The outspoken creator of Mega Man has said that Japanese game companies are suffering because they lack a creative vision and they aren’t taking enough chances on young game developers.
In an interview with Gamasutra, Inafune, who is known for his controversial remarks about the Japanese games industry being “finished”, said that the Japanese video game industry relies too heavily on older, more experienced talent, in turn not giving new talent a go.
“They’re thinking, ‘It’s just faster if I do it myself. If I do it myself, there’s not the risk of it being a failure,’” he told Gamasutra.
“They just don’t really have the bravery to give the younger generation a chance.”
Inafune says it’s important to give younger people a chance so that they can be trained from an early age.
“If you look at the Japanese game industry in general, if you want to become a director, if you become a director by the time you’re in your early 30s or mid-30s, that’s pretty good in a major publisher or a major developer. But at Comcept [one of Inafune’s studios formed last year], we actually have two directors that are in their late 20s. So ultimately, we’re giving people their chances at an earlier time. They would never have gotten these chances if they were at Capcom or some other big publisher.”
He added that many Japanese teams lack a creative vision, with developers asking where they can make money rather than asking themselves what kind of game they want to build.
“If you look at other companies, they may have a president, they may have producers and directors, but these guys sometimes don’t really understand,” he says.
“In the end, you can’t say whose game it was that they made. They’re not really unified as a company under a single person’s vision.”
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