Ex-SIE Producer Teruyuki Toriyama Joins VR Startup Thirdverse

Thirdverse announced that it hired ex-SIE Bloodborne Producer Teruyuki Toriyama as producer and manager of its Game Design Division. Toriyama himself also made an announcement via his Twitter account. The announcement comes a few months after Toriyama officially left Sony Interactive Entertainment back in December 2020.

Toriyama previously worked as a producer for games such as Bloodborne and its subsequent The Old Hunters expansion. He also worked on the Soul Sacrifice series and the Demon’s Souls remake for the PlayStation 5. Additionally, he helped produced quite a few VR games including FromSoftware’s Déraciné and Japan Studio’s Astro Bot: Rescue Mission.

In an interview posted on Wantedly, Toriyama explained some reasons why he chose Thirdverse as well as his decision to focus on the VR game industry. Toriyama expressed frustration over what he perceived to be a “ceiling in the consumer games industry.” He continued, “There is an already established theory of game making, and aside from graphical improvements, I felt that our ability to provide emotional experiences was limited.”

That doesn’t seem to be the case for VR, at least in Toriyama’s eyes. He stated that the biggest reason for joining was being “excited by Thirdverse’s vision” and the possibility of creating “an entirely new gaming experience.” Notably, Toriyama also explained that he chose the VR startup over a more established studio due to the “fast-paced nature of the VR industry.” On the topic of challenges, he mentioned that Thirdverse’s ultimate goal is to produce a “Fully VR MMORPG.”

Thirdverse, originally Yomuneco Inc., previously developed the VR RPG Swords of Gargantua and published the VR shooter Frostpoint VR: Proving Grounds. Established in June 2020, its mission and namesake is to create a “third place inside the Metaverse, where people can live freely in the virtual world.”