23rd August 2006, 7:43 PM
Well, kind of... and they prove the truth of this with Dead Rising -- 300,000+ demos downloaded, over 800,000 sales expected in North America -- significantly better than they expected. That it won't do much in Japan doesn't really matter.
Quote:IGN: So, why go with Microsoft?http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/707/707854p1.html
Keiji Inafune: It's a very basic answer. We got the tools the quickest. They gave us the kits first and there you go. I can have tons of different ideas. I can say I want to make different kinds of cakes, different soufflés, whatever. If they don't give me the pans, the pots, the knives the forks to make it, then I can't make it.
IGN: Have you noticed any particular strengths or weaknesses while working with the 360?
Keiji Inafune: What the Xbox 360 represents is a great balance. When you think about when it was released, what it can do, how much it costs, the type of games it will have, it's just in a very nice position. The PlayStation 3 being that expensive is going to put it out of the price range of a lot of people, but yet the 360 will still be there. It will still be something that's affordable for enough people. The one disadvantage, unfortunately, is that it did not succeed in Japan.
GN: Is there still a chance that it could succeed in Japan? Is staying with Microsoft beyond Lost Planet and Dead Rising something you're interested in?
Keiji Inafune: Even though I used the past tense by saying they did not succeed, there still of course the possibility in the future. I'm never going to rule anything out. The game market is a tricky business, that's for sure. I guess that, at least with our titles, we knew right from the start. It's not like Microsoft's brand image for the Xbox was going to go from what it was from the first one to just being some huge success overnight for the 360. No one every even thought that would occur. We all thought that they would, at best, get a slightly larger market share than the first Xbox. Unfortunately, they're doing even worse. They're having a very tough time of it, and that is too bad, but every single developer out there no longer can afford to just look at one territory when making a game. Games are on an international level. If you look at the 360 from an international perspective, it still has a lot of potential. So the games that we created are hopefully applicable to not just the Japanese market but they're hopefully something that Japanese gamers would want to purchase as well. We don't see it as such a big problem, and so long as we can come up with ideas that are internationally viable, then there's no reason not to develop more Xbox 360 games.
IGN: Are you thinking of developing anything to specifically increase the Xbox 360's share in the Japanese market?
Keiji Inafune: We're not planning on making Japanese-exclusive games. Again, it's an international market and games have to have an international appeal. We have to think about those markets while we make them. When it comes to making a game that Japanese people like, we have added certain touches to our titles. For example Lost Planet uses a famous Korean actor. That is the latest trend in Japan, so hopefully that will give it some appeal in the Japanese territory. Japanese people like gigantic robot mechs, so it's got that in it as well. There are a lot of areas a Japanese person would find that they'd like. The gameplay itself is not something that Japanese people are used to, so they're going to have to adapt to what the new world standards are in games. If not, the Japanese market is going to be in trouble, because I can guarantee you not just Capcom, other Japanese companies, developers as well, are looking at games on a worldwide scale. They're not just looking at little Japan like before.
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