Nintendo backed out of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics opening ceremony

MondoMega · Jul 28, 2021

Bumped an existing thread with this news, but a new thread is probably the better way to share it.

As many speculated last week, Nintendo content was planned to be included in the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games opening ceremony, but the company stepped away from the event within the last month before it was held.

台本11冊を入手　五輪開会式“崩壊”　全内幕　計1199ページにすべての変遷が | 週刊文春電子版

　演出責任者の相次ぐ交代など迷走を重ねた五輪開会式。今回入手した11冊にも及ぶ台本には、その過程が詳らかに記されていた。なぜ、どのようにして、開会式は“崩壊”していったのか。小誌だけが書ける全内幕―…

bunshun.jp

The article above discusses many changes made to the opening ceremony before the final performance, which includes the removal of Nintendo music from the athlete parade. Their absence was noticed by many, as while other Japanese video game developers like Square Enix, Bandai Namco, Capcom, Sega and Konami contributed music to the event, Nintendo was entirely absent. As recently as June 16th 'Main Theme' from The Legend of Zelda, 'Super Mario Suite', 'Kirby Super Star Medley' and 'Opening' from Pokemon were part of the ceremony, with the article stating that they were removed "just before the show". Nintendo declined to comment, saying "we are not in a position to answer".

Another cut segment of the opening ceremony that was being pitched in October last year would've featured Naomi Watanabe and Lady Gaga appearing from a warp pipe, wearing a Mario hat; replicating Shinzo Abe's appearance during the Rio 2016 closing ceremony, with what was supposed to be a comedic twist.

Considering around 80% of surveyed Japanese people were against the Olympics being held, the reason why companies like Nintendo would decide to bail and not be associated with the event isn't much of a mystery.

Martin · Jul 28, 2021

Personally I think it was a good decision.
Currently we are still in a pandemic and vaccination in Japan isn't really good right now.
Also cases exploded over there.

Jimmy Shedders · Jul 28, 2021

Lady Gaga for Smash Ultimate confirmed.

Igor · Jul 28, 2021

I would die to see Gaga emerging from the Warp pipe, and Watanabe performing with her? Amazing.

Then again good on Nintendo. Feel bad for the Olympians but overall these olympics have been nothing but a shit show.

oracion · Jul 28, 2021

There was also a surprise scene in which Lady Gaga, wearing a red hat, entered Mario's warp pipe and was replaced by Naomi Watanabe wearing the same outfit. However, perhaps it was just Sasaki's idea, and the Lady Gaga part was marked with a note saying, "If". On the other hand, the introduction of the game, which was supervised by Nintendo, was changed to a "comedy performance" by the pictogram team at that time.

The MIKIKO team was supervised by Nintendo, and Mr. Miyamoto, the president of the company, came to Tokyo every week from Kyoto, where the company's headquarters was located, to hold many meetings. However, after Mr. Sasaki took control of the game, he easily changed the introduction to pictograms. Nintendo must have had mixed feelings about this. In the end, all of Nintendo's music was removed just before the show.

Lampa · Jul 28, 2021

Martin said:
Personally I think it was a good decision.
Currently we are still in a pandemic and vaccination in Japan isn't really good right now.
Also cases exploded over there.

Not sure how Nintendo being part of the ceremony would impact cases one way or another, but at least we now know that they did back out.

NotLiquid · Jul 28, 2021

Naomi Gaga (Real)

shancake · Jul 28, 2021

Bit of a weird one for me. Obviously might be different in Japan but at least in the rest of the world I haven't seen any negative reactions to those games/publishers/composers that were featured.

Martin · Jul 28, 2021

Lampa said:
Not sure how Nintendo being part of the ceremony would impact cases one way or another, but at least we now know that they did back out.

Because they didn't support this event in those times.
Wish same happened with EuroCup with more companies getting out of it.

entremet · Jul 28, 2021

shancake said:
Bit of a weird one for me. Obviously might be different in Japan but at least in the rest of the world I haven't seen any negative reactions to those games/publishers/composers that were featured.

