Grasshopper Manufacture Licenses Unreal Engine 3

Tuesday, October 07, 2008

TOKYO, Oct. 7 /Xinhua-PRNewswire/ — Iconic Japanese developer Grasshopper Manufacture has licensed Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 for a new multiplatform action horror game to be published by Electronic Arts Inc. (Nasdaq: ERTS). The new game is directed by innovative game designer Suda51 and produced by legendary Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami.

"Unreal Engine 3 is a powerful, easy-to-implement game engine that is helping the creative team at Grasshopper quickly bring our vision to life," said Goichi Suda, CEO of Grasshopper Manufacture. "The innovative tools and technology in Unreal Engine 3 help developers create games faster, easier and with less risk."

"It's an honor to work with Suda-san and Mikami-san on their next project," said Jay Wilbur, Vice president, Epic Games. "Grasshopper Manufacture is one of the most daring and innovative studios in the world, and we can't wait to see what they're able to do with Unreal Engine 3.

For more information about Grasshopper Manufacture, please visit http://www.grasshoppermanufacture.com

For more information about Epic Games, please visit http://www.epicgames.com

For more information about EA, please visit our press Web site at http://info.ea.com

About Grasshopper Manufacture Inc

Grasshopper Manufacture Inc. is an independent interactive entertainment studio based in Suginami-ku, Tokyo. The studio was founded in 1998 by CEO Goichi Suda, who is known around the world for his distinctive style and innovative work as a game designer and scenario writer. To date, Grasshopper Manufacture has shipped 11 titles, including 2007's breakout hit, "No More Heroes." More information about GhM can be found on the internet at http://www.grasshopper.co.jp/

About Epic Games

Epic Games, Inc., based in Cary, NC and established in 1991, develops cutting-edge games and cross-platform game engine technology. The company has created multiple million-selling, award-winning titles in its Unreal series, most recently shipping Unreal Tournament 3 for PC, PLAYSTATION(R) and Xbox 360(R). Epic's breakthrough game, Gears of War, sold 5 million copies and won over 30 game of the year awards. The highly anticipated sequel, Gears of War 2, is scheduled for release on November 7, 2008. Epic's Unreal Engine 3 is the current holder and three-time consecutive winner of Game Developer magazine's Best Engine Front Line Award. Additional information about Epic can be obtained through the Epic Games Web site at http://www.epicgames.com .

About Electronic Arts

Electronic Arts Inc. (EA), headquartered in Redwood City, California, is the world's leading interactive entertainment software company. Founded in 1982, the Company develops, publishes, and distributes interactive software worldwide for video game systems, personal computers, cellular handsets and the Internet. Electronic Arts markets its products under four brand names: EA SPORTSTM, EATM, EA SPORTS Freestyle TM and POGOTM. In fiscal 2008, EA posted GAAP net revenue of $3.67 billion and had 27 titles that sold more than one million copies. EA's homepage and online game site is http://www.ea.com . More information about EA's products and full text of press releases can be found on the Internet at http://info.ea.com .

EA, EA SPORTS, EA SPORTS Freestyle and POGO are trademarks or registered trademark in the U.S. and/or other countries\ Epic, Epic Games, Unreal, Unreal Engine, Unreal Tournament and Gears of War are trademarks or registered trademarks of Epic Games, Inc. in the United States of America and elsewhere. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

SOURCE Electronic Arts Inc.

Suda51's PS1 Game The Silver Case Coming to PSN [1UP]

Suda tells the Official Nintendo Magazine that the main character of No More Heroes, originally planned as an Xbox 360 title, was inspired by a pants down sit down session.

"I actually came up with the initial idea for a game featuring a [Johnny] Knoxville-style character whilst on the toilet," Suda says. "I decided to use that inspiration as the save game mechanic." Knoxville's penchant for Jackass toilet humor, we assume, was Suda's muse, as it later also fostered inspiration for one of the game's more memorable marketing campaigns.

The Making Of No More Heroes [ONM UK]

According to an MTV Multiplayer discussion with EA Partners group general manager David DeMartini, Suda51 and Shinji Mikami aren't the only Japanese talent the pub has its eye on.

