The reputation that Kotaro Uchikoshi has developed for surreal and metatextual storytelling through games like Hundred Line: Final Defense Academy and the Zero Escape series means that it can be difficult to know when he’s being entirely forthright and serious. For instance, when he announced his new studio called Crash Keys by telling the world the game he was working on at the company had been canceled, people were more likely to believe it was an ARG than the truth. Yet in a new interview, he insists the studio and its game’s cancellation were real, and says that maybe the game wouldn’t have been canceled if he had been allowed to use AI.

But why start a new studio? He sat down with Famitsu to discuss it, telling the publication it was partially to make more “Uchikoshi-like” games while still working with his friends and partners at Danganronpa creator Kazutaka Kodaka’s Too Kyo Games. “Even if someone thinks ‘I want to work with Uchikoshi,’ the fact I’m affiliated with Too Kyo Games makes it harder for them to reach out. More, they feel cautious about it, and frame their request to work with me in a way that also takes Kodaka and the studio into consideration. I ultimately felt that if I wanted to collaborate more with people interested in funding a project that’s distinctly ‘Uchikoshi’ in style, or simply wanted to work with me, it would be better to have my own studio that serves my personal identity.”

Source link