In a statement which will make many go "Well, duh!" former Capcom developer and current Game Republic big dog Yoshiki Okamoto has added another to his quickly growing list of controversial developer quotes. (The first being his gem about good developers not liking games in the first place.)
In an interview on the Japanese +D Games, Okamoto is asked about the disparity between Western and Eastern game development these days, and states:
"It’s almost too late. During the Famicom (NES) era, Japanese video games comprised 70 percent of all video games. And currently, it’s like 15 or 20 percent, isn’t it? Now, Western games are more advanced. For games like GTAIV, those guys are spending something like 5 or 10 years to make them. Even if we thought about catching up with them now, they’d still be making progress. But, not necessarily giving up, it’s just not possible to catch up in a single lifetime."
Can the Japanese developers catch up with the American and European developers "in a single lifetime"? Who knows. The Wii has proven that things can turn around very quickly in this industry, but then again the Wii hasn’t exactly had the best success with innovative game development.
In the meantime, I encourage all of our Western readers to bust out the gear they wore during the Olympics and cheer on your country’s game developers! Together we will make Mark Rein the next Michael Phelps!
