When we first played Steel Diver at Nintendo's Discover 3DS event in Amsterdam, we were blown away with anticipation. It instantly rocketed to the top of our 3DS most wanted list, as what we saw, we thought, was an incredible teaser of things to come.
Except, it kind of never happened.
Instead, what we ended up with, was a full game that hadn't evolved all that much from the demo we played in Amsterdam. Disjointed, and with just seven levels, for an RRP of £40, the game simply asked far too much money for far too little - we gave the game a reasonable-but-somewhat-disappointing 6/10.
If only there was more to it
However, in the latest in Nintendo's interesting series of Iwata Asks, where Nintendo head honcho, Satoru Iwata discusses the latest Nintendo releases with their development team, it was revealed that Nintendo's star designer and creator of Mario and Zelda, Shigeru Miyamoto, specifically decided that the game didn't need any more levels.
Steel Diver first began life as a tech-demo for the DS at E3 in 2004, where it was used to show off how the handheld's touch screen controls could revolutionise how we play games. The game's development continued on the back burner, while Nintendo EAD went to work on Wii Fit, until the project eventually surfaced again as a DSiWare game (where, incidentally, it would have faired much better at the reduced price point). The development continued for the DSi, until just after the 3DS hardware had been finalised, when Miyamoto dropped on the team that he wanted them to develop for the new hardware.
In the roundtable discussion, Miyamoto says that he wanted the game to be a finely crafted experience, even at the expense of longevity:
"Making something concentrated requires a lot of work, like making something big and gorgeous. For example, making a single ring-even though it's small-is as hard as making the kind of fancy dress with lots of ornamentation that you might wear to a ball. So this time, we ruled out getting by with making lots of submarines or courses and instead focused on something limited that you could play again and again."
The game's director, Takaya Imamura, backed up Miyamoto's story: "Several times, I actually told Miyamoto-san and Sugiyama-san that we should add more stuff, but they said it wasn't necessary."
Unfortunately for Imamura-san, we disagree with his boss. While what's present in Steel Diver was fun, it's far too limited for a game that retails at £40 - the small number of levels, and lack of any real replay value are what led to the game only receiving a 6/10.
Still, the full interview's well worth reading over at Nintendo's official site - you can find it here.
