The creator of Smash Bros. gives the key to a game that catches the player from the beginning

For Masahiro Sakurai, it is essential that the title captures the user’s attention during the first three minutes.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is one of the most popular titles in the Nintendo Switch catalog, but it is possible that the general public does not fully know its creator, Masahiro Sakura, also responsible for having directed other mythical sagas such as Kirby or Kid Icarus. The Japanese creative is an eminence in video game development, so those who are training are grateful that he has opened a YouTube channel where he talks about his experience and tries to help other creators.

In one of his videos published last week and that you have located at the top of this news, Sakurai himself offers new tips on video game design and insists that the first three minutes of the game are the key to any worksince this is when the user’s attention should be captured.

Think slow prologues are not suitableIn that time, the developer needs to be able to send the message to the user that what they’re going to play is fun or worth their time, and so they believe that “a game that starts at a slow pace often starts off on the wrong foot“. The creative rejects the prologues that go little by little, and gives Persona 5 Strikers as an example of good work, the Atlus title that initially takes us to a fairly advanced stage.

Another option to do this in the correct way is to take us to control other characters different from the protagonist, although he affirms that the essential thing is that the tutorial feels organic and is as camouflaged as possible. Furthermore, Sakurai believes that to present the game it is better to offer gameplay to resort to the typical trailers with cinematics, since what the user needs to know is what he can expect once he gets behind the controls.

All these are just recommendations from a Masahiro Sakurai who has extensive experience in the development and design of video games, so we recommend you take a look at his YouTube channel if you want to discover more videos in which reveals aspects learned in his journey in the industry. Likewise, at 3DJuegos we already told you about the promise that Sakurai made to Iwata on his day and that led us to have in Super Smash Bros. Ultimate one of the best tributes to the world of video games that the medium itself has given us.