Shameful Human of the Week: Kazunori Yamauchi

This week’s Shameful Human is Kazunori Yamauchi. He’s the guy who created the Gran Turismo series, and the designer of the (still) upcoming Gran Turismo 5.

Yamauchi’s apparent dedication, or perhaps obsession, with “perfection” has resulted in an ever-ballooning development period for GT5 that never seems to end. The game was revealed in 2006, but work had begun way back in 2004. Its original release date was going to be March 2010, but that was eventually pushed to early November, where it stayed until today. The game has now been delayed again, knocked back to an unspecified date “this holiday season.”

The official PlayStation Blog claims “creator Kazunori Yamauchi and the team at Polyphony Digital want to make certain they are creating the perfect racing experience,” but I must, of course, take serious issue with the use of the word “perfect” as it relates to anything Gran Turismo. Frankly, the games may very well represent the pinnacle of realistic driving recreated in video game form, but realism is often the opposite of fun when it comes to games.

Can you imagine if SimCity was about quibbling with the crotchety old residents living on the land you want to build a road over? Or if Mario was about clawing shit out of clogged toilets? Yamauchi’s obsession with recreating real-world tracks, cars, and physics is the racing genre equivalent. “Perfect” would be giving players something fun to do, not allowing them the chance to tediously steer around large ovals.

Source: PlayStation Blog
Image: Thankfully released into public domain by SpoonerTuner.