Although some time has passed since the closure of Tango Gamework, this closure remains a rather controversial issue. Now, Matt Booty, head of Xbox Game Studios, has pointed out that one of the reasons that led to this unloved decision was the change of director in this studio, that is, the departure of Shinji Mikami.
In a recent interview with Variety, Booty was questioned about the closure of Tango Gameworks, and pointed out that the change in management that the studio underwent after the departure of Shinji Mikami last year played an important role in deciding what to do with this team. This is what he said about it:
“I won’t go into detail about what went into the decision, mainly out of respect for the people there, simply because a lot of work went into delivering Hi-Fi Rush, which was a great game and we did well with it.
What we have to consider is that for us it is both a future situation and a look back at a certain game. There are a lot of things that go into the success of a game: what leadership do you have, what creative leadership do you have, is it the same team that released something successful before?
We have to look at all of those things together and ask ourselves: are we set up to be successful in the future? And while factors or situations that previously led to success asked to be present, they may not all still apply when you look at what you are doing in the future.”
Although he does not mention it specifically, everything seems to indicate that Shinji Mikami’s departure left Xbox executives with several doubts about the future of Tango Gameworks. Let us remember that the person responsible for Resident Evil took the role of director in The Evil Withinand oversaw multiple studio projects as a producer, as was HiFi Rush.
Let us remember that after the departure of Shinji Mikami, a director was not chosen for the studio, although many came to think that John Johanas, creative director at Tango Gameworks, was going to take this position. Unfortunately, this was never the case. Along with this information, the interview with Booty revealed that Xbox considered other alternatives before closing the studio, as an independence similar to what we recently saw with Toys For Bob. This is what he commented:
“In many of our studies, we try to look at options. For example, we recently had Toys For Bob, a studio that was previously working on Call of Duty titles, come back out and become a new independent studio, and we announced that we have a publishing deal with them, and I’ll share more about it when it’s important.
So we absolutely looked at what the potential business options are for keeping a studio open or maybe changing hands, and it’s just one of the things we look at across the board. “Sometimes these things come together, sometimes they don’t.”
However, this did not happen. It is clear that without Mikami, Xbox had no clear idea of the direction Tango Gameworks would take, and while Johanas may have been a good studio director, the nature of the Westerner-led Japanese team may have caused some friction. On related topics, Tango Gameworks was already planning the sequel to HiFi Rush. Likewise, Xbox mentions that it needs more games like Hi-Fi Rush.
Author’s Note:
The direction of a studio is extremely important, as it can make a game a success or a failure. While the decision to close the studio for this reason is something that remains unjustifiable, I can understand why Xbox was concerned. However, what they should have done was find a solid replacement for Mikami, not shut everything down.
Via: Variety
#Xbox #reveals #Tango #Gameworks #closed #Atomix