Nintendo of Japan have released a statement announcing that Nintendo President Satoru Iwata has unfortunately passed away at the age of 55.
Satoru Iwata passed away on July 11th due to a cancerous bile duct growth. Iwata has been reporting various health issues over the past year where he was unable to attend E3 in 2014 and 2015.
Iwata began his gaming career working at HAL Laboratory as a programmer straight after graduation. He became president of the company in 1993 and was eventually transferred to Nintendo in 2000. After the resignation of Hiroshi Yamauchi, Iwata became president of Nintendo in 2002. With his time at Nintendo, Iwata oversaw the development of their most popular systems and numerous games, where he was even tasked with helping in the development of their properties, including working on Pokemon, Mario and the Legend of Zelda. With the declining sales of the Nintendo Wii U in 2014, Iwata announced that he would half his own salary in order to further more development for quality games.
Iwata also had a regular series on the Nintendo website known as Iwata Asks, where he interview developers about the decisions and process of developing their games. He also appears on Nintendo Direct frequently, speaking to fans about Nintendo’s latest developments.
Source Article – Nintendo
Source Article – Nintendo Everything