Is Shigeru Miyamoto the Michael Jackson of the video game industry?
With Michael Jackson passing away this weekend and the non stop tributes on TV over the weekend I got to thinking about who the Michael Jackson of the video industry was. Ignoring the rumors of odd behavior and questions about in-proprietary with children, Michael Jackson was an artist who’s music reached a lot of people. There are millions of people out there who have fond memories tied to his music and/or music videos and while the video game industry isn’t as pervasive as the music industry is there are certainly game designers out there that will generate a significant amount of mourning when they pass on. The three big names I came up with were Nolan Bushnell, Will Wright, and Shigeru Miyamoto. All three had significant roles in the early development of the video game industry and all three have some name recognition outside the game industry. Bushnell makes the list for his work on the Atari 2600, one of the biggest mainstream consoles of all time and I think a lot of Gen-X folks
