PlatinumGames Wasn't "Experienced Enough" to Make Scalebound, Says Kamiya

PlatinumGames Wasn't "Experienced Enough" to Make Scalebound, Says Kamiya

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Matt Lorrigan

PlatinumGames co-founder Hideki Kamiya has gone into further detail on the cancellation of Scalebound, the planned Xbox-exclusive that was in development at the Bayonetta and Vanquish studio.

The new details come from the Cutscenes YouTube channel (transcribed by VGC) and sees Kamiya explain how Scalebound came to be, but also what lead to its cancellation.

“Teaming up with Microsoft [on Scalebound] meant releasing the game on the [Xbox One] console. I once again had the desire to make a high-end game. I wanted to go back to something photorealistic,” explains Kamiya.

“I loved fantasy worlds since I was a child. I’ve always enjoyed worlds with swords, magic, and dragons… I always wanted to make something around that theme. This is how I thought of a world revolving around a young man fighting together with a dragon. However, it was a big challenge for PlatinumGames.”

While the concept appeared to be sound, Kamiya says that PlatinumGames lacked the correct experience to make Scalebound's planned online features a reality.

“We were working in an environment we weren’t used to. We were developing on the Unreal engine, we also lacked the necessary know-how to build a game based on online features… the hurdles we had to overcome were very big. We weren’t experienced enough and couldn’t get over that wall, leading to what happened in the end.”

“I’m sorry to the players who looked forward to it, and moreover I’m sorry to Microsoft who had placed their trust in us as a business partner. I want to apologize both as a creator and as a member of PlatinumGames.”

Kamiya has previously said that “both sides failed” when talking about Scalebound's cancellation, in response to player sentiment generally placing the blame on Microsoft. You can see the full Kamiya documentary in the video down below.

Comments
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  • Not to mention Xbox had Marc Whitten at the time and that guy was crap Phil would've helped every possible way
  • @Scardro Phil was already the head of Xbox when Scalebound was cancelled.
  • @Ralos yes Phil took over Xbox during that time but Marc was the leader at Xbox for the 1st year and a half of the Scalebound's development
  • Sounds like Scalebound was going to be heavy on online features. I probably wouldn’t have liked it then.
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