Inafune: Japanese games industry needs to take more chances on 'the young guys'

As part of a new Gamasutra feature interview, Japanese industry veteran Keiji Inafune suggests that the biggest issue with the Japanese video game industry is that companies rely too heavily on older, more experienced talent, and don't take chances on "the young guys" enough. "They're thinking, 'It's just faster if I do it myself. If I do it myself, there's not the risk of it being a failure,'" he tells us. "They just don't really have the bravery to give the younger generation a chance." He continues, "If you look at the Japanese game industry in general, if you want to become a director, if you become a director by the time you're in your early 30s or mid-30s, that's pretty good in a major publisher or a major developer." "But at Comcept [one of Inafune's studios formed last year], we actually have two directors that are in their late 20s. So ultimately, we're giving people their chances at an earlier time. They would never have gotten these chances if they were at Capcom or some other big publisher." Inafune says that he believes in giving younger people a chance, teaching and training them from an early age, rather than seeing younger talent as inconvenient. The full interview, in which Inafune discusses how he plans to bolster the Japanese video games scene, is live now on Gamasutra.