Eiji Aonuma

Eiji Aonuma is one of the Nintendo employees most closely involved with The Legend of Zelda games. He was born in 1963. His journey began while attending the Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music where he studied design. He graduated in 1988. He worked on mechanical figures that moved, which are essentially marionettes. Aonuma believes the name "Mario" originates from the word marionette. Aonuma acquired his job at Nintendo when he was just 25 years old and has been with the company since.

Aonuma admits he's never really cared for Mario games. "To be honest with you, I just don't like action games that require you to jump," he says. "They're scary. The jumping factor kind of freaks me out."

Eiji Aonuma's first major game creation came with his director role in the 1996 Japan-only Super Famicom adventure title Marvelous, under Nintendo developer Research & Development 2. Marvelous was heavily influenced by A Link to the Past. Shigeru Miyamoto saw the game and asked Aonuma to join him as assistant director on Nintendo 64 development with Ocarina of Time. Aonuma got to incorporate the same assets to that game -- dungeon layouts, enemy placement, and more. Miyamoto was very pleased and permitted Aonuma to be the main director of Majora's Mask. Aonuma's ingenuity and hard work showed in his game, garnishing high praise and acceptance from all Zelda fans. Aonuma resumed his duty as Chief Director with The Wind Waker. Eiji Aonuma is now working as a producer overseeing a variety of Zelda titles in development.