Smash Bros. Ultimate is complete, so please, developers, take a break

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I said what I said, Sakurai. Do not look at me like this. Screenshot: Nintendo

It’s confirmed: the same big-shoe hero, Kingdom Hearts Sora, is the 82nd and final fighter to complete the overflowing roster of Super Smash Bros. Ultimates. Wow, this is that. Now only one thing remains: it’s time for game creator and director Masahiro Sakurai to take a damn break.

It’s no secret that Sakurai-san works himself to the bone. He has written a weekly column on Famitsu for at least 18 years. He has been the main brain of Super Smash Bros. since the series’ introduction in 1999. He was even diagnosed with calcific tendonitis in his right shoulder in October 2012, during the development of Smash Ultimates, a condition he told the director and producer by Tekken Katsuhiro Harada was caused by his work schedule. (In an August 2021 episode of Haradas Bar, Sakurai-san said she’s fine now.)

And throughout all of this, Sakurai-san also had a hand in the direction of many other Nintendo games, including 2002’s Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land and 2012’s Kid Icarus: Uprising. Which is to say, he’s probably very tired. I mean, I would be if I had been directing video games for 30 years now.

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With all the influence he has, being such a recognizable name not only in Japanese game development, but in game development in a big way, his imperative Sakurai-san takes off a weight. However, he comes in, reportedly does all his work and handles other tasks because he said he’s faster this way.

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I do not agree.

This is overwork. Whether it’s manual work or not, work is work. Carrying the burden of development simply because it is more accurate is no excuse to put work above health, especially when health can (and often does) hinder work. Nobody should be in physical pain for work, as Sakurai-san did during the Smash Bros. playtest for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U. He even admitted in a 2015 Famitsu piece that his arm would have given out in 10 minutes if had button pressed. None of this seems conducive to a productive, let alone healthy work environment.

Read More: Kingdom Hearts Trilogy arrives on Switch via cloud streaming

So yeah, Masahiro Sakurai should absolutely, 100%, take a damn break. But the rest of the Super Smash Bros. Ultimates developers at Bandai Namco Studios and Sora Ltd. should too. Sakurai and Co have been adding more and more content to the game for the past three years. There were two Fighters Passes, for a total of 11 additional characters, all (mostly) surprises. And in the DLC packs are Mii costumes, stages, music and a whole host of cool things. This game is pretty stuffed.

So now that, finally, the last fighter joins the fray on October 18th, it’s the right time for Sakurai and his companions to leave at sunset. Or, at the very least, take a nap. I know I would if I were on that development team.

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