Hideaki Itsuno

Hideaki Itsuno (伊津野 英昭, Itsuno Hideaki) is a Japanese video game director and video game designer. He has been employed by Capcom for most of his career.[1] He is best known as the director of the Power Stone, Devil May Cry and Dragon's Dogma series. He was also behind many of Capcom's popular fighting game series such as Darkstalkers, Street Fighter Alpha, Capcom vs SNK, Street Fighter III and Rival Schools.

Hideaki Itsuno
伊津野 英昭
Born (1970-08-25) August 25, 1970
Osaka, Japan
NationalityJapanese
OccupationVideo game director, video game designer
Years active1992–present
Known forDevil May Cry
Dragon's Dogma
Street Fighter Alpha
Rival Schools: United by Fate
Darkstalkers
Powerstone
Capcom vs SNK
Websitetwitter.com/tomqe

Career

Early years (1992–2001)

Hideaki Itsuno's earliest work with Capcom was in 1992, where he worked on Quiz & Dragons: Capcom Quiz Game as a designer. He would go on to develop many fighting games throughout the 90's, such as Street Fighter Alpha Series, Star Gladiator, Street Fighter III, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure, Rival Schools: United By Fate, Power Stone, One Piece Mansion, Darkstalkers and Capcom vs SNK 2, the latter four where he served as director.

Devil May Cry series

Despite the success of the original Devil May Cry, its director Hideki Kamiya did not return to work on the sequel.[2][3] While the name of the original director assigned to Devil May Cry 2 is unknown, Hideaki Itsuno would be credited as director despite his limited time on Devil May Cry 2,[4] Hideaki Itsuno was only brought onto the project at the tail-end of development in order to steer the project back on course after the shortcomings of the original unidentified director of DMC2.[5] Nonetheless, the game received mixed reviews.[6] Since its release, Hideki Kamiya has defended Hideaki Itsuno as not being responsible for DMC2's shortcomings,[7] and has expressed disappointment at his exclusion from working on the series.[8]

Following the lukewarm reception for Devil May Cry 2, Capcom chose to return to the design philosophy of the series' more successful first entry for Devil May Cry 3, this time allowing Hideaki Itsuno to work on the project as director on Day 1 of the project's development. Gameplay elements such as the size of environments and the game's battle engine were reconsidered, and common criticisms such as decreases to Dante's cockiness and the game's difficulty were brought back in line with the first game.[9] These changes were met with praise and the game was very well-received.[10]

Itsuno returned to direct Devil May Cry 4.[11] He stated that the visual design sought to deliver a satisfying sensation of floating in the air, and that the actions of Nero's Devil Bringer could not be done on contemporary generation consoles, necessitating a new generation of consoles such as the PlayStation 3.[12] Devil May Cry 4 (2008) was met with both commercial and critical success.

The next game in the series, DmC: Devil May Cry, was developed by British developer Ninja Theory; Itsuno was the supervising director on that project.[13] When discussing this decision, Itsuno said: "With DmC this time, we wanted to avoid the problem that befalls some series where you keep making it with the same team, same hardware, and it tends to decrease and fans move away from it... We don’t want the series to die."[14] The development team included over ninety members, several of whom were from Capcom. Alex Jones and Motohide Eshiro acted as producers, aiming to help Ninja Theory make DmC play like the previous Devil May Cry games.[15] Itsuno's latest work, Devil May Cry 5, was released in 2019.[16]

Dragon's Dogma

Itsuno later directed Dragon's Dogma.[17] During the press conference at Capcom's Captivate event in 2011, he stated that Dragon's Dogma was a game he had been dreaming of making since his school days; it was finally a project he could realize now due to advancing technology. At the time of the press conference, he had been directing a staff of 150 people at Capcom Japan for three years of concept and project development.[18][19]