Nintendo cares about their perception in their home country a lot.

Soap · Jul 28, 2021

A smart move to pull out. It is deeply unpopular and Nintendo is the o my console manufacturer these days with a dominant position in Japan, so they had more to lose than to gain.

Piccoro · Jul 28, 2021

Good on Nintendo to pull out of that shitshow.

And I can't stop laughing at that first pic with Gaga crouching on the pipe.

Deleted member 64609 · Jul 28, 2021

No surprise there, public opinion around having the Olympics at all and the bigotry and corruption of JOC has been bad for months.

The final nails were probably the composer that made his classmate eat feces and the Holocaust joke comedian

shinken · Jul 28, 2021

shancake said:
Bit of a weird one for me. Obviously might be different in Japan but at least in the rest of the world I haven't seen any negative reactions to those games/publishers/composers that were featured.

Erm....a lot of Japanese people are against the Olympics being held. Japan is in a state of emergency, cases are rising etc.

Jonnax · Jul 28, 2021

shancake said:
Bit of a weird one for me. Obviously might be different in Japan but at least in the rest of the world I haven't seen any negative reactions to those games/publishers/composers that were featured.

Koichi Sugiyama - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

The dragon quest composer denies Japanese war crimes in China.
As well as how Japan forced Korean women into prostitution during their occupation.

Of course Square Enix keeps paying him, his music is in the Olympic ceremony and there's no backlash.

Leo · Jul 28, 2021

Good call by Nintendo. It's a shame we will never see the colab that was hinted in 2016, but that's on the Olympic committee for being irresponsible and not waiting to hold the even in a safer context.

TheDinoman · Jul 28, 2021

Jonnax said:
Of course Square Enix keeps paying him, his music is in the Olympic ceremony and there's no backlash.

To be fair, they kinda have to considering he owns the rights to Dragon Quest's music lol

Plum · Jul 28, 2021

This makes perfect sense, and I can't fault Nintendo in any way for deciding to bow out here, but it's still a shame nonetheless.

The opening ceremony could have been one for the ages but, despite their best efforts, it was very much hampered by the greedy, stupid decisions of a select few at the top. I'd love to go to the universe where COVID never happened and we got to see what they had originally planned but, alas, this pandemic has ruined so much :(

Dyle · Jul 28, 2021

Lady Gaga? Bayonetta 3? I want to believe

Le Dude · Jul 28, 2021

Seems like a fairly respectful decision considering the Japanese public was opposed to continuing with the games.

Spring-Loaded · Jul 28, 2021

Jimmy Shedders said:
Lady Gaga for Smash Ultimate confirmed.

what if Gaga is involved with Bayo 3

Chaos2Frozen · Jul 28, 2021

Did this even affect any of the companies that did took part?

Deleted member 10737 · Jul 28, 2021

good call.

Deleted member 44122 · Jul 28, 2021

Chaos2Frozen said:
Did this even affect any of the companies that did took part?

maybe, but probably not statistically relevant

Ghostsonplanets · Jul 28, 2021

Excellent decision from Nintendo part. This Olympic Games shouldn't even be happening, but as always profits come first.

L Thammy · Jul 28, 2021

I don't know if it's the right decision as a business or not, but I personally feel like it's the right move. The committee for these Olympics was a disaster.

Bonejack · Jul 28, 2021

L Thammy said:
I don't know if it's the right decision as a business or not, but I personally feel like it's the right move. The committee for these Olympics was a disaster.

Ultimately, if they thought dropping out of the Olympics would've been a worse business decision than supporting it further, they wouldn't have dropped out.

Strider_Blaze · Jul 28, 2021

A pretty good call. The Olympics Committee was in a lot of heat with their bigotry and the Olympics shouldn't have happened when the pandemic is still ongoing.

oneroom · Jul 28, 2021

This Olympics is a symbolic event for power and money. It's ugly.
Maybe it's a good thing that Nintendo is no longer involved as a result.
Too bad they had to waste Miyamoto valuable time on such an errand.

