Yakuza creator "committed" to Sony, but feels consoles are on the way out
Famed Sega creative Toshihiro Nagoshi is a big PlayStation fan, but expects home consoles to bow out before portable platforms.
"At the very least I am committed to Yakuza remaining a game for Sony hardware. I feel like we grew up together," Nagoshi told CVG.
"When we were deciding which platform was right [for the first Yakuza game], it was PlayStation 2. I wanted it to be on the number one platform, so I didn't think twice before approaching Sony."
Disappointingly for Nagoshi, Sony did think twice.
"The truth is, at first they turned it down. For the market at the time, they thought it was too niche; they were worried it wouldn't sell, and I got a quite disappointing reply from them," he said.
"But I kept pestering them, and eventually they gave it a closer look. That's because they saw the passion I had for the game, rather than anything to do with whether or not it would sell. So I'm very grateful. In as much as they were putting their faith in Yakuza, they were putting their faith in me."
Despite his avowals of eternal love, Nagoshi believes the era of consoles is coming to an end.
"Consoles - PS3, PS4, Xbox 360-2 - the market for those will get smaller, and the main market will become portable games," he predicted.
"I don't think consoles will disappear, but more and more people will use home PCs for gaming, and a long time in the future it will just be PCs and mobile phones, and eventually mobiles will become just as powerful as games consoles."
The creative predicted the next major change in gaming will be how we interact with them.
"Right now, that means either buttons or touchscreens. Those are the only two interfaces we have. So I think the next big evolution will be the introduction of a new type of interface," he said.
"Sure, we have voice input, but voice will never become the main input. So I think that whoever can figure out that new type will be victorious.
"It's strange the number of buttons has increased and never decreased. So that means we need to reset things, somehow. I think your hands will always be directly involved. That will never change. It'll be something you can touch. Something like gyroscopes is close, but gyros are hard to control accurately. It needs to be something new and that allows for totally accurate control. Once that is discovered, everything will change."
Nagoshi's latest game, Binary Domain, is out now in Australia, due in Europe on February 24, and hits the US on February 28 - it uses robust, conversational voice control in addition to the controller.