Satoru Iwata
Satoru Iwata (Japanese: 岩田 聡, Hepburn: Iwata Satoru, December 6, 1959 – July 11, 2015) was a Japanese game programmer and businessman who served as the fourth president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Nintendo. He is widely regarded as a major contributor in broadening the appeal of video games to a wider audience by focusing on novel and entertaining games rather than top-of-the-line hardware.
Born in Sapporo, Japan, Iwata expressed interest in video games from an early age and created his first simple game while in high school. He later majored in computer science at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. In 1980, he joined the game developer HAL Laboratory while attending the university. During his early years at HAL Laboratory he worked as a programmer and closely collaborated with Nintendo, producing his first commercial game in 1983. Notable titles to which he contributed at HAL include EarthBound and the Kirby series. Following a downturn and near-bankruptcy, Iwata became the president of HAL Laboratory in 1993 at the insistence of Nintendo President Hiroshi Yamauchi and brought financial stability to the company. In the following years, he assisted in the development of the Pokémon and Super Smash Bros. series. Iwata joined Nintendo as the head of its corporate-planning division in 2000.
Famous quotes by Satoru Iwata:
A Thousand Years
You were right, you were bigger than me
I no longer see the sun, you have eclipsed it
When you left you reflected back the light
The glow of a million creatures with hope burning bright
I will wait for you a thousand years
You retrograde like planets slipping backwards
I will wait for you a thousand more
One thousand promises, one thousand last goodbyes
You were right, you were better than me
I've broken all my mirrors so you can't see what you've done to me
I am yours forevermore
I will wait for you a thousand years
A thousand promises, one thousand last goodbyes
I will wait for you a thousand more
You retrograde like planets slipping backwards, slipping backwards
You were right
You were right
You were right
You were right
I will wait for you a thousand years
You retrograde like planets slipping backwards
I will wait for you a thousand more
One thousand promises, one thousand last goodbyes
A thousand last goodbyes
You were right