Itagaki slams Japanese gaming executives' lack of creativity

News - Japanese games industry takes more flack from one of its leading figures

Ninja Gaiden creator Tomonobu Itagaki has had some strong words to say about executives in the Japanese games industry.

Following on from his experiences of working with THQ on his new game Devil's Third, Itakagi-san criticised the lack of creativity and ingenuity at executive levels in Japan, saying that the Western games industry does things better by hiring executives who actually know how to make good games.

He said: "In Japan, in this industry, they are lacking not just in technology, but the important thing is the creativity and ingenuity. They're lacking in that. So they complain a lot, they say a lot, but then they don't take action. So before they say anything bad or complain -- 'Do something!' is what I want to say."

"In the U.S., more so in the U.S. than in Japan, I think there are a lot of top management people who actually know how to make games. I think there are more people here like that, than in Japan. I think it's a good thing," Itagaki explained. "In Japan, management people, they sort of pretend they know what they're doing. Those management people, they say, 'I love games,'but they don't know how to make them. So the kind of instructions that they would give to the employees would be, "Okay, you've got to make it by when, and it has to be within this budget, and you have to sell whatever many copies." It's the opposite of the practical. It's not practical.

Devil's Third is expected to be released on PS3 and Xbox 360 in 2013.

Thanks Gamasutra.