Veteran Bandai Namco director and producer Katsuhiro Harada has some sobering thoughts to share about what the game industry looks like, from the point of view of the person who makes them.
Before we get to Harada’s statement, we have to talk a bit about the tweet that he was replying to. Joshua M. French, project lead at a game publisher named East Asia Soft, shared this frank assessment of where console gaming is now:
“Fine, I’ll just say it. The 9th gen has sucked so far. There are only 4 games that actually feel special to me and make PS5 or Xbox Series X feel somewhat worthwhile. Nearly everything else has straddled generations or feels hollow and formulaic. There’s no passion, no risk.”
Mr. French is entitled to his own opinion, but we should acknowledge the context in which he makes his statement and how it may ring true to many gamers, as consumers. Because of the difficulties created by the quarantine/lockdown period of this pandemic, Sony and Microsoft were unexpectedly constrained in selling their newly launched PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. That included having supply issues, with consequences that still reverberate today.
Mainly, many game studios chose to make more of their games cross-generation, between PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5, and to a lesser degree, Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S. While Microsoft addressed their supply issues sooner, we still saw a scenario where many of the ninth generation games were also available on eight generation consoles. As a result, they didn’t take full advantage of the power of the newer consoles, and did not feel like true ‘next-gen’ games, as the gamers like to put it.
This was Harada’s quote tweet and response to Mr. French:
“In fact, there was a strong opinion from the business side that not releasing for PS4 and X1 platforms was a big risk in terms of reduced sales, and I was a bit scared to make the decision myself…But as a result, we have been competitive with titles in the same genre that have been released on more platforms than us, but only on next-generation consoles.”
While he didn’t name the game he was referring to, it’s safe to assume that Harada was talking about Tekken 8. While it may not be as obvious to fans, Tekken 8 was a substantially more expensive game to produce than Tekken 7, and really needs to make much more money to break even, and make a healthy profit.
Harada’s statement certainly feels very real. While developers also want to go forward with making newer games, that are better than what they could make on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, they have to worry about whether they will still be profitable, especially when the newer platforms don’t have as many gamers on them. No less than Call of Duty, the biggest annualized franchise in the industry, continues to be published on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
We have reported on Tekken 8’s aggressive monetization, the spurious first that this title brings to the series. It remains to be seen if the franchise’s fanbase is loyal enough to pay, but it’s obvious that Bandai Namco chose to go this route because they’re not satisfied with sales so far, and the game needs to make more revenue.
Tekken is a rare breed indeed, as one of the most enduring video game franchises generation after generation. But if this latest Tekken isn’t profitable enough in the end, even such things could change.
We certainly hope Project Tekken finds that right balance to keep the game popular and profitable enough to make everyone happy. But for now, their dilemma reflects the same dilemma game companies face for all their upcoming projects.
