News: Junichi Masuda moving to new role in TPC as “Chief Creative Fellow”

[bobandbill]

Got a formal announcement on the pokemon corporate website and all. Article has more details!

 

[pkmin3033]

I'm really not sure if this is a good thing or not. It diverts his attention away from the games which means they finally, just maybe, might be able to actually make some progress on them. But it gives him ample opportunity to ruin everything else.

A talented composer, yes, but that's literally the only thing Masuda has ever been able to do right. Putting him in a position like this...

 

[_confused_piplup_]

I think it's not a news. It's just that they made it "public" today. Recently, Masuda has been way less involved in the games, which implies he was focusing on something else. He wanted to have his career and he went for it. I am pretty sure Masuda has been working in that position for a while already, but they waited for the right time to make it a formal an official announcement. What I mean is not that he was secretly working already in that position, but that he had been already collaborating and doing things to get that role, if that makes sense. So, it's not such a news: pokemon games will stay the same and no huge change will be felt for us, because Masuda has already been off the games for a while. And, I feel like it's actually a good thing for him, because he was the face of GF, so he kinda cares about the ideas and the games. But future will tell. I just wanted to clarify that from my perspective, no huge changes will take place.

 

[Sheep]

Not sure if this will impact his involvement with the games too strongly - I can see piplup's point that it may have been something that had already happened but was just only recently publicly announced. I personally am not expecting any major changes to the games and assume Masuda will continue being involved in some way.

 

[Palamon]

I don't think this will change anything. Since he's the highest on the creative team, he's probably still going to have say in the franchise, just not the lead producer anymore. Now, this is something I swear I remember hearing that he was taking a step back from directing after Sword/Shield? Or was that Let's Go Pikachu/Eevee? At any rate, this really isn't changing much. Pokemon will probably not be much different going forward. He just won't be the lead face anymore.

 

[bobandbill]

I think it's not a news. It's just that they made it "public" today. Recently, Masuda has been way less involved in the games, which implies he was focusing on something else. He wanted to have his career and he went for it. I am pretty sure Masuda has been working in that position for a while already, but they waited for the right time to make it a formal an official announcement. What I mean is not that he was secretly working already in that position, but that he had been already collaborating and doing things to get that role, if that makes sense. So, it's not such a news: pokemon games will stay the same and no huge change will be felt for us, because Masuda has already been off the games for a while. And, I feel like it's actually a good thing for him, because he was the face of GF, so he kinda cares about the ideas and the games. But future will tell. I just wanted to clarify that from my perspective, no huge changes will take place.

I'm not so sure. He was co-director for BDSP, but it's hard to say to what level he had a say on design choices, release date, etc. And he was very much present for all parts of SwSh news, interviews and announcements.

I don't think this will change anything. Since he's the highest on the creative team, he's probably still going to have say in the franchise, just not the lead producer anymore. Now, this is something I swear I remember hearing that he was taking a step back from directing after Sword/Shield? Or was that Let's Go Pikachu/Eevee? At any rate, this really isn't changing much. Pokemon will probably not be much different going forward. He just won't be the lead face anymore.

It was LGPE.

 

[pkmin3033]

Thinking about it, I wonder who is going to replace Masuda as the face of the Pokemon games, or even IF there will be a replacement. I don't think this is just a formality or already a done deal that we're finding out about in arrears - Shigeru Miyamoto became a Creative Fellow for Nintendo as a whole a while ago, and we very rarely hear about Miyamoto any more in connection with game development...which is a real shame.

If this is going to happen with Masuda as well in the same way though, it can only be a positive thing - the man is a liar, and his approach to game development is to start completely from scratch every single time. It'd be nice to see a Pokemon game that actually builds upon gameplay in a meaningful way and learns from past mistakes, with a team that doesn't spend months deciding how long the bloody grass should be. It doesn't mean he can't wreak his particular brand of havoc elsewhere, but it should mean he doesn't have quite a hefty stranglehold on the games.

 

[bobandbill]

Thinking about it, I wonder who is going to replace Masuda as the face of the Pokemon games, or even IF there will be a replacement. I don't think this is just a formality or already a done deal that we're finding out about in arrears - Shigeru Miyamoto became a Creative Fellow for Nintendo as a whole a while ago, and we very rarely hear about Miyamoto any more in connection with game development...which is a real shame.

If this is going to happen with Masuda as well in the same way though, it can only be a positive thing - the man is a liar, and his approach to game development is to start completely from scratch every single time. It'd be nice to see a Pokemon game that actually builds upon gameplay in a meaningful way and learns from past mistakes, with a team that doesn't spend months deciding how long the bloody grass should be. It doesn't mean he can't wreak his particular brand of havoc elsewhere, but it should mean he doesn't have quite a hefty stranglehold on the games.

Yeah, I agree it doesn't seem like a change done a while ago. Quoting myself from a previous article:

For starters, he's still been listed as a Producer – for the base game and the DLC. And in that role, despite being one of three, he had essentially been in every important PR appearance. He was the one who gave the widely criticised news about the Galar Dex restriction at the 2019 E3. He also featured alongside Ohmori in the various interviews had on the gaming website Eurogamer. And he appeared again for the announcement of the Expansion Pass. The pair were even highlighted as the stars of an interview published on the official Pokémon website. This adds to other titles where he served as Producer, such as for the Alola games.

He may not have been directing, but he sure was acting like he had a lot of sway and insight into specific decisions (e.g. the always on EXP Share). And then he did co-direct for BDSP!

Bring back Morimoto for directing =(

 

[colours]

sometimes i wonder if pokemon fans were scapegoating him. not to Defend Him or anything, but it's not like we really know the inner workings of Game Freak. he became easy to blame simply because he's the face of Game Freak, to what extent he's involved in any decision or /made/ any of them himself, no one really knows.

 

[bobandbill]

sometimes i wonder if pokemon fans were scapegoating him. not to Defend Him or anything, but it's not like we really know the inner workings of Game Freak. he became easy to blame simply because he's the face of Game Freak, to what extent he's involved in any decision or /made/ any of them himself, no one really knows.

It's an interesting perspective. If various decisions weren't up to him though, then he was the fall guy - the public face who announced the decision in the first place, and then put up a follow-up post on it. But when he was a game director to a producer and general director, and constantly going to interviews and PR events, up to answering specific questions with his reasoning on why e.g. there's no exp share with Ohmori, it's a bit hard for me to see it as him having no or limited involvement on specific decisions.