Tango Gameworks Founder Shinji Mikami Wants to Release Smaller Titles - News
by William D'Angelo , posted on 24 March 2022 / 1,947 Views
Tango Gameworks founder Shinji Mikami in an interview with Famitsu says he wants the studio, best known for The Evil Within series, to develop smaller titles alongside bigger releases.
"First of all, we should produce a masterpiece every ten years," said Mikami via VideoGamesChronicle. "Secondly, we want young people to create new games on their own. We also want to nurture good game creators.
"Although we are a studio that makes games, we also want it to have the aspect of a game school where staff can learn how to make games. We want to make it a place where you can grow as a creator and develop your skills and core while working from the bottom up."
He added, "To be honest, it is quite difficult to train newcomers in a large team. I think the most effective way is to run several game development teams of several dozen people.
"In recent years, commercial considerations have meant that we have had to develop in large teams. However, thanks to the emergence of game subscription services over the past few years, we feel that it is now possible to make games on a smaller scale.
"It is possible to gain experience in a small team and then get involved in a big project. This way, we can make even better games and projects can proceed more smoothly."
Tango Gameworks is now a first-party studio for Xbox following the $7.5 billion ZeniMax acquisition. The mention of subscription services suggests he is specifically talking about Xbox Game Pass.
The next title from Tango Gameworks, Ghostwire: Tokyo, will launch for the PlayStation 5 and PC tomorrow, March 25.
A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.
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Makes sense, Microsoft has tons of big AAA games and ips now, so some of these studios should start sub-dividing to create some AA games to help the pacing of games and differentiate the Microsoft experience.
Make a successor to VanQuish please! Note successor not sequel
"However, thanks to the emergence of game subscription services over the past few years, we feel that it is now possible to make games on a smaller scale." Further evidence that Game Pass is actually beneficial for developers :)
Or that they want to pump more games even if smaller or less proeminent.
You Sony fanboys will always find a way to put a negative spin on every single Xbox news story lol
The person himself is saying they will make smaller games that wouldn`t be made without GP, so seems like you decided to ignore part of what he said to pretend I'm spinning it.
I get that but making smaller games does not automatically equal pumping out crap.
And nowhere I said pumping crap, said less proeminent, which games with less funding and lesser scope is most likely going to be, they aim lower just that. And there is plenty of great smaller games out there.
Pump out has a pretty negative connotation but otherwise I fully agree :)
gotcha, wasn't the intention to use it on negative tone. It may be a simpler title and or less polished if left only to the new guys, but I doubt it since it would impact the team image so I expect some seniors to lead and ensure that even if small in scope it is a well made game.
Yeah I'm fine with them making some small games, although I hope that they continue to make bigger ones too since they've made some great ones.
From the interview it seems like they will keep doing what they do with the main teams, but instead of trying to train the newcomers on those games, they will make smaller games where those guys will be mentored along the way. So it would just be more smaller games in between the bigger games and GP financing that makes it more feasible (and that is what I meant to Azz on change of ownership->change of leadership-> change of strategy for the studio).
Oh I see. That actually seems like a really smart strategy to me, since smaller games are much lower risk financially and give developers a lot more creative freedom.
I also think so. I like when Sony done that project with college grads to start deving.
Another good point of doing this strategy is that on smaller project and team those guys will have the opportunity of bonding and also seeing more of the scope of what they are deving (like someone doing a whole game alone, with 10 people and one per core area, with 1000 people it is likely that the bigger the team bigger the specialization of that person but also the less he/she will see of the full picture while developing).
Plus as you said with less risk, and more freedom we may even see some jewels that may never been done otherwise.
More games = good. Scale is by design. Some of the best games are small scale.
Haven't said otherwise, although I wouldn't expect the best games from the studio to come from the newcomers, but who knows the director may be great and the new guys talented.
Exactly. More games that take risks and experimental. Right now, it's only indie studios doing this. Would love to see more of this from larger studios because it feels like most AAA games are following the same formula.
Yeah I'm starting to find a lot of AAA games boring. Innovation trumps budget every time!
