of games, especially US developed ones. Most of the time he's probably too busy working.

I find it so laughable that you expect Miyamoto to be on top of his competitions games. Do any of you even work for corporations?

The higher up the management chain you go, the further from the pulse you are, particularly with developers. It's the programmers and grunts that probably spend the most time with other games. But Miyamoto manages multiple teams and probably spends more of his time in meetings talking about games than he does playing them.

And in all honesty, if he wasted time trying to keep up with his competition he takes the chance of taking focus away from genuine design. In my current work as a writer, there is only so much research I do in what people have done on a certain project for fear of them influencing me too much, even on a subconscious level. The trick is knowing what's out there but not being affected by it. I wouldn't be surprised at all if Miyamoto doesn't play very competitors games purely so he can focus on just making his games good.

I used to work for a video game company and I can tell you that after having been immersed in games for an average of 10 hours per day, the last thing I wanted to do when I got home was play more games. You realize at some point that there are more important things in life.

It was horribly arrogant of Naughty Dog to assume that Miyamoto directly used their mechanic. This made me laugh. I'm sure Galaxy implements it quite differently from R&C.

I got to play the demo of R&C for the first time today. I know a lot of you will disagree with me, but IMO Miyamoto isn't missing much.

@EternalDeathSlayer: So... What part of "I don't want to" did you not understand?

About the actual topic: Arguing who invented spherical worlds is fucking insane when you're sitting on one.

Now don't get me wrong I love Galaxy. I have to wonder though does Miyamoto really have much to do with game design anymore? I'm not saying it is true but I wouldn't be surprised if he is simply a recognizable face that Nintendo attaches to games.