Gamasutra has a nice five page interview up with David DeMartini of EA Partners, the Electronic Arts division that has released games like Rock Band, Crysis, The Orange Box, and, uh, Hellgate: London in the past year. It's a pretty wide ranging chat, from discussions of the challenges the come with working with Japanese studios, to acquiring new titles, to the relative disaster of Hellgate:

We're certainly sad with the results for Flagship and what's happened with Hellgate, because at the time we signed it, we were trying to get involved in a very complicated relationship between Namco and Flagship. We were coming late to the party, and trying to do whatever we could to sprinkle the game magic on the project and get it headed in the right direction.

I think that's an example where all three parties had the best interest of the game in mind, and sometimes the game doesn't work out. Hellgate is still an incredible concept. The guys who worked on it spent thousands of hours trying to make that concept work, and sometimes we just don't see something. Sometimes, we just didn't take enough time. Sometimes, things don't work out the way you expect.

It's kind of like a film with all big stars — on the script, it should be successful, but the movie doesn't turn out as good as everybody hoped. That's why EAP takes a portfolio approach with its games. You have to place a lot of bets, and hope for a lot of hits.

Certainly worth a read through — I always enjoy reading interviews that cover a lot of ground, and this certainly satisfies in that respect.

David DeMartini on the Renaissance of EA Partners [Gamasutra]

This week's Famitsu has a look at the Nintendo published surivival horror Zero ~Tsukihami no Kamen~ AKA Fatal Frame IV. The Wii game is being directed by Tecmo's Makoto Shibata and Grasshopper's Goichi Suda. While Shibata worked on the previous Fatal Frame games, Suda was roped in to work on Fatal Frame IV. Hit the jump for another look at the game.

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Word has it that No More Heroes creator Goichi Suda and Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami have joined forces for a yet unannounced project. (Previously, the duo worked together on Killer7.) We've been hearing rumblings about this for a while, as has game magazine GamesTM. The latest issue dishes:

UNTITLED PLATINUM GAMES PROJECT
One of our spies informs us that Grasshopper is currently discussing a new game with the ex-Clover studio.

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Marvellous Interactive have published some worldwide shipping/sales figures for Suda's No More Heroes. In Japan, homeland of all parties involved? It's done terribly. Only 40,000 copies have shipped since launch. Ouch. How about America, then? Little better: they've shipped around 200,000 copies, and have sold just over 100,000 since launch. Not bad! Finally, however, they announce some European numbers. And while the game's not even out there yet (it's shipping late Feb/early March across all PAL territories), they're expecting to sell 160,000 units across the continent at launch. Could something finally be coming up roses for Suda? Let's hope so!
NO MORE HEROES打上げ [Marvellous, via Alkaline @ NeoGAF]

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Grasshopper's Goichi Suda (51) is pretty comfortable making violent games, like bloody light saber fest No More Heroes (a slap in the face to most fiction/reality when burns tend to cauterise wounds, but we digress). So he was recently asked by Nintendo Official Magazine UK if he'd consider making titles for a younger crowd. And that's when his eyes turned red and pupils the darkest black of night...

I want to make a Super Mario game for adults...Maybe Mario could wear an Italian suit and have a machine gun...But Nintendo probably wouldn't like that idea.

With a gun.

Suda wants to make 'Mario with guns' [CVG][image]

Goichi Suda is known for his quirky, cel shaded games like Killer 7 and No More Heroes — both appearing on Japanese hardware. But Suda's ready to expand his game developer wings and try something different. Says Suda:

This originality will always remain, but I also want us to challenge ourselves by working at making realistic visuals as well. The next title will have a very different style, but keep the Grasshopper feeling at the same time... The Xbox 360. Definitely, I want to develop on this platform. It is really easy to work with. It is also quite popular outside Japan on markets that I would like to aim at. Specifically, I think of the American market as the Major League — I would like to go there and be successful.

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No More Heroes creator Goichi Suda says third party Wii games aren't selling. He should know! Even though it faired well critically, nobody in Japan bought his game. (Well, not nobody.) What does Suda think of developing for the Wii? This:

Whilst the sales weren't as high as I hoped, other titles for Wii aren't selling so well either. Only Nintendo titles are doing well. This isn't just because of the current situation in Japan, as this is happening outside Japan... Actually I was very surprised about the reality about Wii, because before I was making this game, I wasn't expecting that Wii would be a console targeted only for non-gamers. I expected more games for hardcore gamers. The reality is different to what I expected.

Third Party Wii Games Aren't Selling [CVG via Games Radar]

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Last time I caught up with Goichi Suda, dude was pumped about the impending release of No More Heroes. He also said that he and Grasshopper Studios were at work on an Xbox 360 game, which we still know absolutely nothing about. But after that? More No More Heroes, of course:

I'm really willing to make a sequel version - and right now I'm asking if it can be made...I think No More Heroes is a great game, there's no other action game like it for the Wii. If it was a band, it would be really energetic, like the Arctic Monkeys.

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