Feature: 'Nobody Beats The Miz'

In this in-depth Gamasutra interview, Q Entertainment's Tetsuya Mizuguchi (Rez, Ninety-Nine Nights) discusses the importance of developer name recognition, the state of creativity in big companies in Japan, and the karaoke box origins of Lumines. Mizuguchi is particularly interesting when discussing some of the reasons that led him to depart Sega and form his own company, a trend that seems to be increasing in Japan of late: "I don’t know about everyone, but from just my case, I felt like I didn’t have freedom. I was in Sega. At the time, I don’t know now, but at the time, that was a big client for me, and I had a studio called UGA, United Game Artists. And I had seventy people. I had many visions, like to make casual games. Not big stuff, but small games. Not Lumines, but many other ideas. If I made a presentation to Sega executives about this kind of thing, and if they said no, that’s over. That’s it. But beyond Sega, looking beyond where I was, there were many, many possibilities in the world. Not only game console, but also mobile, and other markets that exist. I wanted to make a new phenomenon, not only traditional games. So I felt this was the limit." You can now read the full Gamasutra feature on the subject, including much more insight from Mizuguchi on a multitude of subjects (no registration required, please feel free to link to this feature from external websites).