I mean, not to burst the Doritos bag, but Kojima-san’s involvement included not writing the script, not being lead producer, not directing, and not running the development team. He did hang out in the VIP of all PR events though… so yeah, top billing on this one.
After every Tokyo Game Show, all these western journalists run around fetishizing Japanese studios/developers like tourists with blinders on and it is absolutely infuriating.
Here’s some real talk: many Japanese devs make shockingly low wages and crunch for literally years.
I miss the food. I miss the people. I miss the beautiful country… But if anyone thinks for a second that labor practices in Japan are not atrocious even on their best day, you are buying PR and your own nostalgia for games you love.
Having a one-button mode (Easy Automatic) in Bayonetta didn’t make getting Pure Platinum any easier. It didn’t ruin your experience. It did make myself and others on the team receive many comments from new Bayonetta fans who could have never otherwise enjoyed the game.
Yo!
@ladygaga
playing Bayonetta!! I totally went to her show in Kobe right after Bayonetta came out and got a ton of inspiration. Glad she is enjoying our game. Don’t fuck with a witch!!
I got off a plane instantly making double what I made in Japan. I went from working 60+ hour weeks for 5 years on Scalebound (and sometimes more like 80-90) to working 40s. And I’ve never had to replace a lead in the US because they were hospitalized with stress related illness.
I talk about going back all the time... I’m sure I will one day. And I know my exact conditions - a Western company on an ex-pat package, or I run the studio. Unless there is major cultural change, I would never work at a Japanese company in Japan again. Too much life to live.
Studios come and go, but closing Tango Gameworks is absolutely unforgivable in my opinion. That studio was on the verge of defining itself post-Mikami-san.
I’m sure everyone will land on their feet, but I’m here to help if anyone wants advice on moving to the US.
Ahh, the classic “Weird Japanese Dev” article.
Every contract in Japan has those clauses. You can’t even sign up for a gym membership in Japan without signing those clauses. Those clauses are the key way they Japanese government fights mafia groups.
Revealed in the Epic Games vs Apple court documents, Nintendo has a clause in its contracts that stipulates any Japanese dev or publisher it works with can't be tied to organized crime groups like the Yakuza.
I think I’m more angry at what happened to Tango than what happened to Scalebound, and that even included leaked details about my mental health break to the press, which could have drastically derailed my career.
You know how many people didn't try Vanquish because some idiot equated the length of the campaign with the game's quality? Then you get to spend your press tour discussing how long your game is, not how much fun your game is.... Real fun. Thanks for that.
OBJECTION!
To claim that Tango was "likely bloated" when Japanese studio man-month costs are usually 40-60% of a US studio is just incorrect conjecture. That studio wasn't bloated at all. In fact, they were probably too lean...
I've been in the industry long enough now to have seen how things unfold from both sides and I'm honestly not a fan of the outrage culture we've created these days.
Hear me out for a second. I know it's of little comfort for people who have lost their jobs today, but I think
PlatinumGames (Bayonetta, NieR, Astral Chain) says it is changing its approach to its games.
They will now focus on games that “can be enjoyed and loved for a longer period of time”, instead of its usual “one-off, well-designed” titles:
Someone very smart said that year "Never be the third best shooter." With BLOPS, Battlefield, and Halo - we were the fourth "best" shooter. Combine that calendar with some bad marketing and poof - Cult classic.
Perhaps its time to discuss how 'Vanquish' should have been a major success if not for being released the same year as a Mass Effect, Fallout, Bayonetta, Bioshock, COD BLOPS, God of War, Assassin's Creed, Darksiders, Battlefield, Alan Wake, Halo & Red Dead Redemption.
We had our chance. We failed. They know why we failed. Lots of great people left after we failed. Some because we failed. I’m sad that it is now a drunken meme.
Anyways, since nice people asked nicely, here is how I would have translated the full quote from Inaba-san.
