I had met our good friend Yu Suzuki

[kadioguy]

[Virtua Fighter 30th Anniversary - Video message from NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang]

[...] Sega gave Nvidia our first big break. Sega commissioned Nvidia to build a post Saturn console and ported Virtual Fighter, Daytona and Panzer Draon to our first chip MV1. I had met our good friend Yu Suzuki, the legendary, the visionary game creator and the incredible team at AM2. Years later, Nvidia and Sega collaborated on the Lindberg arcade platform for Virtual Fighter 5. It's been amazing to see how Virtual Fighter has evolved over the years, and we are so thrilled to partner with Sega once again to reimagine the world of Virtual Fighter.

[Source at 0:46]
--
Jensen Huang's use of "I had met" (past perfect tense) instead of "I met" (past simple tense) seems a little unusual to me. I think that the latter would be a more natural way to express it. "Had met" implies that the meeting occurred before another past event, which doesn't seem to be the case in this narrative. What do you think?

 

[5jj]

It's before this; Years later, Nvidia and Sega collaborated on the Lindberg arcade platform for Virtual Fighter 5.

 

[emsr2d2]

If it helps you to understand it, imagine the writer had used "years before" rather than "years later".

I had met our friend Yu Suzuki ... years before Nvidia and Sega collaborated on the Lindberg arcade platform.