After Miyamoto finished speaking, the audience fell silent for a few seconds.
Interestingly, this silence was more telling than any applause.
Takuya Nakayama leaned back in his chair, watching the man in the polo shirt on stage.
He had invited Shigeru Miyamoto because the name alone would set the tone for E3.
But he hadn't anticipated Miyamoto's speaking style.
His address lacked sentimentality or fiery rhetoric. Instead, it sounded like someone who had genuinely pondered these matters, calmly presenting his well-considered conclusions.
The effect of these two approaches was vastly different.
"I don't know what games will look like twenty years from now," Miyamoto said, slowing his pace slightly.
"But I do know that everyone here today is working toward the same goal—finding ways to bring joy to players the moment they pick up a controller. Whether it's 3D or 2D, regardless of graphical resolution, that fundamental truth will never change."
"Compared to film and literature, gaming is still a young medium. But youth has its advantages—fewer established rules to follow, and vast territories yet to be explored."
"I don't know what games will be like in twenty years. I'd bet that whatever we're making now won't be able to compete with them graphically."
Laughter rippled through the audience.
"But if, even then, someone picks up a controller and smiles, I think that would be enough. That would be the greatest meaning behind creating these games."
He paused, then delivered his final words.
"Thank you all for being here today. We all love games. Let's transform that passion into something that players around the world can look forward to. Thank you."
The translator followed suit, and as his voice faded, applause erupted from the front rows and surged backward through the crowd.
Shigeru Miyamoto bowed deeply and retreated backstage.
The applause continued for nearly half a minute before finally subsiding.
The host returned to the microphone to officially open the first day of the media event.
After Miyamoto's departure, the main stage lights dimmed briefly. IDSA staff replaced the nameplate on the podium, and the two large screens switched to Konami's corporate logo—simple and striking, with white text on a red background.
At 9:15 AM, Konami's press conference began on schedule.
Instead of Kazumasa Kozuki himself, Kazuhisa Hashimoto took the stage.
Many might not know him, but most gamers are familiar with the iconic Contra cheat code: Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A.
This secret technique was created by Kazuhisa Hashimoto.
At the time, he was the programmer responsible for porting Contra from the arcade to the Famicom.
The game itself was notoriously difficult. Developers had to beat it themselves to find and fix bugs, and Hashimoto himself wasn't particularly skilled at side-scrolling shooters. To make the testing process less painful, he devised this cheat code.
He greeted the audience in English, his pronunciation not perfect but clear enough, before switching to Japanese and handing over to the interpreter.
"Today, Konami is presenting six titles," he said, skipping the pleasantries and getting straight to the point.
The first title to be unveiled was J.League Pro Soccer: Winning Eleven, scheduled for release on the Super Famicom and Mega Drive.
The screen displayed actual gameplay footage. For a 16-bit soccer game, the graphics weren't particularly stunning, but the players' movement paths and passing logic showed noticeable improvements. The most striking addition was a brief, close-up cutscene during shots—a few frames of pixel animation, but surprisingly effective.
The audience remained largely indifferent. Soccer games had never been mainstream in North America, and most American journalists knew little about the J.League. However, in the back, a few Japanese media representatives began whispering to each other. One of them was holding a copy of Famitsu.
A reporter with a press pass whispered to a colleague, "Konami is going head-to-head with Sega's ProSoccerWorld."
His colleague shook his head. "They can't win. Sega hired Maldini as their spokesperson—that's a whole different league."
The presentation continued.
After introducing J.League Live: Winning Eleven, Kazuhisa Hashimoto handed the microphone to the person who stepped onto the stage.
He wore a dark, wide-brimmed, Gothic-style fedora—it was Koji Igarashi.
He didn't speak immediately. Instead, he gestured toward the screen, and the image changed.
A massive tree appeared, with a girl in a sailor uniform standing beneath it. The visual quality far surpassed the earlier soccer game. Soft piano music played, and the girl's character portrait had delicate lines and a rich, expressive face.
Tokimeki Memorial: Forever Yours.
"This game will be released simultaneously on PC-Engine, PlayStation, and Jupiter," the producer said with a hint of pride. "Thanks to the large capacity of the Optical Disc, we recorded over 20,000 lines of dialogue for the heroine, Shiori Fujisaki."
As soon as the number was announced, a murmur ran through the audience. Twenty thousand lines of voice dialogue was an astonishing amount for a 1995 game.
"A dating sim?" the GamePro reporter, seated near the front in the media section, asked his colleague beside him. "Would that sell in the United States?"
His neighbor, an editor from NetGeneration, flipped through his notes. "Japan has high expectations. But this genre... it's hard to say how it'll fare in North America."
The demonstration of Tokimeki Memorial continued on stage. Shiori Fujisaki changed outfits three times, each change drawing scattered whistles from the crowd.
The whistles weren't loud, but they said it all: attractive female characters have universal appeal.
Next came the gameplay footage of Castlevania XX. Though the trailer was brief, the gothic castle setting and the satisfying crack of the whip's impact earned a few rounds of applause.
The Castlevania IP already had a solid fanbase in North America; no further explanation was needed. The visuals alone were enough.
Next, Koji Igarashi stepped off the stage, handing the microphone to Yoshitaka Murayama. The screen switched to a CG animation with a Japanese-Chinese anime style, depicting mountains, rivers, and the siege of a city.
Suikoden.
"108 recruitable characters, releasing on both PlayStation and Jupiter."
When the number "108" was announced in the translation, someone in the audience whistled.
108 playable characters—even in the RPG genre, that scale was staggering.
A Gamelnformer reporter drew a large question mark in their notebook, adding a note: "108 characters—real depth or marketing gimmick?"
The presentation quickly moved on to Summon Night for handheld consoles and the multi-platform Live! Crazy Big Shooting, showing a few brief clips. The producer simply said, "For more details, please visit our booth to experience it yourself," bowed, and left the stage.
The entire press conference lasted twelve minutes.
Clean, efficient, and to the point.
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