The purpose of this page is to aggregate quotes about Satoru Iwata. These quotes are arranged chronologically.

If you'd like to suggest a quote to be included on this page, feel free to email me: chad [dot] timblin [at] gmail

“One of the most overused words in the English language is ‘unique’. That’s what all of us want to be in some level or another. But very few of us truly are. Satoru Iwata is one who clearly was unique, in the fullest meaning of the word.

If you were to design the perfect person to lead a video game company, you’d want someone who understood electrical engineering, who understood software design, and who understood business. Not many can claim this broad kind of background. But Mr. Iwata did. And not only did he understand all of these areas, but he was accomplished in every one. If you’ve read the ‘Iwata Asks’ series, you know he could drill down into the particulars of both hardware and game design. No one could lose him in the details.

On his business résumé, there’s one number that stands out. Our dedicated gaming industry is no over 30 years old. In that time, only 5 platforms have achieved lifetime sales in excess of 100 million units worldwide. Of those 5, Mr. Iwata was directly involved with 3 of them. At HAL [Laboratory], he helped bring Kirby's Dream Land and other games to Game Boy. And then, as President of Nintendo, he oversaw the introduction of both Nintendo DS and Wii.

Beyond his résumé, I can add another signature point: the man was fearless. Remember how you felt when you first heard the name ‘Wii’? Or remember what was said when you found out about Nintendogs or Brain Age or ‘dual screen portable device’. You may have been puzzled. But he already knew. He had already heard the criticism internally. But he always championed an idea he truly believed in, and we all benefited. For Mr. Iwata, it was not enough to repeat the words of Nintendo’s mission, to ‘surprise and delight with the unexpected’. He lived those words. He was unique.

Finally, on a personal level, he was my boss, and he was my mentor, and he was my colleague. But most of all, he was my friend, and I’m a better person for it. And I think every gamer is better for having Mr. Iwata’s vision and talent help inspire and shape the passion we all share.

No matter what [was] going on in our lives or in the world, Mr. Iwata wanted Nintendo to be about putting smiles on people’s faces. Nintendo at its heart, is about making us feel younger than we are today. Mr. Iwata, I hope you’re smiling right now.”

– Reggie Fils-Aimé on December 3, 2015 at The Game Awards 2015

"Now you might be wondering why I’m up here introducing a tribute to Mr. Iwata. Why would Nintendo ask me? Well the simple reason is, because I, like many of you, am a huge Nintendo fanboy. As evidenced by my Christmas tree last year, which is chock full of Nintendo characters and complete with a Mario star on top … Yes, being a Nintendo fan helped, but most of all, my friendship, admiration, and respect for Mr. Iwata probably sealed the deal. I got to spend a good amount of time with Mr. Iwata over the years, and it’s an honor to be able to talk about what he meant to me and the industry, and share some of my memories and observations from our time together.

Now what surprised me when I first met Mr. Iwata, was that he was not a normal video game executive. He was a game maker, a game designer, a producer, and a true programmer, all in one. And when I asked him if he stopped programming when became President of HAL [Laboratory], he said that he still helped out when needed. Now in fact, he wrote code for Pokémon, Super Smash Bros., and Kirby. Now how great is that? The President of the company not only overseeing and providing management, but also contributing actual 6502 code. He was my hero. Mr. Iwata never gave up being a game maker either, even when he joined Nintendo as President in 2002. He shared that it was very important for him to stay hands on and be involved, and did so by chairing Nintendo’s Software Planning & Development or SPD.

Now one of the early games that Mr. Iwata championed within SPD was Brain Age for the Nintendo DS. Mr. Iwata had read Dr. Kawashima's ‘Train Your Brain’ book and wanted to bring his brain training to the upcoming DS platform. He wanted to change the path of the industry, and he didn’t want to just make games for core gamers. He wanted everyone to be a gamer and he knew that Brain Age would be the perfect title to bring in new gamers. Now Mr. Iwata had been trying to meet with Dr. Kawashima, but it seemed the good doctor was quite busy. Finally, Dr. Kawashima proposed a time to meet, and unfortunately, it happened to be the same day as the upcoming launch of the Nintendo DS. This was to be his first hardware launch since becoming President. However, Mr. Iwata’s game maker persistence did not let this stop him. He spent the day traveling … to meet with Dr. Kawashima. His gaming instincts knew that Brain Age would be the perfect title to kick off his broadening strategy, so that day he forged a partnership with Dr. Kawashima, rather than bask in the glory of his first hardware launch.

Now shortly after the launch of the Wii, I invited Mr. Iwata to the grand opening of EA’s newest studio in Vancouver. The Wii was flying off shelves, it was the must-have item of Christmas 2006, and it was sold out everywhere. Yet he was still gracious enough to come visit and spend time with our teams. And while his presentation could have easily focused on the runaway success that was the Wii, instead, he spoke about innovation and bringing gaming to the masses. He shared real pictures of people playing the Wii, except they were not the gamers we expected them to be. They were women, families, and senior citizens playing together and enjoying gaming, many for the very first time.

