Kojima talks about the Japanese game industry, looks grim

[Reggs]

http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3172266

Hideo Kojima is the ex Konomi guy who is now in charge of his own studio. He was made famous for the Metal Gear series.

A few highlights:

Kojima agrees, adding an even more pessimistic note to matters. "The US and European marketplace are far better balanced. There are games everyone can play -- maybe calling them 'kids' games' would be inappropriate -- but there's also a deep base of core titles made with movie-industry people that explore the depths of hi-def. I'm addicted to Left 4 Dead right now, but people say to me that that game would never work in Japan.

Kojima also points out that the hi-definition era has changed the rules of game design itself. "Game design up to now has been about making rules," he notes. "It was like a card game; there were lots of things that weren't possible and had to be cut. With hi-def, the more real it gets, the less instruction you need to give, so preoccupying yourself with making rules seems silly. Western developers have realized this, but Japanese ones are still preoccupied with making these rules."

The presence of Japanese games outside of Japan has taken a huge decline in the past decade. Nothing feels new and people have just stop caring. I remember when Xbox was about to come out, and the lingering fear was about MS winning over Japanese developers. Fast forward to recent times when the 360 was about to come out, and no one could care less about winning over japan, and american/euro games have been topping the charts ever since.

Kojima Productions is going through a restructuring atm. The plan is to update the company and borrow what they like about western developers. Kojima is a huge fan of Valve, so I'm exited to see what happens.

 

[j]

Dear Kojima-san,

Please infiltrate the studio responsible for Deus Ex 3 and make it not suck.

Yours,
A loyal customer

 

[j]

P.s. make PS3 games compatible with mouse/keyboard control scheme and make me infinitely happier with playing them. It's not like it's hard to make a mouse and keyboard work, and they are about ~1 Zillion times better at controlling a FPS type game. thx, bye.

 

[Reggs]

Originally Posted by j

Dear Kojima-san,

Please infiltrate the studio responsible for Deus Ex 3 and make it not suck.

Yours,
A loyal customer

Some guy on the dev staff of DE3 said that DE1 was "too slow." I fear the worst.

 

[breakz]

Originally Posted by Reggs

Nothing feels new and people have just stop caring.

I don't get what the complaints are all about. When's the last time an essential Japanese game came out...Resident Evil 4? Hell, MGS4 is Japanese in name only, as the game was designed like Gears of War. Meanwhile, on the Western front, GoW 1/2, Little Big Planet, Halo 3, Call of Duty 4, Left 4 Dead immediately come to mind.

Games are becoming literature (no, not like that) in that people are more interested in the way things are done vs. a completely innovative IP. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that, and we'll appreciate the truly innovative stuff even more when it releases.

Also, MS made a biiiiiiiiig deal about winning the Japanese market early in this gen. They secured the rights to Lost Odyssey/Blue Dragon for this reason. Then the 360 took second place and MS no longer cares about Japan.