 Well it looks like we might have some potentially I mean it's happy and sad news at the same time. It sounds like Masahiro Sakurai the creator of Kirby's Smash series obviously is well known for the Smash series more than anything. You know he's wrapping up the final two DLC characters in Fighter Pass 2 for Super Smash Brothers Ultimate and it looks like he is considering early retirement. Now look we all know the story of Masahiro Sakurai and if you aren't aware Masahiro Sakurai is a workaholic right. His work is his passion and he has worked himself to the brink of having severe medical complications sometimes with his hands and his wrists and other things. Last year he ran into some medical issues due to his long hours of work and obviously some people can think that sets a bad precedent for overworking yourself. We actually talked about this yesterday on live stream about how while it might set a bad precedent for some people obviously when we talk about crunch and all of that it's also one of those the very best to ever do it are workaholics that's how it works. Their work is their passion and they put all their time and investment into it sacrificing other things in life sometimes their health family whatever it's not always right but that is just the reality of being this successful but he did a we have a full translation here from a recent article in Femitsu. He's been doing Femitsu columns almost weekly since 2003 and one those columns are ending and two he's actually thinking about calling it quits early now he's not saying he is retiring for sure once he's done with Super Smash Bros but it doesn't sound like he's planning to stick around much longer. Here is the full column update and this was on Nintendo life and it was translated by at Cody Nicola and at Cephan's it says the summary of Sakurai's own words Cody Nicola writes he was able to stop working long enough to let his thoughts percolate in his time off he doesn't want to keep working forever after he's older he says that honestly if he had a little more free time he thinks his days would be more fun he likes the idea of an early retirement then at Cephas on ads Sakurai says that while the experience people create can last forever personal work will always come to an end someday as long as he works he will do his best to entertain people he says that society is built upon such experiences regardless of the medium and genre as long as he can continue to create new experiences he will even if he's busy he believes it's best to push on and do as much as you can he does however express doubt whether this feeling is best suited for the times and then speaking about his Femitsu column Sakurai reportedly said he'll continue for just a little bit longer later on we learned that he's actually going to be ending his Femitsu column at some point this year at the conclusion of the two current Smash Bros characters coming out which apparently are supposed to come up for the end of this year and then he will be done with his Femitsu column now it's interesting thing to think about because Sakurai is actually just 50 years old he does turn 51 on august 3rd later this year so he is rather young in the development community to consider retirement but obviously we know he's had a number of health problems and it sounds like he feels if he could just step away from work he'd actually enjoy life a bit more that isn't to say he doesn't enjoy work clearly the work he does on video games and new experiences he creates are passion built and extremely gratifying for him he won't keep working himself to the point of health issues if he didn't enjoy it but at the same point it's one of those situations where you know what if he could step away from game development step away from his career and just retire early he could go and enjoy other aspects of the world without obviously further risking his health and obviously without having to worry about the pressure that fans put on him think about how much the community has been pressuring Sakurai for add this character add that character make a new kid Icarus game come back and handle the Kirby series again make a new IP do this do that do this we're constantly making demands of not just Sakurai but all these video game developers and Sakurai as we know has had health issues because of how hard he works on his projects and now he doesn't say he's retiring when he's done with Smash Bros but he does say hey I'm going to be doing it for at least a little bit longer which infers that he probably has at least one more game coming up for him you know what whether it's another kid Icarus whether he wants to get back involved with the Kirby series or maybe he wants to leave the world of one last brand new IP I don't know what it's going to be maybe it maybe it's another Smash game I kind of hope it's not because if it's another Smash game you know that's games not going to come out for another like five years six years so he's going to be doing that he's going to be doing updates and new character adds to that into his 60s into his mid 60s and at that point I just don't think that we should be expecting Sakurai to put in that kind of work anymore and he has been trying to um diverge some of the work he currently doesn't ultimate to more people in comparison to the past I think kind of in preparation to move away from the series so I gotta say that it is kind of sad to think that he's only 50 years old and by the time he's 60 you know I'd probably say sometime in the next decade he's going to be retiring you think about other people like Aji Anomu you think about Shigeru Miyamoto all these other guys that aren't retired and are still going at advanced ages Master Hero Sakurai is choosing to not do that he wants to enjoy life so to that I say you know what man you deserve it you deserve to step away from game development and do something special with your time so my thoughts are retire man retire when you want to retire I'm sure you have made plenty of money from Nintendo over the years I would like to see one more project from you of course a passion project maybe an idea you've had percolating for a number of years that you haven't been able to work on because of smash so I would like to see one last hurrah but not at the expense of your health so retire when you're ready I think him stepping away from Famitsu is just his first step towards retirement and then he'll probably have one last hurrah game which you know ultimate would feel like a nice last hurrah but you know what Sakurai if any game developers earn the right to retire before they're 60 it's you so please take care of yourself take care of your family and enjoy the rest of your life whenever you do step away it is sad we're always going to worry about the future of Smash Bros without you we're always going to wonder can Kid Icarus even come back if Sakurai is not involved because you know he was the reason uprising happened you know is Kirby ever going to reach its former glory if Sakurai never gets back involved Sakurai is one of the greatest video game developers of all time and he will be missed when he retires but I'd rather he retire than hold on too long and have severe long-term health complications like keeps happening the more and more he's game developed we we already lost Satura Awada too soon right we lost him to colon cancer and that sucks and it's a really tough thing for us to swallow to this day because he was so young as a CEO when that happened but maybe you know maybe things would have been caught sooner if he wasn't so busy working maybe it would have been caught in time potentially to you know maybe do something about it before it became too late we won't know obviously that's playing the what if game but same thing here for Sakurai I'd rather see him walk away while he still has some youth then hold on dearly pray you know hoping that he could continue to keep his health and work longer and longer and for another decade another decade and then before you know what he's 70 80 years old and there's not many years left left to have fun and enjoy the world he's still young enough where he can go have fun and enjoy the world and even if he steps away in retirement game developers always seem to get this itch and come back so he still might come back and make a game at some point but you know we've been begging Sakurai to take a break for years and if that break his retirement I'm good with that and I hope you guys are good with that too I think we can all agree he's earned it thank you guys so much for tuning in be sure to turn it into our podcast then at 8 p.m. if you catch it later that's fine we will be live streaming we have rule of tube review on it's gonna be about a 90 minute podcast hope to see you guys all there and I'll catch you in the next video