With the Wii, he had achieved his goal and delivered on his vision of bringing gaming to the masses and broadening the gaming population. And the Wii reminded us that gaming is all about delivering innovation and fun—something everyone enjoys. And more importantly, it taught us that everyone was a gamer. It was as if almost overnight the industry woke up and realized that the market was bigger than ever before, with many new segments of gamers who just a year before would have never been considered a gamer. The industry went from a couple hundred million gamers to billions thanks to Mr. Iwata’s Wii.

Now during my last trip to Kyoto, I got a chance to see Mr. Iwata’s office, and it helped me understand what he valued and placed in high importance. It wasn’t a grandiose office full of executive decor. Instead, it was chock full of hardware, game discs, and cartridges. It was jam-packed with development material. Stacks of games and piles of notes covered his work area. It was an office where games were made. It was the office of a game maker who also just happened to be the President of Nintendo.

Now that night, we had a private dinner where we talked about the games we loved, the many options facing gamers, and the amazing advancement of connected devices. But most of all, we just talked. Me, the Nintendo fanboy, and Mr. Iwata, the industry changing game maker.

Mr. Iwata left an indelible mark on the industry. He made the industry bigger and better for everyone—from game developers to gamers. His passion and dedication are deeply missed. But as game makers, let’s keep his spirit alive and remember what he showed us firsthand: that innovation and fun are the true gifts that we have to share. So please, make every game count.”

– John Schappert on February 18, 2016 at the 19th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards

"Just think about Mr. Iwata’s career. Direct involvement in titles as diverse as EarthBound and Kirby; Pokémon and Wii Sports. It’s a cliché to say that someone ‘did it all’, but he really did. He worked on games for every single game platform Nintendo ever created. Mr. Iwata [has] been gone for some time now, but I still think about him almost every day. And what occurs to me more and more, is how Mr. Iwata left his fingerprints on so many projects. And for that matter, how those impressions changed our entire industry.

EarthBound was one of the games he worked on early in his career. And one of the people working alongside him was [Shigesato] Itoi. So he knew Mr. Iwata from way back when. After Mr. Iwata’s death, I think Mr. Itoi may have best captured Mr. Iwata, the man, when he said, ‘Mr. Iwata, you always put yourself second.’ And that’s it. That’s who he was. Humble, self-effacing, and incredibly kind.

John [Schappert], I appreciated your Iwata anecdotes, and I thought maybe I could follow up with one of my own. It was a dinner we had in Kyoto, just the two of us, just after I had been promoted to President of [Nintendo of America]. Now, Mr. Iwata did not drink alcohol, but he knew I had a certain fondness for a good glass of red wine or a quality saké. So he arranged in advance to have a special saké prepared just for me. I found out later, the Japanese name is ‘Harusaki’, quite a delicacy. It’s prepared by taking the fin of a blowfish and steeping it in hot saké for about 10 minutes. He had the waiter present it with full formality, and I took a sip. Woah! … I worked for Mr. Iwata for over a decade, involving thousands of conversations and phone calls, meetings, emails, and I can tell you, that in all that time, I lied to him only once, and that was the time. Because I smiled and I told him I really liked it.

But the point, as Mr. Itoi said, is that he was putting me first. It didn’t matter that this wasn’t something that he wanted, it was something he thought I might want. And as we continued to talk that night, he created an even stronger impression. Because he told me how much he thought we were alike. What?! This is a man who grew up making great games, while I was just happy to be playing a great game. I’m like him?! And then he explained. He said that, when he came into Nintendo, even after having worked for them for years at HAL [Laboratory], he was supremely challenged. He was an outsider. He not only needed to understand how the company’s gears meshed, but he had to be the one personally to operate them. And he said [that] my background, with no video game employment, was similar. Even though I loved games, I had to learn about this wonderful industry, and more importantly, about Nintendo, on the fly. And I can say, that was the night when I felt we changed from being colleagues to being friends.

Everyone on Earth feels like an outsider at times; it’s an anxiety we all know. In fact, I imagine almost everyone who started work at Nintendo felt that way at first. But I also think that if you asked them, they’d say they soon became part of a very warm and close family. And it’s a family that Mr. Iwata guided wisely and considerately.

Let me conclude by saying this. Maybe there are some of you out there who had the opportunity to meet Mr. Iwata in person. But for most of you, probably not. So let me tell you what it would be like to meet him. He would greet you with a big smile. Always. And if he found out you were a game developer, the smile would get even bigger, and he’d ask you about the game you were working on. He’d want to know how it played, and how things were going. And if you’d try to ask him about his work, he’d briefly answer and then turn the conversation back to you. That’s how he was. As Mr. Itoi said, he always put himself second. In closing, there’s no other way to say this. Mr. Iwata, you were the best of us. You were never second to us. You’ll always be number one. Thank you.”

