The gaming world is mourning the death of Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, a former programmer who was instrumental in bringing the Japanese giant back to mainstream relevance with the Wii and DS consoles in the mid-2000s.
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The president — who also served as the global public face of the company — had been absent from big gaming events like E3 since the discovery of a growth on his bile duct last year. While he explained these absences away to Nintendo fans, the company on Monday morning confirmed his death was related to the medical condition. Mr Iwata was 55.
After joining the entertainment company in the 1980s, Mr Iwata worked on iconic titles like Balloon Fight before becoming head of game studio HAL Laboratory, where he was instrumental in the rise of Kirby, now one of Nintendo's most popular characters.
In 2002 Mr Iwata became only the fourth president in Nintendo's 125 years as a company, and the first president outside the founding Yamauchi family.
This break in tradition led to a profound shift in the company culture, changing it from a deeply secretive business that had been struggling against rivals Sony and Microsoft into a more accessibility-focused company. Under Iwata, Nintendo solidified its iconic characters and began to work with other companies with the Nintendo Gamecube, before bringing gaming to the masses with Wii and Nintendo DS.
More recently Mr Iwata has found admiration among gamers for his open and irreverent public-facing endeavours. He hosted a series of behind-the-scenes interviews called "Iwata Asks" which shed light on the goings-on at Nintendo, and also brought news directly to fans in the company's frequent update videos.
Mr Iwata was currently leading Nintendo into new markets for the company, announcing a partnership that would see Nintendo products on smartphones, as well as a "new concept" in gaming that has yet to be unveiled.
Even given his limited English, he became revered outside Japan for his quirky humour, providing plenty of ammo for gif-makers by dressing up as a rabbit or enigmatically regarding a bunch of bananas to tease upcoming news.
Nintendo's statement names Genyo Takeda and Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto as representative directors of the company following Mr Iwata's death.
