Shigeru Miyamoto Is Retiring... From His Current Position [UPDATE]

This was a day I didn't see coming for another few years: the godfather of Nintendo, Shigeru Miyamoto, says he is stepping down from his position at the company to work on smaller projects.  Speaking in an interview with Wired.com, Miyamoto, who will turn 60 next year, said that he wants to step away from five year development cycles and focus on projects that take a significantly smaller amount of time to develop.

"What I really want to do is be in the forefront of game development once again myself," he said.  Miyamoto went on to say that he intends to start a new project sometime in 2012 with the goal of being able to show it off the same year.  Miyamoto reportedly spent the last year telling his staff that he was retiring to get them prepared for when he actually leaves the company.

So, yea, while he won't be at the forefront of gaming or in the same position of influence that he's had at Nintendo for the past two decades he will still be working there, albeit on smaller projects.  Still, I didn't expect him to start scaling back his work for another few years as I figured that he'd want to see the Wii U launch through before even considering doing so.

 UPDATE

It seems that Nintendo investors panicked under the mere thought of Mr. Miyamoto retiring, causing shares of the company to drop two percent overnight.  Nintendo released a statement this morning DENYING Miyamoto's change in position, saying that "he will continue to be a driving force in Nintendo's development efforts."

Whether this means that Wired misquoted him or there's a bunch of miscommunication at Nintendo is uncertain but one thing looks quite clear to me: it might just be for the best if he actually DID step down to help younger developers build their games and reputations such that they could be the next wave of names to carry the company on for another couple decades.