Miyamoto on Swimming, 3DS, Cats and New Characters

Pikmin and Nintendogs seem to be getting Miyamoto's attention at present. (Picture from the Mario Galaxy 2 Iwata Asks column.)

Nintendo has posted a full transcript of the Q&A session from its recent shareholder meeting, allowing us to get a more accurate account of just what Shigeru Miyamoto said about swimming, 3DS, Pikmin, and his upcoming projects.

CEO Satoru Iwata fielded most of the questions at the event, but Miyamoto took the mic for a question directly relating to new games that he might be working on.

Miyamoto replied that he's busy with a number of things, including getting the 3DS ready. This leaves him little time for relaxed thought, but at the same time being told "time is up" is when ideas really start popping up in his head. "I get more ideas when I'm busy," said Miyamoto, "and with that meaning, this is an extremely good condition now."

He mentioned just two specific projects, Pikmin and Nintendogs + Cats.

Regarding Pikmin, he said "Amongst the present promises, I have to finish Pikmin quickly, so production is progressing extremely well."

Regarding Nintendogs + Cats, Miyamoto broke off into a conversion about his interests and the possibility of new announcements for next year. Said Miyamoto, "For Nintendogs, which we announced at E3, cats will appear this time. Recently, I've been taking care of cats. I'm often asked about my interests, but the CEO has told me to if possible not speak about this as the theme of my next game would be known externally. About one year back, I started talking about cats, and right according to schedule, it was announced. We'll soon be completing Nintendogs + Cats, which features cats.

"Also, I'm still full of energy. Recently, I've been doing a lot of things -- continuing to work hard at swimming, for instance, and also having exchanges with school kids, doing such things a serving on a neighborhood youth guidance committee. I think that next year I can probably deliver something new. I'm still active on the development scene, so please look forward to [my output]. It's been nearly 10 years since I made the Pikmin character, so I feel this is the year where I must at long last make a new character. This is as far as I'll answer today."

Different from the original report you might have read here earlier, it's not so clear if we should take "swimming" and "guidance counselor" to be Miyamoto's hobbies at the same level of cats and gardening. In other words, maybe we won't get a "Nintenyouth + Swimming" (curses!). But it does look like we can look forward to Pikmin sooner than expected, as well as a long-awaited new character from Miyamoto.