See there's a board — a secret board — at EAP with names of good "gets" from all over the globe.

DeMartini tells MTV that "it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to guess who might be on the board or who might not be on the board," noting that "EA looks at the top 20 developers in the world and we try to sign anything those guys are working on."

The goal with Grasshopper, apparently, is to bring the developer from the minor leagues — a hit with critics and the Insert Credit crowd — to the majors, shifting millions of units, not tens of thousands. Even Mikami said it's all about the money.

For speculation on who else might be on the board — folks like Hideo Kojima — venture forth for the full piece.

EA Wants To Sign More Japanese Developers, Teases Board Covered In Secret Plans [MTV Multiplayer]

Here's how AJ earned her keep this week:

Battlefield Heroes – Battling The Stigma Of Battlefield
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince – Wii Impressions
Tetris, Spore, Scrabble and Sudoku – EA’s iPhone lineup
Boogie SuperStar – Objectifying And Empowering Tween Girls Everywhere
Celebrity Sports Showdown Impressions
The Odd Couple - EA & Grasshopper or Suda 51 & Shinji Mikami
Epic's New Game – President Tells All

And stay tuned next week for more from EA's 08 Showcase and some stuff on those mysterious events I'm not allowed to talk about yet.

Thanks for the big welcome, y'all! (And I can say that because I'm from Texas, so back off.)

I went into my interview with the two Japanese developers with a bunch of questions I knew I couldn’t ask; I lived in Japan long enough to learn that the direct approach is usually not the best. The questions I did ask, though, had some fun answers:

“What do you think of MadWorld?” I shot this one off at Suda directly and he didn’t even wait for the translator. His face lit up and he exclaimed something about how cool it looked – like Sin City. And something about how he had a similar idea, but my Japanese ain’t that great, so I had to wait for the translator to explain that Suda had a similar idea for a futuristic game that now he couldn’t do because it would look too much like MadWorld.

Mikami didn’t seem as thrilled. He’s an “external board member” at Platinum Games, so he probably knows all the guys on MadWorld’s dev team and wouldn’t want to comment on anything of theirs that could be secret. Mikami is the man for horror, though, and that’s how this odd partnership came about.

Suda 51 makes his games with a story first and fits them to genre later. His newest idea (the mysterious new project to be published by EA) seemed to fit well with the horror genre and so he took it to Mikami.

Now we get into globalization business talk. Skip this paragraph if you don’t give a damn. The Japanese gaming industry is mostly closed off from Western gaming; at least, they’re not as chummy as the US gaming industry is with the European industry. The tendency for independent developers in Japan is to find a big studio with a Western presence (Capcom, Sega, etc.) and work through them. But every independent developer is always afraid of having their idea screwed with in the name of brand marketing, and in Japan, the eternal “We’ll think about it” runaround keeps games from getting made for years at a time. Not so with EA. Mikami and Suda pitched their idea and received an instant “When can we start?” which lead to GHM’s new partnership with EA. So while it might look weird on paper to see Mikami paired with Suda and GHM paired with EA – it all makes sense in the global view of gaming politics.

Mikami especially wants to give Japanese developers the chance to go global; and Suda says collaboration is the future of gaming. There are a lot of rock star developers in Japan (Kojima, Miyamoto, Itagaki, etc.) that want to take their ideas to a worldwide audience and that’s always good for the market.

Or at least it’s good for me – I heart Japanese games.

I also heart horror games, so this is going to be an amazing year for me – Left 4 Dead, Resident Evil 5, Dead Space… That’s an awful lot of horror games on the market already.

What do Suda and Mikami think about the possibility of too many horror games? Not much, really. They like horror too – and more horror can only be good. Bear in mind though, that Suda is an action man first and foremost. So whatever we see from the dream team is going to be a blend of action horror; with Suda as the action and Mikami as the horror. We will not see Resident Evil: The No More Heroes Experience, and we probably won’t see Killer 7 Part 2: Electric Boogaloo.

