So just what did The Killa, Iga, and Suda 51 have to say?
Giving his presentation wearing a Nirvana T-shirt, Goichi Suda, better known as Suda 51, gave one of the final and most unique talks at GDC. Suda’s talk, titled “Punk is Not Dead," focused on the need to maintain a “punk" spirit when developing games. He felt that this spirit is necessary to combat the decline of gaming in Japan. Filled with phrases like “Let’s Punk" and “No Game No Life," the presentation was intended to inspire developers to come up with original games.
Suda got his start in the game industry working at Human on games such as Super Fire Pro Wrestling Special. Seeing signs of the company’s imminent collapse, he decided to found his own studio, Grasshopper Manufacture. Though they developed several games, the first to make it to the US was the highly stylized action thriller, Killer 7 on GameCube. Contrary to other Japanese developers, Suda believes that current American and European games are vastly superior to Japanese ones.
Due to the original nature of Suda’s games, people often wonder how they came to be. Suda noted, “People always say to me, ‘You're probably on drugs when you do these games, right?’ No, I'm not. I don't do drugs. I don't smoke. I like alcohol, but I can't drink a lot." The director strives to develop games that nobody would even think of doing. He feels that while there are tons of games on the market, most of them are copycats. This wasn’t universally true, however, and Suda described Miyamoto as “a god" due to his creativity.
Suda spent some time discussing the role of director versus the role of producer. While he thinks that having a smaller, independent developer studio is important for creative artistry, he also noted the significance of having the game published on a console. Thus, the “punk" mentality must be balanced with business concerns and having a good producer is important. He credits Killer 7 producer and Resident Evil creator Shinji Mikami for providing him with the necessary support and insight, allowing him to create what he wanted rather than what would do well in the gaming market.
At the end of the presentation, Suda showed off the latest trailer for No More Heroes, a violent, stylized game under development for the Wii. The trailer showed several scenes with the character Travis Touchdown fighting and killing his enemies. Two other undisclosed Wii titles are also under development. In a surprise announcement, Suda also announced two games that would be coming to Nintendo DS. The first, The Silver Case, is a port of Grasshopper Manufacture’s first game, originally for PlayStation. The second is the sequel, The Silver Case: Ward 25, which is currently available on cell phones. Both of these games are text-based adventures, so Suda was unsure if they would be released in the US. Neither of the originals made it outside of Japan, but he does hope that the DS games will be translated.
Aaron Kaluszka, Staff Writer
