Silver linings are (potentially) two-fold though. With the focus taken away from the west, it now transpires that Capcom Japan might finally be about to drop some more original ideas on us. Remember them? I used to like Capcom's original ideas, and I miss seeing new ones. Also, the way in which the west is to treat old IP could turn out to be pretty damn exciting in the future. Could also be terrible, but hey, the potential is there.

Speaking at GDC last week, Capcom US Vice-President Christian Svennson spake thusly on th🎀e subject of IP and its coꦬmparitive newness:

"When I say no more new IP, I mean no new IP in the West. I think ꦇyou will 🐷see us actually taking some major new IP risks"

"Major"? "Risks"? Why, this sounds borderline experimental. I've previously moaned at length about Capcom's recent loss of vitality. It's been one of my favourite third-party developers since the days of the NES, but lately seems to have fallen into the same trap of tried-and-tested safe bets as everyone else. A push for new ideas from its core Japanese teams is exactly what it needs, particularly in the wake of Mega Man creator Keiji Inafune's departure. It should hopefully do a great deal to stop me moaning aboutthis, too.

As for what the west wi🎐ll be doing, Svennson was good enough to detailꦿ this:

"The remit at the moment ♔is still to leverage existing classic Capcom brands - I think you see that in bigger ways than perhaps you've seen from us before. New IP for the near term? No𓃲 go.

"We have loads of things which we're still noodling which🍎 we haven't touched in ye🙈ars and years and years. We really still think there's value in trying some stuff with them. Obviously we're heavily reliant right now on a narrower range of core brands."

Franchise-whoring then, Chris?

"We're looking at ways to not over-saturate the market with them. I think that care has to be taken to a🥂void brand fatigue."

Phew, had me going there for a minute. Carry on then, sir. Here's a quick tip though. If you intend to avoid over-saturation by bringing back brand🔴s we haven't seen in years, may I suggest 💞you start with Ghouls 'n' Ghosts, Strider, Viewtiful Joe and Power Stone? That'd be grand. Full disc release or download, either is good. Just don't balls 'em up.

Any of you lot have any other suggestions?

Source:

March 11th, 2011