Nintendo Europe President Says He Was Initially Too Shy To Do Nintendo Direct

Satoru Shibata, the president of Nintendo Europe, has confessed that he was initially a little too shy to appear in the European Nintendo Direct presentations. He also said that he was worried that the audience wouldn’t understand him due to his English skills. Shibata says that after Nintendo Direct presentations he always goes to websites to read the comments. Here’s what he had to say.

As some of you know, I had seldom appeared in public before starting Nintendo Direct (because I was too shy!) and in the beginning, I was quite hesitant about hosting Nintendo Direct for many reasons. To begin with, I was almost certain that no-one would recognise me when you saw me on screen, I was worried that you might not understand my English because of my awful accent (I still get laughed-at for my English pronunciation from time to time!) and I wasn’t sure if you would even be interested in watching a European Nintendo Direct in the first place.

I am always reading every single comment that you kindly post on various websites after each Nintendo Direct. I jump for joy when I read that someone is excited about an upcoming game that I announced. Conversely, I feel down when I read comments such as “I’m disappointed that there was no new information” or “The release date is too far ahead!” (which was the case last time…).