The last thing we talked about in that awkward interview of my lousy Japanese, their lousy English and the translator trying to keep up (don’t you just love language barriers?) was the concept of developing games for multiple platforms. Like Epic Games, GHM doesn’t believe in making a game and then trying to squeeze it onto a system in a watered-down form to fit the audience; but they are determined to bring their game to as many people as possible.

The number one challenge, Suda says, is developing for the Wii. Its audience is less cut-and-dried than the 360/PS3/PC crowd (what with the inclusion of old people, young people and casual gamers) and what appeals to Wii people might not appeal to 360/PS3/PC people. He just has to have faith that his idea is good enough on its own to bring in the fans and not worry so much about maxing out an audience on a specific console.

I’ve got to say I was feeling pretty good about the mystery project when I was ushered out of the door. It normally irks me when a studio gives the “we can’t tell you” spiel, but Suda 51 and Shinji Mikami are guys who know what they’re doing. And hopefully EA trusts them to make an awesome game as much as I do; but then, if they didn’t, they wouldn’t have made them partners, right?

Shinji Mikami: Money. [Laughs]

Goichi Suda: I was really surprised at things such as the size of their studios and their massive marketing and production teams. I've never had the experience of working on such a massive team before. We haven't done voice recording yet, but I know EA would be a huge help in finding talent and getting them to the studio and the motion capture as well. In other cases, I would want to do something before but couldn't, and since working with EA, they've provided everything I wanted. I get tremendous support from EA... Of course I had a chance to present it to different publishers, but EA was the company that understood the game and understood my approach to it. That's why I took the chance to work with EA. Also, EA produced Rock Band, so they understand the "soul of rock."

Shinji Mikami: ...Also, EA has strong marketing power. If Suda just keeps on doing what he wants to do, players might not understand what they're playing. But with EA's strong marketing power, they know what people want from a game, and we combine both their knowledge and his creativity to help create a better game.

This is one to watch.

Mikami and Suda Talk EA Partnership [1Up]

The press release, which does not provide a date for the game, notes that Q Entertainment, responsible for Lumines and Rez HD, helped broker the publishing gig and will be working with Grasshopper on the project. Insert fanboy squeal here, hit the jump for more details.

EA SIGNS PUBLISHING DEAL WITH GRASSHOPPER MANUFACTURE
Legendary Producer Shinji Mikami and Innovative Designer Suda51 Working with EA Partners on an All-New Action Horror Title

Redwood City, Calif – August 14, 2008 – Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ: ERTS) today announced a publishing agreement with iconic Japanese development studio Grasshopper Manufacture. Under the terms of the deal, EA Partners will publish an all-new action horror game produced by Shinji Mikami and directed by innovative game designer Suda51.

The title is being developed for the PC, Xbox 360® video game system from Microsoft, PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system and Wii™.

“Grasshopper Manufacture is excited to work with EA Partners to bring our new title to gamers around the world,” said Goichi Suda, CEO of Grasshopper Manufacture. “They are a great partner who shares our commitment to quality and innovation while respecting our independence as a studio, which is very empowering.”

“It is an honor for EA to sign Grasshopper Manufacture and help bring their new franchise to gamers worldwide,” said Frank Gibeau, President of the EA Games Label. “The roster of partners at EA is growing and the caliber of talent is outstanding. Grasshopper Manufacture is a world-class studio and, within the EA partner program, they stand alongside some of the world’s most revered independent studios.”

“Grasshopper Manufacture is one of the most daring and innovative independent studios in the world, and EA Partners is honored to be working with Mikami-san and Suda-san on this new project,” said David DeMartini, senior vice president and general manager, EA Partners. “EA Partners is a truly global resource for the world’s best independent developers, whether they’re in North America, Europe or Asia.”

The deal was brokered by CAA, in conjunction with Q Entertainment who will be working with Grasshopper Manufacture and EAP on the project.

