Ninja Gaiden creator to embark on new action franchise

Ninja Gaiden creator to embark on new action franchise
James Orry Updated on by

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Speaking to press at a Ninja Gaiden 2 event being held in London today, Team Ninja’s Tomonobu Itagaki has offered further insight into what he plans to do next.

“I love the action game genre, in particular I am very focussed on movement and the animation. One of the precepts I always have for my games is making sure that the animation of all the characters is as fluid and as cool looking as they can be,” explained Itagaki. “I think that I’m going to continue to explore the action genre and do something that allows me to go in directions that I haven’t been able to go with the Ninja Gaiden series, with an entirely new franchise.”

Itagaki’s decision to move onto a new challenge follows his recent announcement that he was finished with the Ninja Gaiden franchise, a decision he elaborated on today.

“I really put all my heart and soul into making this the definitive game in the Ninja Gaiden franchise. So I personally don’t intend to make any more,” said Itagaki. “It is a game [Ninja Gaiden 2] that we basically built from the ground up. We threw away everything we had from the first game, improved on what was good, changed what was bad. So it’s been a long project, it’s been close to three years in the making. We were able to accomplish everything that we wanted to achieve with this franchise.”

Ninja Gaiden II is scheduled for release exclusively for Xbox 360 on June 6 and look out for our review soon.