The creator of Devil May Cry is not optimistic about the future of Bayonetta but he is interested in working on Viewtiful Joe and Ōkami.
Hideki Kaimya’s surprise exit from PlatinumGames – the developer he helped to found – still has no real explanation, with little evidence of whether it was acrimonious or not, or if he had a specific plan for what he’d do afterwards.
He’s previously said he will stay in the games industry, but what made his departure all the more surprising was that he was deep into development on new game Project G.G., whose fate is now unknown. On top of that, he had also just begun to talk about a long term, nine game plan for the Bayonetta series.
Answering fan questions in a new video blog he refenced that plan as the ‘Bayonetta Saga’, but admitted that, ‘it seems like I may have to take the full saga to the grave with me. It’s a shame. It’s not like I own the Bayonetta IP, but I suppose those who do will probably keep it going.’
Despite critical acclaim, the Bayonetta series has never been particularly successful commercially, with the sequels only happening thanks to Nintendo’s involvement as publisher.
That makes it difficult to guess whether Platinum will continue the series or not, as while each sequel had a different director, Kamiya had a supervisory role in all of them.
Most of the other comments from the video are about non-gaming subjects, such as his love of aquariums and hot springs but at the end he reads out a question about potentially working with Capcom on a Viewtiful Joe or Ōkami sequel.
Kaimya, and many of Platinum’s other senior staff, previously worked at Capcom, with those two titles being amongst the last they worked on before leaving.
As director of both games, Kaimya has a strong attachment to them and has often spoken about his desire to make an Ōkami sequel in particular.
‘I’d love to work on them if I ever get a chance. I actually had the story for a third Viewtiful Joe all thought out. I’ve always wanted to make it. I wonder if Capcom would let me make another Viewtiful Joe…’ he muses in the new video.
‘Ōkami, too. I feel like I left that unfinished, so if we could make that happen as well, I’d be happy. Capcom I’m waiting for your offer.’
As with anything Kaimya says, it’s hard to tell how serious he’s being, especially about wanting Capcom to call him, but taken at face value he seems very keen.
The only other gaming related snippet from the video is a reference to the manga Cobra, whose creator Buichi Terasawa recently died. Kaimya is apparently a fan, but the actual question was about a new video game adaption of the anime by French company Microids (the same publisher behind the recent Flashback 2).
Kaimya was vaguely aware of the game, but unless he’s a really good actor there didn’t seem to be any indication he was involved.
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