Shigeru Miyamoto: "Customers are no longer just looking for specs"

The Switch is Nintendo's best-selling gaming device of all-time, with just over 155 million consoles sold, and there's still a possibility that it could surpass the PlayStation 2 to become the best-selling console in gaming history. Despite this, it wasn't without its critics at launch, as many felt it was far too underpowered.

However, buyers didn't seem to care, and the Switch had a lifespan of over eight years, which is significantly longer than consoles typically last. This raises the question of just how important graphics really are. In an interview with Famitsu (thanks to Nintendo Everything), Mario's creator, Shigeru Miyamoto, now shares his perspective on performance, and he believes it's no longer what gamers are looking for:

"First of all, I was happy that the Switch lasted for 8 to 9 years. I think that customers are no longer just looking for specs. I think the ideal is that 'if you buy the software, you can play it on the device you have at home.'"

Miyamoto then went on to compare the Switch to smartphones, explaining how the concept allows Nintendo to work faster and more cost-effectively, while offering something no one else has:

"Smartphones are 'everywhere,' aren't they? I think that's one ideal. But Nintendo has always been 'providing gameplay that only we can create,' including the interface, and compared to smartphones, it has the advantage of being able to respond quickly and having a high degree of freedom because it only requires one architecture and support for one piece of hardware.

"If you use a general-purpose device, you have to support all versions, so the amount of work increases. We still want to make a living with minimal effort, to live without working... that's half a joke, of course (laughs). But we believe that reducing the amount of work as much as possible is important for making development more efficient, so considering that, I think we've created a pretty good environment."

Given that the PlayStation 6 is rumoured to be powerful and Microsoft's upcoming Project Helix is said to be something truly extraordinary, the executives at each company are likely hoping that Miyamoto isn't right in what he says. What do you think? How important is console performance today?