Bandai Namco General Manager on the Making of Shonen Jump Games

In the latest issue of V Jump, Bandai Namco Games general manager Ryo Mito talked about his history developing Shonen Jump series video games, and some of his thoughts on the future of such games. [Thanks, Ryokutya2089!]

Here are the highlights:

• “I’ve worked on games for many Jump series (Saint Seiya, One Piece, MHA, Shaman King), and even with the Dragon Ball franchise alone, I’ve worked on nearly 20 games.”

• “Our company has a ‘Jump Team’ that focuses on making Shonen Jump games.”
• “Originally, I was a game producer who worked on organizing all the creative ideas that come up in a game’s development.”

• “When we went to show off Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit (PS3/360) to “that editor” (a certain editor that also appears in Dr. Slump with scissors for hands) at Shueisha, he gave lots of criticism, and we had to remake it in 3 months.”
• “I’m very grateful towards that editor, as he’s taken care of me in many ways, so that we were able to create pretty great games.”

• “I hope that people who like games, anime, and the characters will aim to join this industry, where they can make use of their knowledge.”
• “I still think that respect for character games still isn’t that high, so I hope that we can keep making games, and make people hyped for character games.”