Yoshiaki Koizumi
小泉 歓晃
Koizumi atMontreal International Games Summit in 2007
Born	(1968-04-29)April 29, 1968 (age 57) Mishima,Shizuoka, Japan
Alma mater	Osaka University of Arts
Occupations	Video game designer, director and producer
Employer	Nintendo (1991–present)
Notable work	The Legend of Zelda Super Mario
Title	Manager atNintendo EAD (2008–2015) Representative Director at1-Up Studio (2013–2023) Deputy General Manager atNintendo EPD (2015–2023) Senior General Manager at Nintendo EPD (2023–present) Executive Officer atNintendo (2018–2020) Senior Executive Officer at Nintendo (2020–present)

Yoshiaki Koizumi (小泉 歓晃,Koizumi Yoshiaki; born April 29, 1968) is a Japanesevideo game designer, director,producer, and business executive. He is a senior executive officer atNintendo and a senior general manager atNintendo EPD, where he is known for his work within theirMario andThe Legend of Zelda series, and as the General Producer of theNintendo Switch. In 2009, he was chosen byIGN as one of the top 100 game creators of all time.^[1] Koizumi is also on the board of directors ofNintendo Pictures.

Koizumi was born inMishima, Shizuoka on April 29, 1968.^[2] He played his first video game,Super Mario Bros. 2,^[3] at the age of 21 when he borrowed a friend'sFamily Computer console.^[4] A graduate from the Visual Concept Planning Department ofOsaka University of Arts, Koizumi studiedfilm,drama,animation and, to a lesser extent,storyboarding.^[4][5] He had originally intended to become afilm director but applied atNintendo instead to pursue his goal of creating a kind of drama only experienced in video games. The company's close proximity to his university also played a role in his career choice.^[4]

After Koizumi had joined Nintendo in April 1991, he was assigned to work on the manual for theaction-adventure game,The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past for theSuper Nintendo Entertainment System, for which he did the art, layout and writing.^[2][4] In the process, he conceived the game's backstory and the designs of thethree goddesses and the star sign associated with them. For the sequel,The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, he was again tasked with designing the manual. However, since work on the game had just begun, Koizumi would end up creating its entire story and came up with plot ideas such as the island in a dream.^[4] He also worked on the event design for the interactions with the villagers, wrote the owl's and the Wind Fish's lines and designed the bosses' behavioral patterns.^[4][6][7] Koizumi later experimented with a polygonal, side-scrolling remake ofZelda II: The Adventure of Link. Developed for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, the prototype was based onchanbara action, a type of Japanese sword fighting.^[8] WithSuper Mario 64, Koizumi became assistant director and animated the 3D models, among others working on Mario's swimming movements in cooperation with directorShigeru Miyamoto.^[6][9]

While developingSuper Mario 64, Nintendo's employees devised rough concepts of a three-dimensionalThe Legend of Zelda game with a bigger focus on puzzles and less pronounced action elements.^[8][10] Koizumi wrote several notes on sword battles and combat with multiple opponents. When he joined Toru Osawa and Jin Ikeda, he was the third staff member to work on the game that would becomeThe Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Koizumi consulted his earlier notes and tried to inject leftover ideas fromSuper Mario 64 into this newZelda installment.^[8] On the lookout for inspiration onchanbara action, Osawa suggested a visit toToei Kyoto Studio Park, afilm studiotheme park. There, Osawa, Koizumi and Ikeda entered a playhouse where several ninjas and a main samurai were staging a show. Koizumi observed how only one of the ninjas would attack the main samurai at a time while the others remained in a waiting pattern, which proved to be the solution to designing battles with multiple opponents. Osawa noticed how a ninja using akusarigama weapon would move around the main samurai in circles and never lose track of his opponent. Both of these observations became the basis for the Z targeting system used inOcarina of Time.^[11] Koizumi replaced the simple triangle the team had implemented to mark the player's focus with a fairy that would change colors based on the friendly or hostile nature of the Z target.^[12] Furthermore, he was in charge of theplayer characterLink and designed other characters such as the horse Epona.^[13][14] He also worked on the 3D environments, the camera system, theitems and some of the event design, such as the scenes where the player overhears the conversations of other characters.^[4][15]

FollowingOcarina of Time, Koizumi was designing a "cops and robbers"-style board game that had the player catch a criminal over the course of a week in-game, or roughly equivalent to an hour in real time. However, he was pulled off the project and asked to help develop the sequel toOcarina of Time,The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask.^[16] Koizumi carried over his "cops and robbers" idea with the time limit and expanded it into a world threatened by a falling moon after he had daydreamed about such a scenario.^[16][17] The concept was corroborated by Miyamoto's wish to have a "compact"Zelda that could be played over and over again, and the ideas eventually evolved into a system with a three-daytime loop.^[16][18] Koizumi was again placed in charge of the game's player characters.^[16] He also wrote many of the scheduled events involving the villagers of Clock Town, for which he tried to depict the characters' lives as realistically as possible.^[6][16] Many of the serious elements inMajora's Mask came from Koizumi, which his coworkerEiji Aonuma countered by introducing more lighthearted portions in the areas he was in charge of.^[16]

In 2003, Koizumi switched to Nintendo's Tokyo Software Development Department and directed the 2D platformerDonkey Kong Jungle Beat.^[5][6][19] The game's side-scrolling nature sprang from Koizumi's attempt to overcome problems with complex camera controls in 3D titles. These efforts continued in his next title,Super Mario Galaxy. The game's spherical levels eliminated the possibility of the player getting lost or the need for adjusting the camera when reaching the end of a flat surface. Koizumi directedSuper Mario Galaxy and was heavily involved in the creation of its story, deciding on the inclusion of the optional fairytale book that tells the characters' backstory.^[4][6] Following this, he was promoted to producer and was manager of Tokyo Software Development Group No. 2 within the company'sEntertainment Analysis & Development Division.^[5] In September 2015, he became Deputy General Manager of the newly formedEntertainment Planning & Development Division.^[20] Koizumi also served as General Producer of Nintendo's 2017 video game console, theNintendo Switch.^[21] He alongside Shinya Takahashi also succeededSatoru Iwata as the host of theNintendo Direct video presentations since 2017,^[22] and has been doing so since the live streamed Nintendo Switch Presentation, which took place on January 12, 2017.^[23]

Koizumi was part of the board of directors of Nintendo's subsidiary1-UP Studio as one of its representative directors from 2013 to 2023.^[24] In October 2022, he joined the board of directors ofNintendo Pictures.^[25]

In 2023, Koizumi was promoted from Deputy General Manager to Senior General Manager atNintendo EPD division after almost 10 years in the position, below only Executive General Manager Shinya Takahashi who also was promoted at the same time.^[26]

Koizumi is a protégé ofShigeru Miyamoto and often draws his ideas from real-world influences such ashiking. When creating fictional worlds, he tries to surprise players with visually impressive environments and difficult gameplay mechanics while still ensuring "ease of use", that is effortless navigation and control. He said that most of his time on a video game is spent working onplayer characters and their abilities in order to strike a balance between "fun and complexity" in control. Koizumi mentioned tempo and rhythm as some of the most important elements of aMario game, whereas he gave anticipation of the awaiting challenges as a crucial factor in aZelda title.^[6] Unlike Miyamoto, Koizumi often tries to introduce story elements to the video games he works on. He trains his staff by hinting at the direction they should take rather than just giving them the solution to a problem.^[4]

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