810°

Rumor: Three Dozen Team Ninja Members Leaving With Itagaki

Departing devs also supposedly suing Tecmo.

In case you thought Team Ninja's former boss, Tomonobu Itagaki, was leaving game publisher Tecmo as a solo act of attrition, think again. If that act was a single shot across Tecmo's bow, here comes the fusillade. Word on the street is that key members of Team Ninja -- as many as three dozen or more -- are headed out the door as well, but that's not all. It seems that each one of the soon to be ex-ninjas will be serving Tecmo with a class-action lawsuit in regards to unpaid bonuses for completed games.

BIoodmask6158d ago (Edited 6158d ago )

that was what was going to happen. Itagaki said that the members of Team Ninja were 'his close friends.' I figured if Itagaki left they would follow. Now Itagaki will most likely form his own studio with his old crew and still make high quality titles.

And in the meantime Tecmo will turn into something like EA. If you offer bonuses you should pay them out, simple as that. It's the little guys who are working the long hours to get the projects done and are making less money. While the corporate bigwigs rake in the bonuses and take 3 month vacations.

BISHOP-BRASIL6158d ago

Agree with everything... aside from the high quality tittles!

Sorry, couldn't resist.

Really, the guy is good, NG is good, but he don't need and no way have the right to be such an @ss. Do you see Kojima (MG, ZOE, Snatcher), Myiamoto (Mario, Zelda), Yokoi (early Metroid), Mikami (Resident Evil), Sakaguchi (early FF), Igarashi (Castlevania) Kitase and Nomura (actual FF, Kingdom Hearts) acting like that?

But I just missed the focus, if the guy don't get paid, he have the right to complain, independently if he believe to be god or not.

Superfragilistic6157d ago

If this is true it directly contradicts Tecmo's claims that this was an isolated incident and that the rest of Team Ninja were hard at work on further sequel. It would perhaps also further justify Itagaki's decision.

I just hope MS picks them up and forms a new studio.

@mistertwoturbo

That was a bit ignorant! What about the stellar studios Ensemble, Turn 10 and the largely successful arcade developer Carbonated Games? And don't forget Mistwalker and Wingnut Interactive along with strong alliances with Silicon Knights, Epic and Bungie (amongst others). :)

Bleucrunch6157d ago

They can leave but they aint doing nothing so forget them.

HateBoy6157d ago

I don't care about any of that, all I want is people working on a patch for NG2 which a) removes levels 9-10, and b) improves the camera. So they better hire some new people fast!

These new people should also be capable of beginning work on NG2 "White" which will fix the above mentioned issues as well as add a couple of levels and making Muramasa and Joe Hayabusa playable.

@bishop: You can bet your ass all those guys are grade-A asses in private as well as Itagaki, they just hide it when they are in contact with the media. He (Itagaki) got his face sliced up by the ninja who inspired him to do NG and he doesn't care about anything anymore. o_O, here come a million fanboys!

+ Show (1) more replyLast reply 6157d ago
Stryfeno16158d ago

Good for them...MS should step up and help them out because they had supported the Xbox brand from day one.

Sayai jin6158d ago

Well it seems that MS is in the drivers seat, now lets see if they make or break this. I would not doubt if they already have something lined up. Time will tell.

Game on...

meepmoopmeep6158d ago

agreed. MS should pick them up and make a 1st party dev studio with them. if the paperwork hasn't happened already.

Stryfeno16158d ago

I like to see what else they can do outside the NG and DOA ip. Team Ninja is a very talented group.

NG and DOA wont be the same without them.

mistertwoturbo6158d ago

Microsoft isn't that smart enough to start a first party developer. They'd rather drop another $50 million on DLC for something else.

Who knows, what if Itagaki starts his own production company if they win the lawsuit. That already would be an X360 exclusive company so either way it would be good for MS. But I just don't picture MS actually being the one that takes charge.

