Oh noes!!! They say the name of the competition...
Let's see… It was about seventeen or eighteen years ago, I think. At the time, there were a lot of 3D graphic games in America. Back then, the Super Famicom (Super NES) system was synonymous with games in Japan.
The era before the PlayStation system made its appearance.
Right. I saw these 3D games from overseas, and they looked incredibly interesting. So I said, "In the future, people will be able to play 3D games in Japan the way they're doing overseas, so take me off the current development projects and let me research 3D on my own."
You were sure that the future lay in this direction.
I was. So I started researching 3D by myself. Then, before long, the PlayStation system came out. Finally, there was an environment in which I could make 3D software, and I became the director of the project team. After that, I left the company and formed LEVEL-5; the members of the team who had worked with me became its nucleus.
http://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interview.html#/creators/0/0