Itsuno stated that his team had "made Dragon's Dogma and come up to this point through our experience of action games. We're trying to make a new genre: We're using our action heritage and putting that into an action RPG."[17] He cited the influence of Capcom's previous works (such as Breath of Fire,[17] Resident Evil, Devil May Cry, and Monster Hunter), other Eastern RPGs such as Dragon Quest, and Western RPGs such as Fable and Oblivion.[17] Itsuno later explained that they had "seen a great deal of open-world action RPGs over the years," but that they still desired "one that really put everything together in the action parts. We figured that if there hasn't been a game made by people who understand how action works, then we ought to do it ourselves. We wanted a game where the player is thrown into the world and needs to figure out how to stay alive via nothing but his own controller." However, the game was designed to allow players to take a less action-oriented approach, with Itsuno stating that they "[made] this game such that you can beat the monsters even if you build up EXP, collect good companions and/or pawns, and sit back and watch the battle unfold." He elaborated that while it is an action game, "that's not all that it is. You can fully configure your party and put as much thought as you like into battle, which is something we're doing for people who really want to get into this world."[20]

Initially, Dragon's Dogma was intended to be a Western fantasy game.[21] In March 2012, Itsuno said he hoped the game would sell 10 million copies worldwide and one million in Japan.[22][23] It was successful upon release, prompting Capcom to begin development on a sequel.[24] Itsuno reports that the team was only able to accomplish 60-70% of what they had wanted to in the first game, and hope to include those ideas in the sequel.[25]

Future

In 2012, Itsuno hinted that the Rival Schools and Capcom vs. SNK series may see a revival.[26][27] The former series was once again hinted in the next year alongside the possibility of a new Devil May Cry entry. Itsuno has also expressed interest in developing a fighting game that would recreate the influence Street Fighter II had on the genre.[28]

Works
Video games
Year Title Notes
1992 Quiz & Dragons: Capcom Quiz Game Planner
1995 Street Fighter Alpha Planner
1996 Star Gladiator Director
1997 Rival Schools: United By Fate Director
1998 JoJo's Bizarre Adventure Planner
1999 Power Stone Co-director
2000 Power Stone 2 Director
Capcom vs. SNK: Millennium Fight 2000 Planner
Project Justice Director
Darkstalkers Chronicle: The Chaos Tower Director
2001 One Piece Mansion Director
Capcom vs. SNK 2: Mark of the Millennium 2001 Director
2002 GioGio's Bizarre Adventure Planner
Auto Modellista Director
2003 Devil May Cry 2 Replacement director[lower-alpha 1]
Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne Miscellaneous crew
Resident Evil Outbreak Special thanks
2004 Resident Evil Outbreak: File #2 Special thanks
Capcom Fighting Evolution Consultant
2005 Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening Director
2006 Devil May Cry 3: Special Edition Director
2008 Devil May Cry 4 Director
2012 Dragon's Dogma Director
Project X Zone Supervision & cooperation[lower-alpha 2]
2013 DmC: Devil May Cry Supervising director
Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen Executive producer
2015 DmC: Devil May Cry - Definitive Edition Supervising director
Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition Director
2019 Devil May Cry 5 Director

