Miyamoto gets it right

In an interview with Wired's Chris Kohler, Shigeru Miyamoto has a lot to say about Nintendo's upcoming projects. The conversation drifted to video games' place in the public consciousness, and I think what Miyamoto had to say was wise:

Up until now, the biggest question in society about video games has been what to do about violent games. But it's almost like society in general considers video games to be something of a nuisance, that they want to toss into the garbage can. And so really what we feel is that rather than answering the question of what to do about violence in video games, we can, through the games that we create, once again make video games a topic of popular discussion and popular culture, then gradually you're going to see society come to understand video games better and understand what they're all about. At that point, once that understanding is there, people will become able to address their concerns about violent video games from a position of understanding rather than a position of being on the outside looking in.

And so I think that Nintendo's role in that is not to answer the question of what to do about violence in video games, but to expand the overall market in an effort to expand people's understanding of video games.

People who don't play games don't interpret them as anything but loud noises. I'm not fully on board with everything Nintendo's done on the Wii so far, but if developers want to stop feeling like concerned parents are out to get them, maybe the solution is just to make better games.