Suda Rumor & Poor Journalism

I didn't really want to talk about this, but it's spreading like a virus and someone needs to inject some common sense into the lunacy that is the videogame media. See, a game magazine posted an interview with Goichi Suda, the creator of No More Heroes, in which he supposedly said something like this:

I think this is the last NMH that is going to be developed on Wii. To expand NMH to new possibilities, we need a new platform. Wii is a great platform, but we've done everything we can with it now.

I don't know if that's the official version or one of the many versions floating around the net, but he supposedly said something like that. I say supposedly because of two important reasons:

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1. He's only said this to one publication.
2. He doesn't speak english and translation issues are not uncommon.

If Suda had been saying or even hinting he was ditching Nintendo to multiple publications in multiple interviews then this would be a lot easier to swallow, but this is the first we've heard him rail on the Wii like this. Maybe he will continue to, I don't know, but there needs to be a pattern for me to believe he really feels that way. Then there are the translation issues and there are so many, so often in the videogame news business that at this point anything translated from Japanese needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

Now let me address this rumor as if it were true before pointing out the stupidity of the videogame media. If it is true that Suda really said this it was incredibly stupid of him to do so. First of all he has multiple Wii games that are coming out and the last thing you want to do is piss off the people you are trying to sell something to. Telling Wii gamers that he can't make anymore games for them because their console sucks isn't the way to promote your products.

Secondly, him saying that he needs a new platform to expand NMH is pure insanity. No More Heroes is a very low budget, technically inferior game. I love it and think it's excellent, but there's no way in hell it even starts to utilize all the power of the Wii. Implying that you've done everything you can on a system when all you've done is one low budget game that could have easily been done on the PS2 is dishonest at best.

If Goichi Suda really feels this way he will be nothing more than another videogame industry asshole who gets popular then shits on the people who made him popular in the first place. He hasn't tapped the Wii in any way so if he is leaving it's because of money. Somebody, somewhere offered him a lot of money and now he wants to jump ship. I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft threw him some cash since he now seems to think Natal is the greatest thing ever - a prototype peripheral that hasn't proven itself in any way, shape or form.

I want to stress that I don't believe this rumor is true or that Suda is dumping on the people who got him to where he is now... yet. I hope it's not true, but only time will tell.

Finally, with this mess the videogame media have once again shown off their incredible lack of standards and Journalistic credentials. Not only have multiple publications spread this quote around as truth and fact, they haven't bothered to get a clarification or try to find out if he really feels this way. A developer who just found success (for the first time in his life), on the Wii suddenly dumping on it is pretty important yet no one cares to get to the bottom of the story or make sure it's true to begin with. Of course this should come as no surprise since the vast majority of the videogame media would love nothing more than for developers to ditch the Wii.