– Reggie Fils-Aimé on February 18, 2016 at the 19th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards

Segment from EP116 of the Kit & Krysta Podcast from May 2, 2024:

Listen to minute 15:41 to 35:41.

“Like so many, I was sad to learn of Satoru Iwata's passing in 2015.

Iwata's warmth of character, which became so well known over the years in press conferences and Nintendo Directs, truly came across when we met him for this interview and on other rare occasions.

Satoru Iwata was an inspiring and charming leader who will always be very fondly remembered.”

– Adam Doree in a May 19, 2024 YouTube video titled “Nintendo's Satoru Iwata: Lost Interview 20th Anniversary Remaster”

“When Mr. Iwata was [at Nintendo] he really was like the ‘all in one’ … last stop for every part of the business. It’s like ‘who’s gonna make a development decision?’ [and Iwata would say] ‘I can do it, or I’ll help you make it. Or if there’s some other business decision I can do it.’ That’s why he was a unicorn—he could do all this.”

– Kit Ellis in EP124 of the Kit & Krysta Podcast from June 27, 2024

Excerpt from Nintenbyte Podcast Ep. 12 from July 17, 2024:

Nathanial Rumphol-Janc (Nintendo Prime): “Iwata’s the one who decided [Nintendo was] going to be a personality forward company. Iwata very much put himself directly in front of fans. [He] created the damn Nintendo Direct and hosted it.
…
The saddest thing in my lifetime as a Nintendo fan was when Iwata passed away. Not just because it was cancer, which is a tough way to go. But [also] how sudden it was, how they thought they had beaten it the year prior, and he was 51—he was set to lead Nintendo for another 20 [or] 30 years
…
He was the hardest one to lose because it felt like we lost him way too soon.” (minute 2:51:47 to 2:53:13)

GameBird Classic: “His legacy is so bittersweet because the Switch is Iwata’s baby, and it’s amazing what the Switch has accomplished and become off the heels of … the lowest point Nintendo’s had to face. It’s sad that … he’s not around to see the success and see his vision.” (minute 2:53:19 to 2:53:46)

Excerpt from Toadstool Boardoom Episode 100 from July 31, 2024:

Logan Plant: "He's a legend. For my money, he's the fourth person of our Four Giants [of Nintendo History]."

Justin Koreis: "I think that the really special thing about Iwata is that he was the bridge … between Nintendo as a company and … the players. For a lot of time, people … were fans of Nintendo sort of conceptually, and the characters, and the things that they did, but it wasn’t really until he took over that the head of the company became the face of the company … and … players had this relationship with him in a way that just didn’t exist with Yamauchi.

And things like the Direct … it really is meant to be a direct conversation between Nintendo as a company and its fans and player-base. This is basically a theme that you see in his tenure as a leader there … He was the architect of bringing players, and Nintendo itself, together. I think the things that we see recently, [like theme parks and Nintendo Live], I honestly believe that those are his legacy, that we’re seeing that extend further and further.

And I think the fact that he was so charismatic and … so likable was a big part of why that was so successful, but I also think that it was really genuine … The gestures that you mentioned like … famously taking the pay cut and things like that. Things that you don’t have to do, and honestly … in the grand scheme of things, for companies of [Nintendo’s] size, that’s not the difference between them being able to make payroll or not. But as a gesture, as somebody who is putting themselves out there and on the line, I think that the power of that is really hard to overstate. Iwata’s a legend.”

Logan Plant: “Yeah, and there were times … in the Wii U era his approval rating from the shareholders was at like record lows, just because of what was happening to Nintendo. But they continued to stick with him. They did not change course [which] I think is a testament to everything he had built at that point … The Switch is absolutely … one of the final things he worked on, guaranteed. The Wii U was that half step there, and we wouldn’t have the Switch without him. And yeah, the Wii U was a misstep, but it was an important one.”

Justin Koreis: “I also love that he never stopped being … a game designer really at heart. And just the idea that there would be times [when] literally the President of the company would step in, and roll up his sleeves, and get in there, and start messing with the builds … to get them across the finish line or polish things up … It’s like the CEO jumping on the assembly line in the factory basically, and he was not shy about it. Honestly, he probably relished it. It seems so in keeping with … what we understand of his personality.”

Logan Plant: “Yeah, I think he’s somebody that held on to being as hands-on [in] development as long as he could, until some of the jobs and responsibilities of being President took over.”

…

Chris Shriver: “Having [a] boss that is willing to get into the weeds and has the experience to get into the weeds the way that he did … is so good for morale. And I think you see that throughout Nintendo during his era, and I think it’s why so many people probably stuck with him.”