Random: Is Miyamoto’s Most Famous Quote Not His After All?

“A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad.”

How many times have you heard this quote over the years? Twitter threads of people posting responses to game delays, or even using it as a response to people upset about delays. It’s reached a kind of god-like status, like uttering these words has the opposite effect of saying Beetlejuice in the mirror three times.

These words are often attributed to Shigeru Miyamoto, the father of Mario, Pikmin, Zelda, etc. – he’s pretty much the face of Nintendo. And the quote is often associated with the delay of Ocarina of Time. It’s been quoted time and time again in interviews – and he’s even discussed it with YouTuber TheJWittz – but do we have any proof that Miyamoto ever said it?

Javed Sterritt, filmmaker and owner of the YouTube channel Good Blood, has dared to ask what nobody has asked before: where is the original quote from?

This has caused a minor frenzy in the Twitter landscape – there are real gold coins at stake, after all! People have been supplying articles where it’s been quoted or paraphrased or interviews with Miyamoto himself where they discuss the quote. But many have fallen at the first hurdle, with no real source linked to the articles.

Another YouTuber, AllieMeowy, has dug up an article from shmuplations, where this quote may have been chopped up and requoted from since. And for about an hour, this seemed like the one true answer. Soon after, Sterritt uncovered that this was actually from a Famitsu interview from 2001 that got translated much more recently. However, the quote has been in regular circulation in English for a while (remember the pre-Twitter days?).

Then in comes Ethan Johnson, who runs the blog The History of How We Play. He supplied evidence that the quote may be a simple misquote. His first answer provides proof that these words were said more or less by Jason Schreiber, from GT Interactive, in June 1998 at a convention:

This answer has gained a lot of attention since, with Johnson going back to it a few times in the same thread to provide more context. It’s like a giant, tangled web of words and timelines!

Fortunately, Johnson has compiled all of his evidence in a handy little thread, in chronological order – with one further discovery since his original response. It might, actually, just be an old industry catchphrase:

There’s a lot to dig into here, including an interview with Miyamoto from 2001, which is probably where a lot of people formed the Ocarina of Time association. And, indeed, it’s a thing that can easily happen. Sid Meier of Civilization fame has also been misquoted – oddly enough from around the same time.

So, there you have it! Those famous words were unlikely to have been uttered by Miyamoto; instead, the phrase could just be an industry catchphrase that has been warped and repeated time and time again. If this is the case, we hope that Johnson enjoys his payment for a job well done!

Are you shaken by this discovery? Let us know in the comments!