Tetsuya Mizuguchi: It’s certainly a trend, sure, but there are not so many cases of this happening yet. We should do this sort of thing more and more, because many publishers exist in the world, and there should be a closer chemistry between the West and the East. Yeah, we definitely need more of this happening.
SPOnG: It’s interesting because a few years ago, the trend seemed to be for Japanese studios to make games specifically for Western tastes and risk losing their own artistic style in the process. Do you think your method is a better way of getting your work to a worldwide stage?
Tetsuya Mizuguchi: I think so. It’s like a creative journey, when you work with different people, in different places and with different atmospheres. You create the development environment, so that everyone can work together efficiently and can share ideas… that’s why it was so fun to develop this game. My staff and I in Japan, and some staff in Paris… we were talking all the time, thinking what kind of game we should make.
It was a brilliant journey, and I don’t know if you could classify it as an East or West production - really, I don’t care, whatever. If you want to make a new kind of experience, you should have that same kind of environment.
Tetsuya Mizuguchi: I have made a couple of music videos, and that was important as a creative challenge. It keeps my mind fresh and gives me a lot of inspiration. I actually produced two 3D music videos last year, and that was creatively liberating. It wasn’t interactive, but I still enjoyed directing the objects and the fusions of sound and colour.
3D interactivity is something that’s totally new, and maybe it’s something I will use in a future production - maybe a future Child of Eden game. I haven’t quite decided yet, but I’m imagining 3D visuals, wearing the glasses, directly touching objects that come out at you. I think this is the future.
SPOnG: You seem to always have a lot of inspiration and ideas. Would you recommend trying all these experiences to get a new outlook on game development?
Tetsuya Mizuguchi: Absolutely. We need to have that kind of fresh inspiration all the time. We have to keep trying new challenges and not be afraid to go into the unknown. The games industry is expanding anyway, you’re finding games on smartphones and social networks - I couldn’t imagine that ten years ago. Now, people are playing with unknown people and working over language barriers just like that.
It’s those sorts of things that will change gaming in the future too. The industry is definitely expanding right now, and I say there’s no limit to where it can go. Maybe in the future we may not even refer to them as games, because they will be so ingrained into society. You could have an interactive product that might not even strictly be a game, which would see the industry explore other areas of society and industries too. I think that’s very exciting.
SPOnG: Thank you very much for your time!
Tetsuya Mizuguchi: Thank you!