Not interested in creating confusion or spending time cleaning up other's messes, so any errors here are entirely my own and I won't apologize for them. :)
There is a thread in a which a Japanese dev at a major publisher is "writing to" new hires saying that basically crunch is inevitable, that all Western devs might get long vacation, but we all work until 10 or 11pm like they do in Japan, but at least in Japan you get Golden Week.
MMBN6. Because I spent 3 months crunching until 3am translating that thing in text files. Everything needed to be full width Japanese characters. Also, all the spaces had to be underbars. And it had all sorts of crazy markup.
I’LL_NEVER_DO_THAT_AGAIN.\n
From my personal POV, if you are gay, straight, male, female, somewhere in between, or even outside that rubric, and Bayo makes you feel empowered. Stay that way. Take that empowerment and tell haters to go fuck themselves. That is what Bayo would do. She lives for herself.
I’m still so sad for Tango… I’m sad for all my friends who did what was asked of them… I’m sad for them trying to work through the mixed signals and pure corp comms speak… I’m sad for the “console warriors” making things up about their situation…
So I got mentioned in some conversation about Bayo and her status as a queer icon. I don't work for PG. I am not a PG spokesman. Personal opinion:
1) This OpZero person has me blocked, so it took me a minute to see their tweets, but they are clearly a toxic bigot, IMO.
I translated MegaMan Battle Network 6 in 2000+ text files using full width Japanese English characters and underbars (also full width) for every space.
Kojima-san was involved, but this was not "A Hideo Kojima Game" and lots of hardworking folks from Konami (many still there) were on the day to day. It feels wrong to not credit them.
Cheers to Yuji Korekado, Etsu Tamari, Yoji Shinkawa, and all the original MGR prototype staff.
I have enormous respect for all of the hard work everyone put into Scalebound. I’m happy the W101 Kickstarter was successful and wish PG all the best. But SB was joy and success and happiness and pain and failures and tears. I’d love to see it made. It just isn’t a joke to me.
I mean, I remember after a big Bayo playtest, we felt the game needed more, and so we all huddled in small groups to come up with ideas. I remember huddling with the character team. My pitch at the time was to go with Jeanna/Bayo as explicitly gay and make the angels more real.
I worked in Japan. I worked on games that had content like this…
Content like this never needed to be in any of these games. If your goal is to titillate, there are better ways than juvenile abuse of the male gaze. This is why I hated the 2B design. It encourages this BS.
Oh! One more thing that I forgot to mention... Yusuke Miyata was the lead designer on Scalebound, and he is super talented, and I can't wait to play Bayo 3 primarily because he is directing it.
And most importantly, 4)
NO ONE. NO ONE. No one has the right to change how you feel about yourself, or your interpretation of a fictional character. You own how you feel about a work of fiction, even if you don't own the next story, or the next move.
I was not at the event, and I am OK. Spent the past hour in my car trying to help. I’m fucking heartbroken. This is the nightmare I prayed would never happen when I was thinking of leaving Japan...
2) It was always clear to me that Bayo and Jeanne had fluid sexuality. There are SO many Takarazuka-esque influences to start. The only reason manipulating the male gaze works in Bayonetta 1/2 is because of that sexual fluidity.
@Retro_1993
Total sense. The other issue is the language barrier prevents them from even attempting critical reporting, and even if by some minor miracle they do manage to get a tough question or article out there, they catch tons of BS from the 4chan crowd.
@XSXbeastmode87
Well... 1) I don’t work there anymore. 2) That didn’t happen. 3) Accusing people of crimes, if you don’t know them to be true, is not a good look and potentially illegal.
Dear
@Nintendo
, during The Wonderful 101,
@PG_kamiya
wished Wii U had a capacitive touch screen. Switch has a capacitive touch screen. I think you know where I’m going here. A port would be wonderful. Signed, a fan.
#ProperPortBegging
So a little announcement from my corner of the world. Monday will be my last day at EA. It’s been an awesome 4 years working on five Madden games, each bigger than the last. The opportunities, learnings, and friends will be things that I cherish forever.
