When I was 18 I already had a business going.

Pikachu. 'Pika' is the sound Japanese say an electric spark makes. And 'chu' is the sound a mouse makes. So Pikachu is like an electric mouse.

What's more important is that the monsters are controllable by the players.Pikachu is like the name of the species. But each player can name their own Pikachu. So kids can relate to it more. They get more attached to them that way.

I was really into Space Invaders in about 1978. It got me more and more interested in video games. There wasn't any media to get information about games, so I came up with Game Freak magazine.

Pokémon was made with Miyamoto-san's advice. Since I was a teenager, playing Donkey Kong, he's always been my role model. He's a mentor for my heart.

I sleep 12 hours and then work 24 hours. I've worked those irregular hours for the past three years. It's better to stay up day and night to come up with ideas. I usually get inspiration for game designing by working this schedule.

I had a cat, though. I wanted to name the frogs, because I watched them grow, but there were too many.