GungHo merger lets Suda focus more on the creative side
I, along with many of you, was pretty surprised to learn that Grasshopper Manufacture merged with GungHo Online Entertainment earlier this year. Personally, I was worried that this would ultimately hurt Suda51’s studio, but as it turns out that’s not the case at all.
“Even before the February 1 announcement, we were talking about creating a game together so we already had that synchronized vibe together,” Suda told me during the Game Developers Conference. “Now that we’re working together, as Grasshopper we get to concentrate more solely on the creative side. It gives me more freedom and not [have to] worry about the other stuff.”
The merger also gives Suda51 the chance to leverage GungHo’s knowledge of how to make online games:
“I think the biggest part of our [partnership] is [GungHo’s] online vision, their online capability is something that Grasshopper [was] lacking. That’s one of those things that we really want to utilize and try to work together to create something new.”
“We weren’t able to make it into Killer Is Dead but in the future I want to create Grasshopper games that people can play online. So not just end it with an ending but [offer] continuous replay.”
Suda wasn’t ready to talk anything specific, but they are looking to do stuff in the realms of both co-op and versus type online multiplayer.
