So Cave cancelled their Vita shooter.

[Drum]

http://andriasang.com/con114/cave_vita_titles/

And that social game.
Wonder where they'll put it now, or if it's just totally cancelled?

[Barrakketh]

Considering how poorly the Vita is selling in Japan, I can't even pretend to be surprised.

The article said that since the cancellation was just a footnote we'd probably have to wait for an earnings report to see what's in store for those two games.

[rancor]

Not surprised in the least. Looking at thousands of people each day during my daily commute, the Vita is a non-player. There are far more 3DS units in peoples hands than Vitas. The PSP is still king though.

[Aisha]

Hiroyuki Kimura also stated that they have no plans for releasing games on next-generation consoles, although I can't see this stance not eventually changing. He also reaffirmed that there's nothing coming to the Vita.

New consoles from Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are set to be released in the next few years. Do they interest you as a developer?
"They do interest me very much personally, but as a video game developer we do not have any plans of developing anything new for or porting our products onto those forthcoming future consoles at the moment."

[AntiFritz]

Hiroyuki Kimura also stated that they have no plans for releasing games on next-generation consoles, although I can't see this stance not eventually changing. He also reaffirmed that there's nothing coming to the Vita.

New consoles from Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are set to be released in the next few years. Do they interest you as a developer?
"They do interest me very much personally, but as a video game developer we do not have any plans of developing anything new for or porting our products onto those forthcoming future consoles at the moment."

It is the first classic vertical shooter that we have released in a while.

What

[trap15]

I'm going to guess that's a translation error and what was actually said was horizontal

[Drum]

http://stocks.finance.yahoo.co.jp/stock ... 760.Q&d=6m

fuuuuuuuuuuuuck

[yosai]

I assuming that CAVEs share prices have dropped a fair bit in the last 12 months.

[Blackbird]

Handheld consoles are in kind of a rough patch. It's hard to compete on paper with smartphone/tablet games that cost a buck when your console games cost 30 bucks. Which is a shame, because I prefer a dedicated gaming platform with real buttons =P.

[sven666]

cancelling that shit was the smartest move cave have done in a long time.

[Teufel_in_Blau]

http://andriasang.com/con119/cave_coo_resigns/

Cave announced today that Representative Director, Vice President, and Chief Operating Officer Miko Watanabe will resigning.

The resignation, said to be for personal reasons, will take effect on May 31. However, Watanabe will continue to serve his Representative Director role until the company's annual shareholder meeting in August.

In its notice announcing Watanabe's resignation, Cave noted that Ito Masahito, Representative Director, President and CEO, will become the company's sole Representative Director following the resignation.

[O. Van Bruce]

http://andriasang.com/con119/cave_coo_resigns/

Cave announced today that Representative Director, Vice President, and Chief Operating Officer Miko Watanabe will resigning.

The resignation, said to be for personal reasons, will take effect on May 31. However, Watanabe will continue to serve his Representative Director role until the company's annual shareholder meeting in August.

In its notice announcing Watanabe's resignation, Cave noted that Ito Masahito, Representative Director, President and CEO, will become the company's sole Representative Director following the resignation.

So... which are the consequences for this?

[Teufel_in_Blau]

Dunno, I thought it fits the doom and gloom of this thread. Also I read the Digitalspy article and if there is neither a plan for the next-gen consoles nor handhelds; and Mushi HD is their last 360 game, what is left? Iphone and arcades?

/e
Fixed a mistake.

[trap15]

;_;

[AntiFritz]

God dammit, keep it together cave.

[ZenErik]

I hope Cave can stick around. Disappointed in the Vita shmup being cancelled, but I just want the company to survive at this point.

Wonder what their future plans will be.

[neorichieb1971]

It doesn't surprise me. When I first saw Vita I thought to myself "its just the same console".

If Sony keep on trying to make the handheld business like the home console business its just going to flop. Especially considering all the phones have to do is just put a joystick on it.

If I were Sony, i'd make exclusive franchises for the Vita that used its core selling options. Then if I were Cave I would make sure it sold a few more units before indulging into handheld territory. But personally, I don't think a shmup fits the system at all. Its too frantic of a game to be holding the system and playing at the same time.

[Kollision]

will not be missed, good riddance Cave Vita shooter

[IseeThings]

The problem with Cave is

Their primary market is the arcade industry, it's been in zombie state for many years now.