Bayonetta vs Bayonetta. You nerds got what you were asking for. Over and over again on Twitter. We said ask Sakurai. You did. Then you got what you wanted. You just couldn’t handle that you got the best. Bayonetta is OP. Because she is Bayonetta.
No sympathy. Take over complete.
Japan has both mental health stigmas and violent video games (I know, I made them, including one, "MadWorld," that was cited in SCOTUS as a game that would have been banned). What it doesn't have are guns; thus, it doesn't have mass shootings. This isn't a difficult equation.
3) It was also clear, from the gun, that Bayo would flirt with Luka. "Now making them..." line, etc. But Luka was always the pure-hearted hapless hero in waiting. I don't have a particular opinion on BayoLuka, but it doesn't change Bayo's character to me, at all.
The idea that upskirt shots are an “aspect of the character” is an absolute joke. If anything it is more like an aspect of the character of the morons posting this.
And I am not just saying this now. I tried VERY hard to get the Wonder-Pink upskirt shot cut from 101 but failed.
Final commentary: It irritates me to no end when people argue against the power of representation. The idea of Bayo as a "queer icon" is because nothing else like her exists in games. Even if her status is ambiguous; ambiguity allows folks to feel seen. Representation matters.
Bayonetta and Motoko Kusanagi from Ghost in the Shell voice actress Atsuko Tanaka has sadly passed away at age 61.
She was known for many different roles across video games and anime.
@UndrGroundNews1
Them being who, exactly? Because I was the creative producer, and I pitched the game before it got signed, and no one ever said that. It was literally ALWAYS 4 player co-op.
It is based on the same bullshit I heard for 15 years. "We are creators." "It takes time to create." "This is what it takes to be at the top of the industry." It is grade-A Stockholm syndrome mumbo jumbo. So let me drop some real truth for a second.
People become miserable, sleeping at their desks, getting cases of depression, medical leaves... All the "crazy" stuff you hear about Western crunch is THE NORM in Japan. It is dehumanizing bullshit.
Since it is going around, that
@SnoopDogg
MUT card is a birthday gift we made for him. He is the only one who has it, so if you play a MUT game and Snoop is on the other side of the ball, you are playing the man himself.
I lied. I got codes.
This is how you get a code - post videos of yourself doing random acts of kindness. Tag
#Madden19
and send them to me. I'll randomly reward these random acts of kindness. You probably won't win. But you'll know you did something good. Make the world better.
I mean, the game literally burnt me out, put me in therapy, disappointed me, made me learn a ton, pushed me to try new things and new places; all sorts of positives and negatives. But what it didn’t do is give everyone on the internet any clue what they are talking about.
Oversharing cancer update:
My final scan came in today, and I went to Tampa for a second opinion. All doctor's agree that I am currently cancer free and can opt for active surveillance instead of chemotherapy! I even got permission to start riding my bike again.
Let's go!!!!!
She's done an amazing job for my district, so I'm real OK with
@AnnaForFlorida
as Governor. But I'm even more OK with her getting rid of any of the three stooges -
@GovRonDeSantis
@marcorubio
or
@SenRickScott
. All three of those clowns have to go.
Why I believe it:
1) The IP is co-owned. Makes the deal easier.
2) Platinum engine is multi platform anyways, so port is easier (but not trivial due to the mechanics)
3) Switch capacitive touch will make the game WAY better, as would PS4 touch pad.
4) Game needs an audience
Went to GameStop today to buy a gift wearing a Scalebound T-shirt. Dude there was like “I was so sad when they cancelled that.” I was like, “Yeah, me too.”
An announcement: I likely have testicular cancer and am having surgery to remove/diagnose. It's scary AF, but I'll be fine. I caught it with a self-exam, mainly because of idolizing
@lancearmstrong
growing up. Normalize talking about testicular cancer.
