While Capcom said in an earnings report Street Fighter X Tekken’s sales were cannibalized because too many fighting games were on the market, the producer of Street Fighter X Tekken for PlayStation Vita feels different about the market situation. I asked Tomoaki Ayano how he felt about the surge of fighting games not just from Capcom, but other developers like Tecmo Koei and Arc System Works.
"As you mentioned, in the fighting game genre there are a lot of different companies coming out with new games every month. If we flip it and look at it, it means this is a hot genre. It’s a genre developers want to get into because there are a lot of users out there that are buying the games," Ayano answered. "There is definitely a lot more competition nowadays, but Capcom has always had faith in its brands like Street Fighter. We’re always going to make the best fighting game out there no matter what the age is or when we release games. This year is the 25th anniversary of Street Fighter and we’re looking at new ways to go towards the next 25 years to give users the best possible experience."
One of the 25th anniversary collaborations is a series of Street Fighter Hello Kitty dolls. Capcom has a history of working with Sanrio and they two companies recently agreed to add My Melody and Kuromi costumes for Felyne de Puzzle. I jokingly asked Amayo if he’s working on Sanrio X Street Fighter. Amayo laughed, "Yeah, that would be cool. I think it’s a great idea."
"Personally, I think it’s great that users out there have a lot of choices to choose from. It’s not like back in the day where there were only a few fighting games. There’s much more variety," Amayo added.
I agree especially since JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure HD is making a comeback. Yoshinori Ono always teases Darkstalkers too so I asked Ayano if he heard anything about Darkstalkers coming back from the grave.
"Ono-san always surprises us as well," Ayano said. "I’d like to ask him as well, because I don’t know what the deal is myself!"