References
  1. Only on last 5 months of development
  2. Devil May Cry series and Rival Schools series
  1. Yin, Wesley (2012-11-05). "Dragon's Dogma taught Capcom new tricks that give Devil May Cry the feel of 60 frames per second, publisher claims". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 2014-02-01. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  2. Team Little Devils (17 October 2001). Devil May Cry. Capcom Entertainment, Inc. Scene: staff credits.
  3. Kristan Reed (20 February 2003). "The Devil's in the detail". Eurogamer. Eurogamer Network Ltd. Archived from the original on 14 January 2011. Retrieved 19 October 2010.
  4. Capcom (25 January 2003). Devil May Cry 2. Capcom Entertainment, Inc. Scene: staff credits.
  5. Bob Mackey (29 June 2015). "The Devil's Own: Capcom's Hideaki Itsuno on a Decade-Plus with Dante". USgamer. Archived from the original on 29 April 2016. Retrieved 9 March 2016.
  6. "Devil May Cry 2". Metacritic. Archived from the original on 2017-07-09. Retrieved 2017-06-14.
  7. Kamiya, 神谷英樹 Hideki (2016-02-23). "Itsuno joined DMC2 team to rescue it from the crisis, but it was too late. Even if I were him, I couldn't have done better than he did". @PG_kamiya. Archived from the original on 2018-09-28. Retrieved 2017-06-14.
  8. Mielke, James (2006-08-18). "The Kamiya Touch". Archived from the original on 2013-01-16. Retrieved 2008-07-20.
  9. Brightman, James (2005-04-06). "Devil May Cry 3 Poised for Success". GameDaily. Archived from the original on September 29, 2007. Retrieved 2007-04-12.
  10. "Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening". Metacritic. Archived from the original on 2013-04-28. Retrieved 2017-06-14.
  11. Christian Nutt (2012-06-23). "Devil May Cry 4's creative minds". GamesRadar. Archived from the original on 2013-10-25. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  12. "IGN: New Hero for DMC4". IGN. Archived from the original on 2008-09-05. Retrieved 2008-07-08.
  13. "Capcom devs describe the 'long-distance romance' with Ninja Theory that led to DmC". Polygon. 2013-01-30. Archived from the original on 2014-02-01. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  14. "DmC Devil May Cry: "We don't want the series to die" | NowGamer". NowGamer. 2012-12-12. Archived from the original on 2018-08-08. Retrieved 2017-06-14.
  15. "DmC Devil May Cry Development Team Has Over 90 Members". Siliconera. October 16, 2012. Archived from the original on February 3, 2013. Retrieved October 16, 2012.
  16. "Capcom Brings Back Hideaki Itsuno for Devil May Cry 5". Bleeding Cool. Archived from the original on 2018-06-18. Retrieved 2018-06-15.
  17. "Dragon's Dogma: How Hideaki Itsuno is taking on Skyrim and the world". VideoGamer.com. 20 March 2012. Archived from the original on 25 May 2012. Retrieved 16 April 2012.
  18. Gantayat, Anoop (April 13, 2011). "Dragon's Dogma Revealed". andriasang. Archived from the original on March 23, 2013. Retrieved April 13, 2011.
  19. Anoop Gantayat (April 13, 2011). "A Few Bits About Dragon's Dogma". andriasang. Archived from the original on March 23, 2013. Retrieved April 13, 2011.
  20. Gifford, Kevin (2011-04-13). "Dragon's Dogma Explained By Staff: A single-player multiplayer RPG?". 1UP.com. Archived from the original on 2011-07-21. Retrieved 17 April 2012.
  21. JC Fletcher (2011-06-12). "Dragon's Dogma preview: A song of 'ice and fire'". Joystiq. Archived from the original on 2014-02-01. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  22. "A million sales pretty much guaranteed for Dragon's Dogma in Japan". Videogamer.com. Archived from the original on 2014-02-01. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  23. Dutton, Fred (2012-03-20). "Dragon's Dogma can sell 10 million worldwide, reckons Capcom". Eurogamer. Archived from the original on 2014-02-01. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  24. Evans-Thirlwell, Edwin (25 June 2012). "Dragon's Dogma 2 on the way, original ships one million worldwide". Official Xbox Magazine. Archived from the original on 23 March 2013. Retrieved 21 July 2012.
  25. "Game Creators Are Constantly Looking To The Future. Here's What A Few Of Them Are Looking At". Kotaku. Archived from the original on 2014-02-01. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  26. "News: Rival Schools and Capcom Vs. SNK 2 revivals teased". ComputerAndVideoGames.com. 2012-10-18. Archived from the original on 2013-10-23. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  27. "Could There Be 'Rival Schools' And 'Capcom vs. SNK' Remakes In Our Future?". Multiplayerblog.mtv.com. 2012-10-19. Archived from the original on 2013-10-23. Retrieved 2014-01-24.
  28. "Dragon's Dogma Director Wants to Make a Sequel on PS4, Also Rival Schools 3 and Devil May Cry 5". dualshockers.com. 2013-10-21. Archived from the original on 2017-01-03. Retrieved 2016-11-21.
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