For more information about Grasshopper Manufacture, please visit www.grasshoppermanufacture.com

For more information about EA, please visit our press Web site at http://info.ea.com

About Grasshopper Manufacture Inc
Grasshopper Manufacture Inc. is an independent interactive entertainment studio based in Suginami-ku, Tokyo. The studio was founded in 1998 by CEO Goichi Suda, who is known around the world for his distinctive style and innovative work as a game designer and scenario writer. To date, Grasshopper Manufacture has shipped 11 titles, including 2007’s breakout hit, “No More Heroes.” More information about GhM can be found on the internet at http://www.grasshopper.co.jp/

About Electronic Arts

Electronic Arts Inc. (EA), headquartered in Redwood City, California, is the world's leading interactive entertainment software company. Founded in 1982, the Company develops, publishes, and distributes interactive software worldwide for video game systems, personal computers, cellular handsets and the Internet. Electronic Arts markets its products under four brand names: EA SPORTSTM, EATM, EA SPORTS Freestyle TM and POGOTM. In fiscal 2008, EA posted GAAP net revenue of $3.67 billion and had 27 titles that sold more than one million copies. EA's homepage and online game site is www.ea.com. More information about EA's products and full text of press releases can be found on the Internet at http://info.ea.com.

EA, EA SPORTS, EA SPORTS Freestyle and POGO are trademarks or registered trademark in the U.S. and/or other countries. Xbox 360 is a trademark of the Microsoft group of companies and is used under license from Microsoft. “PLAYSTATION” is a registered trademark of Sony Computer Entertainment Inc. Wii is a trademark of Nintendo. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

Gamasutra has a great interview up with Masafumi Takada, best known for his work on the Grasshopper Manufacture games killer7 and No More Heroes and contributor on projects ranging from Super Smash Bros. Brawl to Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles. The interview covers a ton of ground, from what it's like to work with Goichi Suda to Takada's work on Samurai Champloo to his theory on composing for games:

Music is really tied to your experiences and memories, similar to how your sense of smell is. If you hear music that you've heard before, it should bring memories from that previous time rushing back. So the game is of course a virtual world, where there are naturally things that don't have any relation to reality.

But perhaps these experiences could happen to you in the future. The music will be tied to these potential future experiences. So I want to create music that will tie you to, and remind you of, the virtual world, but also come back to you in the real world, and create future memories. The soundtrack should recall your old memories, but also help forge new ones.

After you've played the game, when you listen to just the music, I want players to be able to remember the feelings they had at that time, and their feelings of that era.

I, like most people, have an unholy mix of music on my 'favorites' list on my iPod; it's always nice to have some of my favorite gaming tracks sandwiched between diverse music and have those tracks stand out in a good way ('Really? That's from a video game?' is a reasonably common refrain from non-gamer passengers in my car). We do get so attached to music, and I'm so attached to music from some of my favorite games — to think of it as something that should be part of the memory process and not merely unobtrusive background is something that's not new, but important to remember. Somewhat lengthy interview that's certainly worth perusing.

Masafumi Takada: Grasshopper's Musical Craftsman [Gamasutra]

Zero Punctuation: No More Heroes [The Escapist]

UNTITLED PLATINUM GAMES PROJECT
One of our spies informs us that Grasshopper is currently discussing a new game with the ex-Clover studio.

[Thanks, 87th!]

I want to make a Super Mario game for adults...Maybe Mario could wear an Italian suit and have a machine gun...But Nintendo probably wouldn't like that idea.

With a gun.

Suda wants to make 'Mario with guns' [CVG][image]

So what did the critics think? Hit the jump for our Frankenreview to find out: not quite every review, but probably more than you're going to read anyway.

IGNYou've got the GTA free-roaming that is used for doing individual missions, exploring the city of Santa Destroy, and hitting up a few shops and training areas, which leads the way for the action-oriented story. If the game was based only on the open world style, it would have been a pretty sizable disappointment as far as we're concerned, as there are constant frame issues, pop-in everywhere, very little NPC activity, and a huge overall lack of polish...What it all boils down to is about 10 or so stores and buildings to go into, a handful of mission points that bring you into new loading zones, and some mini-game jobs which are fun, but hardly necessitate an entire open world.

