DPPt/HGSS Masuda on the Azure Flute: "I thought it would be confusing for people"

[Chariblaze]

Nintendo World Report published their full interview with Masuda and Hironobu Yoshida today. Aside from various X and Y stuff, lo and behold, they got him to open up about the Azure Flute:

NWR: How come the Azure Flute was never made available in Diamond/Pearl/Platinum?

JM: When we were first developing the games we thought about including it. I thought it would be fun. But once the game was complete and released, I changed my mind down the road and didn’t think it would be – I thought it would be confusing for people and kind of hard to understand how it worked. So I eventually made the decision not to distribute it.

We can now die in peace.

 

[Frezgle]

Meanwhile, R/S/E had a whole puzzle quest in braille, with only a couple of NPCs barely alluding to its existence, first set off in an underwater cave that is incredibly easy to miss.
K.
Really though, couldn't they have included instructions alongside the item's distribution promotion?

 

[PMJ]

[Sylveon is] a new Fairy-type and it’s pretty strong in battles too.

OU confirmed

Also, mega evolution is confirmed as a wifom strategy

 

[Zygarde]

I cannot forgive them for not letting me be a piper climbing a strairway to heaven.

 

[Bolt the Cat]

The only thing confusing about the Azure Flute event is finding it, if you know that the event takes place at Spear Pillar, then the rest is simple.

 

[DNA]

The only thing confusing about the Azure Flute event is finding it, if you know that the event takes place at Spear Pillar, then the rest is simple.

Yeah, and they gave us the Shaymin event in Platinum, which takes about as long to reach. You have to go waaaaaaaay out of your way to find it. The Arceus event takes about the same amount of time (I gave myself the Azure Flute in D/P to test it out, and it really isn't that difficult or time-consuming).

"Too confusing for people" is probably the worst excuse possible.

 

[Chariblaze]

Yeah, it is a bit of an odd excuse considering the event Pokemon in HGSS and BW/BW2. Aside from instructions in marketing materials, why would you think to bring Pikachu-colored Pichu to Ilex Forest? I suppose random Pokemon in a PC box are different than items in Key Items, but still.

 

[Leaf_Ranger]

Meanwhile, R/S/E had a whole puzzle quest in braille, with only a couple of NPCs barely alluding to its existence, first set off in an underwater cave that is incredibly easy to miss.
K.
Really though, couldn't they have included instructions alongside the item's distribution promotion?

How about Rayquaza? If it wasn't for a friend of mine telling me of an opening somewhere along the way to...Pacifidlog (I had to go look the name) I wouldn't know about it or it would take me some time until discovering that, most likely by accident (I offered my friend the knowledge to evolve Skitty (apparently he hadn't paid attention to some NPC in Fallabor's PkMart) and also how to have nice amounts of Heart Scales with "Thief").