Yoshiaki Koizumi: Difference between revisions

'''Yoshiaki Koizumi''' (born April 29th, 1968 in Japan) is the manager and producer of [[Nintendo EAD#Tokyo Development Group No. 2|Nintendo EAD's Tokyo Development Group No. 2]] (EAD Tokyo), overseeing the development of games in the ''Mario'' series. Before moving to EAD Tokyo<!-- in [date][source] -->, was involved with several ''Zelda'' games and co-directed ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time|Ocarina of Time]]'', ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask|Majora's Mask]]'', and ''[[The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker|The Wind Waker]]''. Several of the [[The Legend of Zelda (Series)|series']] iconic elements, such as [[Z-Targeting]], the [[Three-Day System]], and the [[Moon]], can be attributed in part to Koizumi.

[[Nintendo]] was close to his university, and gave him an opportunity to work for them after he graduated. At this time, he embraced video games as an interesting way to create unique dramas that couldn't be expressed as films.

Koizumi's first assignment at Nintendo was to put together the artwork and layout of the manual for ''[[The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past|A Link to the Past]]''. The drawing and writing involved in this project made it just the right fit for him. As he worked, the lack of any solid Zelda mythos became evident. Game elements had no meaning, and there was no peripheral story to create the feeling of a believable Zelda universe. Needing a backstory to put in the manual, Koizumi was responsible for creating many of the now traditional and well-known Zelda legends, including that of the [[Golden Goddesses]] and that of the [[Triforce]]. The Triforce had existed since the first game, but its origins were not explained until ''A Link to the Past'', and repeated in ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time|Ocarina of Time]]'' and ''[[The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess|Twilight Princess]]''.   

:''"Though [[Kensuke Tanabe|Tanabe]] is usually credited as being most directly responsible for Zelda's storyline during these early years, it was actually Koizumi, with his background in film and storyboarding and a desire to bring powerful drama to video games, who did much of the heavy lifting."''

::-Mike Damiani<ref>[http://www.gametrailers.com/users/MikeGT/gamepad/?action=viewblog&id=554326 GameTrailers]</ref>

One of these stories that Koizumi developed, likely in conjunction with Tanabe who was in charge of the game script, was the [[Imprisoning War]]. This particular story becomes arguably the most pivotal series of events in the entire [[Timeline|Zelda chronology]] as well as the basis of an entire game in whose development he would play a major role just five years later.  Unfortunately, the story was not written with future games in mind.  ''A Link to the Past'' being only the third Zelda game, [[Shigeru Miyamoto|Miyamoto]] and the rest of the [[Adventure of Link Staff|developers]] had not yet learned of the series' future success and the importance of leaving stories ambiguous enough that they can be expanded upon in future games.  Because of this, the Imprisoning War story faces a lot of inconsistencies and possible retcons as more stories are built around it. The positive outcome then is of course that theorists have the opportunity to come up with clever ways of making sense out of it.

#[http://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/ds/zelda/0/0 Iwata Asks: Spirit Tracks]

*http://www.gametrailers.com/users/MikeGT/gamepad/?action=viewblog&id=554326

*http://kyoto-report.blogspot.com/2010/11/nintendo-ead-tokyo-software-development.html

*http://www.n-sider.com/personnelview.php?personnelid=124