WillyFive · Jul 28, 2021

They should have been delayed again, it's insane that they still held them this year.

Wilf Netherton · Jul 28, 2021

A good decision by Nintendo, and a surprising one.

NekoNeko · Jul 28, 2021

They backed out of olympics everything not just the opening ceremony. The game gets zero promo.

RROCKMAN · Jul 28, 2021

Jonnax said:
Koichi Sugiyama - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

The dragon quest composer denies Japanese war crimes in China.
As well as how Japan forced Korean women into prostitution during their occupation.

Of course Square Enix keeps paying him, his music is in the Olympic ceremony and there's no backlash.

He actually has square by the balls here

And if someone wanted the DQ music they could just pay him since he owns the rights to it.

Tsuyu · Jul 28, 2021

Yes, this is a good call from Nintendo.

I'm also in the opinion it should be cancelled.

Croc Man · Jul 28, 2021

I get not having the visual elements but I think they could have left the music.
I can't imagine the companies that had their music used suffered a backlash, anybody know if I'm wrong about that?

Peru · Jul 28, 2021

The real tragedy is that MIKIKO had planned for Perfume to open the ceremony.. firing MIKIKO will haunt Japan forever. Shame on DENTSU

el jacko · Jul 28, 2021

Peru said:
The real tragedy is that MIKIKO had planned for Perfume to open the ceremony.. firing MIKIKO will haunt Japan forever. Shame on DENTSU

I haven't read too closely but I understand that the MIKIKO plan was crazy, cutting edge, and interesting. Is that right? But also, a bunch of fossils on the Dentsu executive board intervening to make something underwhelming while benefiting a corrupt business partner is par for the course here...

shoptroll · Jul 28, 2021

entremet said:
Nintendo cares about their perception in their home country a lot.

They care about their perception everywhere. They're very DIsney-esque in that way.

entremet · Jul 28, 2021

shoptroll said:
They care about their perception everywhere. They're very DIsney-esque in that way.

I don't disagree, just saying it's magnified at home.

shoptroll · Jul 28, 2021

entremet said:
I don't disagree, just saying it's magnified at home.

Yea, that's not surprising since they've pretty much got a monopoly going on over there.

MouldyK · Jul 28, 2021

el jacko said:
I haven't read too closely but I understand that the MIKIKO plan was crazy, cutting edge, and interesting. Is that right? But also, a bunch of fossils on the Dentsu executive board intervening to make something underwhelming while benefiting a corrupt business partner is par for the course here...

A bit here also:

Plans for the Original Tokyo 2020 Opening Ceremony Leak | ARAMA! JAPAN

As reported late last year, the Tokyo 2020 Olympics & Paralympics ceremonies committee was disbanded, and their work, which was 80% done as of February 2020, was scrapped. People wondered what the…

aramajapan.com

Bard · Jul 28, 2021

Jonnax said:
Koichi Sugiyama - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

The dragon quest composer denies Japanese war crimes in China.
As well as how Japan forced Korean women into prostitution during their occupation.

Of course Square Enix keeps paying him, his music is in the Olympic ceremony and there's no backlash.

You will never hear backlash from Japan in regards to that cunt Sugiyama. Dude has a lot of leverage over SE and unfortunately at this point the only thing to do regarding him is waiting for his old ass to die.

DarkSora · Jul 28, 2021

RROCKMAN said:
He actually has square by the balls here

And if someone wanted the DQ music they could just pay him since he owns the rights to it.

What I don't understand is can't Square just drop him and have another composer make a whole new soundtrack for dragon Quest games going forward?

Or would they rather keep paying him and be stuck with such a controversial figure.

