Tokyo Jungle pitch elicited "bad" reaction from Sony executives

Tokyo Jungle is all kinds of amazing, but like most people Sony was a little wary when Japan Studio first shilled the concept.

The EU PS Blog asked director Yohei Kataoka how Sony reacted to the survival RPG's pitch.

"It was bad. Initially. It wasn’t received so well at the very beginning," he said.

"I think there weren’t so many people that thought this game would sell just based on the concept, but as the game started to take form there was good user reaction and feedback."

Even Tokyo Jungle ambassador and SCE Worldwide Studio's boss Shuhei Yoshida was a bit cagey about the game.

"Initially when Yoshida-san said that he didn’t necessarily have a positive view of the project, he explained there was a catchiness to the concept but the gameplay itself wasn’t at the same level," Kataoka explained.

"So we had to take some time to bring that up to the same level. That’s why it took some time from Tokyo Game Show 2010 for these adjustments to take place."

Kataoka said a positive reception in Europe "actually in some respects pushed forward the development of the game", which as with all games had a chance of being shelved mid-development.

"But we had an opportunity to show the videos to Europe and US audiences and the European audience thought it was hilarious. So maybe there is something more similar in the sensibilities of Europeans and the Japanese," he added.

"We thought we’d be able to release in Japan and Europe but we weren’t so sure about the US. But we got help and we’re now able to release there as well."

Tokyo Jungle arrives on the US and European PlayStation Stores this week. It's going to be patched to support Remote Play with the Vita.

Thanks, Eurogamer.