Xi6158d ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wik...

they have a couple first party developers already, they recently let bungie go independent and incorporated fasa studio (they still own all original IP's for fasa though, and the halo ip, as well as pgr).

Seraphim6158d ago (Edited 6158d ago )

I'd expect that if they don't want independent MS would scoop them up and create a development house for them. And if they do want to be independent I'd imagine they'll somehow get MS to help fund them. Even as an independent studio it's obvious they'll be creating exclusive 360 titles. Maybe even branching out and creating something on the DS. Whatever it is you can count on anything they now do not coming to the Playstation...

But the biggest question is this. How do they now go about creating a new IP and more importantly selling it. Do they create a new action/adventure IP, and fighting IP to continue doing what they've done? Do they start from scratch and do something totally new and unique? And just how creative and successful can they be in making a new IP? We all Itagaki isn't the best of storytellers. Whatever he does I'm sure you can count on plenty of blood and boobs.

+ Show (3) more repliesLast reply 6158d ago
Fatmanp6158d ago

I think MS need to get all of Team Ninja need to be picked up by MS and given a budget which will allow them to create a new IP to drive up the 360s appeal in Japan and bring more games with the production values of NG to the 360.

user8586216158d ago

either starting a new company or a gay pride parade

NinjaRyu6158d ago

I think I'll start talking one of your bubbles!

aaquib56158d ago

The last game they worked on was a 360 game...

JasonPC360PS3Wii6158d ago

Tt's ok though, you will just come back with a new account like all droids do.

Show all comments (77)
90°

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darthv721d 6h ago

Speaking as someone who uses xcloud, i havent really noticed much lag, if at all. I have used the service on a wide variety of devices. A VCR XBO, a One X, the logitech GCloud, steamdeck and my work PC. in all cases it just works and works really well. I was not interested at first in the idea of streaming a game, but then i really started using it as a way to gauge interest if a game is worth my time of downloading/installing and I just cant help but jump into new titles when they drop. I used to do the same with new releases on netflix so i can see why they make that similar proclimation.

Tacoboto7h ago(Edited 7h ago)

With Remote Play, the lag can be almost complete nonexistent too. My TV and Receiver glitched up really bad a few weeks ago and my Xbox wouldn't output through 4K 120hz for a few weird hours of power cycling these stupid devices, so I got to test this out while my Xbox just refused to output video through hdmi.

With a Backbone on my phone, and a controller connected to the console (hardwired into the modem through an Ethernet switch; my phone is connected to a Router that the modem routes to - so there is that extra network layer), I could not notice any difference. Avowed was set to the Balanced mode, maybe Performance would've exposed a lag with the extra frames but the response on my phone screen looked near exact from stick push to game response.

Cloud Gaming, playing something like South of Midnight feels responsive enough to me, and games like Pentiment you really really can't tell, and if you could, that's a game where lag would be inconsequential to the experience

Vits13h ago

I live in a city that has an Xbox Cloud server, and my local network uses Wi-Fi 6. I've used the service for quite a while. I can't really say I don't feel the latency. Some titles are completely unplayable for me, like Forza Horizon 5. But there are also many games where I barely notice it, such as A Crab's Treasure and Halo MCC.

Honestly, it's great that they're working on making it better. But the way it works right now is already pretty usable, and casual gamers, who I assume are the target audience, probably won't even notice the latency. The issue then becomes more of a commercial or marketing one, because casual gamers are either on mobile or console, and they probably don't even know Xbox Cloud exists, how much it costs, or how it works.

It also doesn't help that some of the most popular casual games aren't available on it at launch. Sports games from EA, for example, are always a couple of months late.

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S2Killinit1d 11h ago (Edited 1d 11h ago )

I would have included the Uncharted games as well. Good list though.

Yui_Suzumiya1d 10h ago

Island would be #1 but that would be anything from Frontwing.

QueenOfFrowns1d 9h ago

Haha it is not lost on me that two of the games in the top four were already novels before they were games

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