Author Jennifer deWinter writes:
I am pleased as punch to announce my recently published book Shigeru Miyamoto: Super Mario Bros., Donkey Kong, The Legend of Zelda, now our with Bloomsbury Press.
This is the first book from the Influential Game Designer series (coming up are Brenda Laurel, Gary Gygax, Jane Jenson, Peter Molyneux). Bloomsbury has been an excellent publisher, helping us keep the price of this series down. This first book is available for USD 18.50 on Amazon, and the Kindle version is only $10.
The preview widget is available on Amazon<http://www.amazon.com/Shigeru-Miyamoto-Donkey-Influential-Designers/dp/1628923881/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&sr=8-1&qid=1432218656> and my Academia.edu<https://wpi.academia.edu/JenniferdeWinter> account.
Here are some of the publisher provided reviews:
The Influential Video Game Designers series aims at a gap in interdisciplinary games studies: the game-‘auteur.’ To date, video games are considered goods-produced in economics without authorship. However, a close look shows that the “object” of the video game comprises not only modes of production or economics, but also the perspective of a maker. In this sense, the first volume of the series, about the Japanese game designer Shigeru Miyamoto, is conceptually and theoretically the right decision: Miyamoto is a game designer who is rather unknown to public, but certainly popular and ever-present (at least to a general audience) with his games. To discuss the work, aesthetic preferences, and strategies of production of a man who could be addressed as one of the ‘father figures’ of game design is the right decision. The book itself is not only a must-have for everybody interested in gaming culture, game design or the Japanese gaming industry, but also a great way to remember when you wasted your free time (and your coins) by playing Super Mario Bros. or Donkey Kong. (Rolf Nohr, Professor of Media Aesthetics / Media Culture, The Braunschweig University of Art, Germany)
Historians of digital games have until now lacked a critical assessment of the game industry’s most famous and influential designer, Shigeru Miyamoto. This certainly held us back, but Jennifer deWinter has at last removed the problem with this balanced account of his achievements. The rest of us will have to get busy and build on her outstanding work. (Henry Lowood, History of Science & Technology Collections and Film & Media Collections, Stanford University Libraries, USA)
With this book Jennifer deWinter and Carly Kocurek have made an enormous contribution to the study of videogame history, design and aesthetics. This is not only due to the work’s novel focus upon a single designer, but also due to the forensic manner in which they unpack the complex relationship between Miyamoto’s oeuvre and the material conditions which influenced every design decision. Written in an engaging, concise style, this is more than just a book for academics: it is essential reading for any designer or fan of the medium. (Steven Conway, Lecturer in Games & Interactivity, Swinburne University of Technology, Australia)
Thank you for the support that this research community has given!
Jennifer deWinter, PhD
