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Q&A with Kazutoshi Ueda, creator of Mr. Do!
“Ninja” Masuda (Left) and Kazutoshi Ueda (Right)
| He was actually told to design it “with Dig Dug in mind” by the President of Universal
“Ninja” Masuda: First of all, please tell me about the creation of Mr. Do!
Kazutoshi Ueda: Mr. Do! was the second game I created. In 1981, I debuted with Lady Bug, and showcased it at the AMOA Show in Chicago, Illinois. Four of our nine team members were there: President Okada, of the first trading bureau, Mr. Harada, who later became the programmer of Mr. Do!, Mr. Kubota, and myself. We already found out the news about Dig Dug by then, and, in the middle of our flight there, I remember President Okada telling me how he was feeling, “our next game really should be made with Dig Dug in mind.”
Ninja: Oh, I see, so that offhand comment really was what should’ve been done?
Ueda: Definitely (laughs). He said that to me since Namco games were huge hits back then. From there, the development of Mr. Do! began. The announcement of Mr. Do! was exactly one year since our last announcement. Our orders were also how I felt: “copy Dig Dug precisely,” and “create the game in reference to Dig Dug” to keep similar nuances. I replied, “I understand. I’ll think about that….”
Ninja: You had orders to copy Dig Dug at that point, but did you think about anything else?
Ueda: For my first work, Lady Bug, I thought I’d recruit the best candidates through the Asahi Shimbun. Apparently, that idea was just a revolving door.* Mr. Do! was only my second game in a time where it was also unusual to create with foreign games and the like in mind, so, in my head, I only created with thoughts about Japanese games and didn’t think much about the rest of the world. Right away, the first thing I wanted to do was create something that could be played.
*An idiom that refers to a cycle where employees only stay in positions for a short time.
| How the drill’s pump attack in Dig Dug became the Power Ball
Ueda: At that point, after I finished looking at the AMOA Show, I went home ahead of the President. Since the President returned a week after me, during that time, I thought about the game design of Dig Dug. In Dig Dug, you move your character around to dig holes while dropping rocks in the dirt to attack enemies, or you shoot a pump to attack. Of the two attacks, I knew I couldn’t change the rocks.
Ninja: So, from your point of view, incorporating your own arrangement of original components properly strengthened it.
Ueda: Right, so I thought about changing the drill’s pump attack. I quickly arrived at this thought. I wracked my brain about it first, but I was able to reference the game a lot at the time, too, so I thought about it myself to the best of my ability and a week passed very quickly. I went to the company restroom, and, outside the window, I saw a huge super ball caught in the gutter of the house next door. I thought, “That’s it!” Mr. Do! came about quickly after that. I have vivid memories of that proposal (laughs). That was on the President’s desk by the time he came back to the country.
Ninja: Oh! So that became the main attack in Mr. Do! By introducing the Power Ball, it gave the game a dramatically different detail.
Ueda: Like throwing a super ball, it would zig-zag through a dug-up route. With that route becoming an attack trail, I thought it created an extraordinary balance. The contents of our proposal were blank up to that point, so I proposed the idea right away.
Ninja: That super ball in the rain gutter outside the bathroom – it had to be fate.
Ueda: Without that, the game really might not have been made!
I love translation, writing, and talking about video games. MOTHER has been the series that's inspired me the most - from Itoi's writing to the MOTHER 3 fan translation. I research gaming translations and storytelling through games. I'm also making a game called GNOMONIC. I appreciate any constructive comments to help me improve.
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