Gamespot
The crux of the action is found in No More Heroes' numerous and impressive boss encounters, where you'll use these subtleties to your advantage, though they don't usually present a foreboding challenge until the final few fights. Yet they're still enormously entertaining, thanks to your opponents' melodramatic (and often hysterical) soliloquizing, interesting attacks, and pure wackiness. Holly Summers launches missiles at you from her fake leg, while Stage magician Harvey Moiseiwitsch Volodarskii locks you up in the box used for his disappearing act...

NGamer
Never before have we played a game that felt so completely in love with being a game - text is rendered in an eighties pixellated font, your map's a sloppy digital display, the whole HUD ripped from Grand Theft Auto without mercy or apology; the ten best assassins table is the high score chart from a 1984 coin-op and the pause menu is like a scene from Tron.

4 Color RebellionThe music in is excellent. The No More Heroes theme is catchy and runs in several variations throughout the game. Fans of Lumines will recognize the song "Heavenly Star" by the Genki Rockets and you can even watch the song's music video from a tape in Travis's apartment...The voice acting is over the top and often hilarious. People have ridiculous accents, crazy rants, and seem to be doing nothing but spouting catch phrases. The dialogue is not good in an Oscar Wilde sort of way, but it is good in an "Army of Darkness" sort of way. No one really sounds like a real person, but nothing in this game ever feels very real to begin with.

InsomniaIn regards to the first point, what's happened here is that the remote/nunchuk functionality is used to mask how terribly shallow the fighting system is. So shallow, that it is quite possible to win half the fights in the game by — get this — turning your back on the TV and mashing the A button while vigorously shaking the remote in random directions.

Back to us—not dissimilarly from the public's reaction to Killer7, No More Heroes garners polar reactions. But that doesn't mean you shouldn't give it a shot.

1. Boring
2. Not super clear
3. Nor concise
4. Dull
5. Synonym of dull

But this No More Heroes manual is modeled after a comic book and looks to lack Wiimote sketches altogether. Why not take a risk on the manual? It's not like you are going to disappoint anyone if the idea's a miss. Of course, if it is fantastic, chances are that no one will notice then, either.

Marvelous! No More Heroes has a comic book manual [siliconera]

No More Heroes Website
[Thanks, Luis]

I am a huge fan of this series, especially Crimson Butterfly and the prospect of having it on the Wii is intriguing. Seeing how much I enjoyed the point and shoot aspects of Wii remote with RE4, controlling a camera with it seems like a perfect fit. And with Grasshopper Manufacture on board, it's bound to be a title worth checking out.

Editor's Note: So, It seems that this story is a bit contradictory to what Suda himself told our own Luke Plunkett at TGS which was that his next project was going to be for the 360. Perhaps a portion of Grasshopper is working on the project but not Suda himself? An email missive has gone out to Suda and we will let you know what's up as soon as we hear back from him.

Tecmo Planning Next Fatal Frame for Wii [1Up]
[Graphic courtesy Asterick]

Killer.

America Has No More Heroes [IGN]

...more than anything we felt that Grasshopper's style is more suited to the foreign than the local Japanese market...
The Japanese fans are very important to me too, but we want to make a big breakthrough with the Grasshopper name someday, and to that end it's not enough for us to just focus on the Japanese market. I can't give you an exact percentage, but the Western market is extremely important.
When I make games, I always put in a lot of effort toward making them with an image of the Western audience in mind. The Western market is that important to me. I don't make games with only the Japanese in mind, I treat it as though people from all around the world are going to play my games.

...the American and European audiences are more receptive to new games. They welcome change. The Japanese are more close minded and the market is showing signs of rejection towards new games. I think that's the main reason.

Grasshopper Interview [Gamasutra]

While such a listing may simply be an error, it would make a great deal of sense. Killer 7's on-rails gameplay and point-and-shoot action are a good fit for the Wii-remote. Plus, the game would take advantage of the Wii's expanded audience, filling in holes in the console's "mature" category. Still, checking with the usual online retail suspects turns up nothing and recent interviews with Grasshoper honcho Goichi Suda reveal no hints about such a project.

I've got an e-mail in with Capcom to see what they have to say. While this is simply a rumor, something about it smells of truthiness. Michael McWhertor

Killer 7 [Capcom via NeoGAF]