PlatinumGames Expanded So It Doesn't Have to Turn Down 'Fun Projects'

Platinum Games, the Osaka-based studio behind Bayonetta and Vanquish, announced the creation of a new office in Tokyo that Platinum director Hideki Kamiya and COO Atsushi Inaba says will be staffed with “Crazy people who want to make games.” Currently, Platinum Games is sized at about 200 employees according to Inaba. The aim of the Tokyo studio is to bring aboard 100 more employees for a total of about 400. At the time of the studio’s announcement, Platinum said the Tokyo location would be working on different projects like live-service games. But in an interview with IGN Japan, Inaba says another reason for expansion is just to work on more games in general, whether they’re original projects or partner projects. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=project-gg-new-platinum-game-first-images&captions=true"] “First of all, we do not have enough staff at the moment. It’s a nice problem to have, but we get a lot of work offers from other publishers, for example something like Nier Automata where we can collaborate on the publisher’s IP, or to make original titles for a publisher, and we are limited to how many projects we can take on. So there are a lot of projects that we have to turn down, and I think it would be better to increase our capacity so we can work on more fun projects.” Platinum, aside from working on original games, frequently partners with publishers to work on their IP. Whether it’s with Square Enix on Nier: Automata, or Nintendo with Bayonetta 3 and Star Fox Zero. From what Inaba is saying, Platinum is quite the popular partner and there are probably numerous publisher projects the company had to turn down. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/02/26/project-gg-teaser-trailer"] But with a new Tokyo studio and an increased employee count, perhaps Platinum can work on even more projects going forward. The Tokyo studio was announced as part of a series of four announcements. Platinum already announced The Wonderful 101 Kickstarter, Project G.G., and the Tokyo studio. There’s still one announcement left and Kamiya says it’s the biggest one of them all.