Hercule · Jul 28, 2021

Wish the people in Japan cared a little less about the Olympics and a little more about getting a vaccine. It took my brother a long time to convince his Japanese wife. Her family however isn't that eager to get a vaccine either

Ghostsonplanets · Jul 28, 2021

DarkSora said:
What I don't understand is can't Square just drop him and have another composer make a whole new soundtrack for dragon Quest games going forward?

Or would they rather keep paying him and be stuck with such a controversial figure.

DQ Music and Sugiyama are highly regarded in Japan. DQ dropping him would be a very controversial move. I also think it's not up to them, as him, Akira Toriyama and Horii probably have the IP ownership alongside Square.

entrydenied · Jul 28, 2021

DarkSora said:
What I don't understand is can't Square just drop him and have another composer make a whole new soundtrack for dragon Quest games going forward?

Or would they rather keep paying him and be stuck with such a controversial figure.

Dragon Quest is a series that thrives on nostalgia and it is the National RPG for Japan. It would be like killing off 1/3 of the DQ spirit. It's probably not up to Square and decided by Horii. Japan also doesn't seem to have a problem with Sugiyama thus far so there's no internal force driving that change and Japan reminds to be DQ's biggest market. Getting rid of him means that they can't use the music for all their games, including ongoing ones like DQX and the many gatcha games they run. It means remakes, ports and spinoffs also lose their music.

KtSlime · Jul 28, 2021

DarkSora said:
What I don't understand is can't Square just drop him and have another composer make a whole new soundtrack for dragon Quest games going forward?

Or would they rather keep paying him and be stuck with such a controversial figure.

While Sugiyama is a terrible person with terrible ideas and uses some of his earnings on supporting groups with those terrible ideas, your average person does not see Sugiyama in that way. It's not that they agree or disagree with his ideas, most are simply are unaware he holds those views, instead when they see him they think about him being a great composer and enjoying his work.

His music is incredibly iconic, and while I know many here on Era hate his compositions, they are well used and instantly recognizable in Japan.
Sugiyama also owns all the jingles in DQ: save, resurrection, heal, climb stairs, etc. all of those are instantly recognizable too. Like it or not, his work is part of DQ, his ideas fortunately are completely separate and have no influence on the series at all.

Ghostsonplanets · Jul 28, 2021

Hercule said:
Wish the people in Japan cared a little less about the Olympics and a little more about getting a vaccine. It took my brother a long time to convince his Japanese wife. Her family however isn't that eager to get a vaccine either

The japanese people don't care about the Olympics at all. There a 80% rejection of the olympics there and protests were happening outside the opening ceremony. Japan governament is to blame for the vaccines fuck-up. In the olympics ceremony games music thread someone shared data showing that japanese people want to vaccinate themselves, but there's a lack of vaccination available.

manzoman96 · Jul 28, 2021

I can't blame them for that decision, but their presence was certainly missed. It's a real shame that things had to play out like this for Tokyo. Like others have mentioned before, this could've been one for the ages. Now it'll probably be a long time for them to get the opportunity to host again.

entrydenied · Jul 28, 2021

KtSlime said:
While Sugiyama is a terrible person with terrible ideas and uses some of his earnings on supporting groups with those terrible ideas, your average person does not see Sugiyama in that way. It's not that they agree or disagree with his ideas, most are simply are unaware he holds those views, instead when they see him they think about him being a great composer and enjoying his work.

His music is incredibly iconic, and while I know many here on Era hate his compositions, they are well used and instantly recognizable in Japan.
Sugiyama also owns all the jingles in DQ: save, resurrection, heal, climb stairs, etc. all of those are instantly recognizable too. Like it or not, his work is part of DQ, his ideas fortunately are completely separate and have no influence on the series at all.

Yup. Not to mention that his influence on music in Japan as well, since he started working in the industry a long time ago. DQ is like a small part of his career. A lot of composers view him as an inspiration.

I don't think they will get rid of him until he dies. I can only hope his estate doesn't continue to donate to those hateful causes.

Nintendo backed out of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics opening ceremony

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