After the excellent Thus spoke Iwata-san translated and published by us in April 2021 at the house of Mana Books, I still needed more. I needed to read, understand and learn more and more about Satoru Iwata, the late great boss of Nintendo who left us July 11, 2015. This is how I learned about the book. The Impact of Iwata written by Lucas M. Thomas, editor-in-chief and founder of the bimonthly magazine Nintendo Force. In his book, the author retraces through 16 chapters the entire life of Satoru Iwata, starting from his childhood until his tragic disappearance, not forgetting his time with Hal Laboratory nor his rise to Nintendo to the head of the company.
When I learned of the existence of this work which would apparently satisfy my desire to learn more about this very great man who was Satoru Iwata, I contacted the author of the book to find out if any translation of it into the language of Molière was on the program. For the moment, this is simply not planned and I had to set my sights on this work in its original language, in English therefore. I must therefore hammer it home, The Impact of Iwata is currently only available in English, whether in physical format or in ebook, if you do not read English you will have to pray that a translation arrives with us. Lucas M. Thomas still kindly sent me the ebook of his book so that I can offer you this review article today and I thank him warmly.
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The first contact with the book is through the cover and I must say that the author has made excellent choices in terms of illustrations. Satoru Iwata proudly sits at the center of the work by making his iconic pause “Directly to you”, that of Nintendo Direct from February 13, 2014.
This judicious choice in the illustrations is also found throughout the entire book since it takes the form of a gigantic premium magazine and not a simple book purely filled with texts and characters. This magazine aspect is in no way pejorative here, since we actually take great pleasure in chaining together the pages of this work as they are beautiful, clean, well worked and well filled. We enjoy browsing and devouring the book as its reading is made easier by all these images and layout effects – it is not for nothing that we all start reading with books filled with images – which prevents all tired of settling down. The images, often from video games and sometimes from moments in the life of Satoru Iwata photographed or illustrated, allow the context of the paragraphs, but also some clarification on the reading by providing visual support to better understand the text. We also find some captures of iconic moments from the conferences and Nintendo Direct of the company, including presentations of all the consoles released by the firm during the Satoru Iwata era.
I cannot say enough about the layout which made me want to devour the book as much as to stop on all the pages to see the photos, scrutinize the details and admire the illustrations created by various artists versed in the art of drawing and appropriating style Nintendo like Philip Summers, well known for his hand-drawn game guides. Each chapter is also introduced by a beautiful illustration announcing both the color and the theme to come. But I must also not forget to talk about the text itself. His reading is fluid, even in English, thanks to a clean style, without embellishments, which goes straight to the point and remains pleasant so that it never gets boring. Full of personal anecdotes, references and witticisms about Satoru Iwata, The Impact of Iwata knows how to tell the life of this great man – he even does it brilliantly – and will captivate you while reminding you of his good, even excellent memories.
From the creation of the Nintendo Wii to the rescue of Pokémon Silver and Pokémon Gold by the young CEO ofHal Laboratory who had only just taken office, Lucas M. Thomas's work is as exhaustive as it is fascinating. I also learned a good number of anecdotes and slices of life from this CEO which fascinates me so much, even though I am quite versed in the subject. I was able to understand a little better his friendship with Shigeru Miyamoto or even that with the neuroscientist Ryuta Kawashima. Indeed, I learned in particular thanks to the book that the day of the Japanese release of the Nintendo DS Satoru Iwata flew to meet the famous scientist and present the console to him with, in it, the outline of the Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training Program: How Old Is Your Brain? in order to secure its sales in the long term with a completely new title that would appeal to more casual players.
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This book salutes and honors the still living memory of CEO of Nintendo who would not have been able to know, although he orchestrated it behind the scenes, the insolent success of the Nintendo Switch. Thanks to his remarkable journalistic work and his effective writing, Lucas M. Thomas managed to revive in me the memory of a Satoru Iwata that only his own words in the book Thus spoke Iwata-san had been able to revive in me despite my almost quarterly viewings of Nintendo Direct of this beautiful era or video retrospectives on the web. Every July, I had a moving thought for the man who knew how to introduce me to Nintendo under another face, that of the company with boundless values and creativity, through its friendly face, its marketing strategies and its beautiful actions such as that of dividing its salary after the failure of the Nintendo Wii U. Next July 11 which will mark the 9th anniversary of his death will this time be even stronger for me thanks to this book which showed me that I am clearly not the only one to have been marked by Satoru Iwata and to what extent I was still unaware a lot about him. If I was clearly not mistaken about his person, about his talent as a developer and business manager or even about his humility and his human qualities, I had never approached his life from the angle chosen by the author . The angle of the influence that Satoru Iwata had on many of the video games that we cherish today, the influence that he may have had on the creation of our consoles of hearts and the influence that his legacy still endures today. The author gives us a book written with passion and admiration for the man who was a president on his business card, a game developer in his mind and a gamer in his heart.
This contagious passion for video games, its creation and the diffusion of this new art, which Satoru Iwata propagated in each of these meetings, these appearances and through his decisions is also found throughout the book with words written by other artists, writers, videographers or former employees of Nintendo such as Kit Ellisfamous for his participation in the creation of Nintendo Direct or as co-host of Nintendo Minutesor even André Segers of virtual media GameXplain. The list of guests in the pages of this book is quite long and, if most of the people lending their pens and their passions to this work are only known across the Atlantic, you should still know that their admiration for Satoru Iwata and his work is enormously felt through their words, like all of Lucas M. Thomas' work, thus testifying to the impact that Satoru's life and work have had and will always have Iwata. Because that’s what we’re talking about here, Iwata’s impact.
If you speak English, I highly recommend reading the book. The Impact of Iwata by Lucas M. Thomas which you can obtain by clicking here. If you do not speak English, join forces with mine to invoke a sacrosanct translation into the language of Molière which would allow this work to shine among us, little French speakers.