Eiji Aonuma (Japanese: 青沼 英二, Aonuma Eiji) was born on March 16, 1963. He is a Japanese video game designer, director, and producer who works for Nintendo. At Nintendo, he holds a high-ranking position in the Nintendo EPD division. He is responsible for producing the Legend of Zelda video game series.

Career

Eiji Onozuka was born on March 16, 1963, in Nagano Prefecture, Japan. He finished school at the Tokyo University of the Arts in 1988 with a master’s degree in composition design, focusing on animated puppets called karakuri. After graduating, he was interviewed by Nintendo. During the interview, he met Shigeru Miyamoto and showed him examples of his college work. Onozuka received a job at Nintendo even though he had never played a video game before. He asked his girlfriend about video games, and she introduced him to two games: Dragon Quest (1986) on the Famicom and The Portopia Serial Murder Case (1983) on the PC-8801. These were the first video games he ever played. His early work at Nintendo involved graphic design, including creating sprites for Nintendo Entertainment System games like 1991’s NES Open Tournament Golf. Onozuka directed the 1996 game Marvelous: Mōhitotsu no Takarajima for the Super NES.

Later, Miyamoto invited Onozuka to join the team working on The Legend of Zelda series. Onozuka helped design the story and dungeons for The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. After changing his surname to Aonuma, he directed The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. Following his work on The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Aonuma considered leaving the series but stayed after Miyamoto encouraged him to continue. Aonuma has since directed or helped produce several Zelda games, including The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Phantom Hourglass, Spirit Tracks, Link’s Crossbow Training, Skyward Sword, A Link Between Worlds, Breath of the Wild, and Tears of the Kingdom.

Aonuma is a founding member of the Wind Wakers, a brass band started in 1995. The band has over 70 Nintendo employees and performs concerts a few times each year. In June 2019, Aonuma was promoted to deputy general manager in Nintendo’s Entertainment Planning & Development (EPD) division. By 2023, he had been promoted to senior officer in the same division.

Recognition

In 2016, Aonuma was given a lifetime achievement award at the Golden Joystick Awards. In 2023, the Ministry of Culture in France honored Aonuma with the Order of Arts and Letters.