My Grandmother passed away at age 91 on Saturday. She raised me since I was 7 or 8, so I was basically considered her fifth child. I held her hand and comforted her as she left us. She was a truly amazing person who set an unreachable example.
So to see a lead at a Japanese developer telling people that crunch is inevitable is revolting. Crunch, and the waste that comes from it, are why $80M budget Japanese games aren't as good as Western games with half the budget. That is the truth.
Excited to announce that I'm now a Senior Producer
@Harmonix
! I can't believe I can finally make rhythm games! (And now my username finally makes sense for my job!)
Every single time the "Let's do Scalebound" stuff starts up, the algorithms let me relive all of the stress of that project without feeling like I can express myself about it, and it sucks.
I'm also REALLY tired of people claiming PG embezzled funds on Scalebound.
One of the reasons I love where I work now is how receptive they have been to my efforts to make our team healthy, sustainable, and happy. I see the effects it has, and they are all positive. Innovation comes from planned iteration, not just burning money for someone’s ego.
Please quit giving Jake and Kraelo a hard time. I sat in the meeting where we figured out what was done and what wasn’t prior to the storm. It is a big team and some people operate on different schedules/deadlines. Kickoff is coming. House Rules are coming. We are going full gas.
@TpBroncosatw
@Jstein2469
Jake & JP (
@synaesthesiajp
) are monitoring player feedback around the Superstar KO mode and integrates into MUT. The mode is in BETA so there is a lot of room for it to grow. Keep in mind as well, there is still a lot of Madden left. Hurricane Dorian disrupted the flow of things.
Now, clearly, that idea wasn't adopted. It was probably needlessly provocative. But I didn't get laughed out of the room for a reason, and that reason was both ideas were entirely plausible. (FWIW, I'm glad we stayed on the course we were on... End results speaks for itself)
Japanese games get much smaller budgets then Western games. Then they proceed to waste at least half of that money at the front end of a project making absolutely horrid decisions. They view process as a loss of freedom and push back against sort of accountability.
For clarity regarding MGR tweet, since nuance/twitter go together like diapers and cheese:
- In my mind, MGR is a KojiPro + PG game. HK is a part of KojiPro, but KojiPro is not only HK.
- Press/PR should quit fawning over individuals and credit teams. Games are made by teams.
Sigh... I think I’m turning off twitter until this rumor dies down. I’ve got people tagging me in all sorts of garbage spouting nonsense. Don’t at me in your dumb trademark search screenshots, or MS/Nintendo arguments, or what you heard/the real truth/etc about Scalebound.
Here’s the script. I forgot that at this point Rodin was still called Mephisto. So much is different, but so much is the same.
Not sure if I can part with this… ❤️
Boom. 150 codes per console. Had fun meeting you all and interacting over the weekend. Hope everyone enjoys the last week of the Closed Beta. Now time to get back to work. Thanks, everyone!
And repeat after me: No streaming. Follow the rules. Have fun. Leave feedback.
I’m glad
@TimOfLegend
said this, but the more important thing he says is we, as game makers, should have zero tolerance for anything that makes people feel unwelcome in the spaces we create.
Just in case you haven't seen it yourself or didn't want to retweet it from some shitty nazi defender, here's Tim Schafer saying "Fuck white supremacists" at GDC
@Ivesaguiar
Sure he did. But so did lots of Konami KojiPro folks.
How that earns an individual top billing over the actual teams that made the game, I dunno…
LOL. I just opened twitter and I guess I made the weeb crowd mad mad. Which is always ironic to me because I actually lived their dreams.
I’m sorry if you don’t like that I think our industry can and should mature beyond upskirt shots.
@Mike_Prinke
I've worked on games that were delayed a year as an independent dev... it is just a negotiation with the pub on who is going to pay, and often times it is an equitable split.
Also, Nintendo absolutely does this all the time. They can afford it and it is in their core values.
So here is a question: If I started a YouTube channel to give talks on video game production/production techniques, would people be interested, or is it way too "inside baseball?"