That Time Miyamoto Wanted Goldeneye on N64 to End With Handshakes
At GameCity Festival in 2015, there was a discussion with the Nintendo 64 classic Goldeneye 007 director, Martin Hollis, and within that interview there was the exposure of what Shigeru Miyamoto and Nintendo wanted out of the game after seeing it first hand.
For those unfamiliar, Goldeneye 007 was one of the most groundbreaking first-person shooters for consoles and arguably one of the greatest games of the 1990s. The James Bond series has never been one known for its casual nature or peaceful outcomes, so of course Martin Hollis and the team at Rare wanted to make an authentic James Bond experience on the Nintendo 64, which would require a bit of violence and sexual innuendo.
During the GameCity Festival interview, Hollis admitted, “Bond is a violent franchise and making that fit with Nintendo, which is very much family-friendly, was a challenge. For a while we had some gore… beautifully rendered gore that would explode out. When I saw it the first time, I thought it was awesome. It was a fountain of blood, like that moment in The Shining when the lift doors open. Then I thought, ‘Hmm, this might be a bit too much red.’”
Towards the end of Goldeneye‘s development, Hollis and the team received a fax from the Super Mario creator himself, Shigeru Miyamoto. Miyamoto went on to share a list of suggestions for the game to make it a bit more friendly. “One point was that there was too much close-up killing – he found it a bit too horrible. I don’t think I did anything with that input. The second point was, he felt the game was too tragic, with all the killing. He suggested that it might be nice if, at the end of the game, you got to shake hands with all your enemies in the hospital.”
Goldeneye would have felt like an incredibly different game if it ended on such a peaceful note like this, but thankfully Hollis and the team at Rare did not let Miyamoto or Nintendo sway them too far away from their original vision. Hollis did, however, add a credit sequence to the end of the game that attempted to make the game feel more like a movie. “It was very filmic, and the key thing was, it underlined that this was artifice,” he explained. “The sequence told people that this was not real killing.”
Although this story is from over 5 years ago now, it is still a fascinating one to revisit. The Guardian’s initial report is stellar and covers even more details from the interview, including Hollis borrowing from Super Mario 64, Nintendo asking Hollis and Rare to make another Bond game, and how Hollis feels about Nintendo and its respect for creators.
Please do go read that full report if you have a moment. It is a reminder that Nintendo still has the same heart since they started making video games, and it is a reminder just how powerful and influential someone like Shigeru Miyamoto is to the industry.
It is a story from 25 years ago, told 5 years ago, and is being reminded today. Let’s hope we can revisit this one and smile again in the future.
Thank you for stopping by Nintendo Link for all of your Nintendo stories and reminders. What do you think of this Goldeneye 007 and Miyamoto insight? What do you think it communicates about the industry, Nintendo, and even how the game was developed? Let us know in the comments below! Happy gaming, everyone.
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