For their primary market they're producing 4:3 SD games when the rest of the industry seems to have moved on to 16:9 Hi Def, their new games therefore look dated from the word go. This limits the market further, especially when their prices are inline with the fancier games.

For secondary markets they're ignoring the everything except the 360 apart from a couple of one-off releases. Look at the big players in the industry, they make sure there's a version of their game on everything for a good reason. Some say this is due to Sony not allowing 4:3 SD on the PS3 without a widescreen mode, but isn't that their own fault again? Look at the majority of the current indie games, many appear to be ditching raster based graphics for re-scalable vector ones even on 2d titles.

Their games require tight controls and good reflexes. Modern systems are inherently adding lag, and have floaty controls with the thumbsticks, or very stiff ones with the sub-par dpads. This gives a bad impression. Touchscreens are even worse and appear to be the way we're heading!

To most of the population shmups as a genre died with the Genesis era, a similar problem to the arcades, they're 'last gen' games being pitched on a current gen system with current gen pricing.

Somewhat tied to the previous point, they produce real games, sadly the gaming masses appear to have rejected real games which require real skill for button mashers and QTE sequences, anything which requires them to actually invest time and effort into becoming a better player is out *unless* it's an online FPS.

The 3DS and Vita face stiff competition from phones, tablets etc. I don't actually know anybody who owns either system. You can buy comparable (often flashier) games on phones for almost nothing, why would somebody want to pay huge sums of money for a game on one of these devices. If they were hedging their bets on such systems they were taking a huge risk, hence the cancellation I guess.

From a games point of view, have they also ran out of ideas? As I've said in the SDOJ thread it just looks like they've turned everything up to 11, and relying further on teenage japanese girls to sell things stinks of desperation.

I've heard customer support is poor too, people sending arcade boards back for repairs, getting them stamped as 'OK' but with the same problems..

Also I think there is a certain degree of arrogance, they think everybody has heard of their IP when in reality outside of Japan nothing they've produced recently is that well known but again this is really of Cave's own doing.... Selling a social game based on IP people have no connection with is tricky when there are already plenty of offerings just as good with more momentum.

If you fail to keep up with the pace, you get left behind, if you brashly ignore change, markets, platforms then you can't expect to do well?

Don't get me wrong, I think Cave have produced some fantastic titles but there are huge question marks over whether producing the style of game they specialize in is even viable anymore and just as many over some of the business decisions which have been made. I imagine canceling the Vita title is only the tip of the iceberg.

The problem isn't even unique to Cave, the Japanese industry as a whole isn't keeping up with the times well, and while a lot of the AAA titles Euro/US manufacturers are shoving down our throats are actually complete trash from a gameplay point of view it doesn't always pay to be right :-/

[gs68]

*sigh* Well, there goes the remainder of the commercial shmup industry, except for maybe Taito.

[Bananamatic]

goodnight sweet prince

[AntiFritz]

I hope whoever is in charge now can make better decisions. Theirs got to be a ton of ways they can gain make more money from releases. I know i'd definitely buy extra arrange modes for their retail games if they were offered as dlc, but they don't do that. Or offering up the preorder dlc to purchase at a later date.

EDIT: Theirs still G.rev left, but I can't imagine their doing so well these days either...

[gs68]

G.rev hasn't really made any original shmups since Under Defeat and mayyybe SnR (although I view that as more of a fighting game with shmup elements than the other way around).

...oops I forgot Treasure

[AntiFritz]

Strania....?

[gs68]

Huh, that's right. I glossed over their WP page a little too fast.

[Udderdude]

Their games require tight controls and good reflexes. Modern systems are inherently adding lag, and have floaty controls with the thumbsticks, or very stiff ones with the sub-par dpads. This gives a bad impression. Touchscreens are even worse and appear to be the way we're heading!

Somewhat tied to the previous point, they produce real games, sadly the gaming masses appear to have rejected real games which require real skill for button mashers and QTE sequences, anything which requires them to actually invest time and effort into becoming a better player is out *unless* it's an online FPS.

The problem isn't even unique to Cave, the Japanese industry as a whole isn't keeping up with the times well, and while a lot of the AAA titles Euro/US manufacturers are shoving down our throats are actually complete trash from a gameplay point of view it doesn't always pay to be right :-/

This is the most depressing point .. there's an entire new generation of gamers growing up on this trash. Oh well, was fun while it lasted. At least I'm still making the kind of games I want to see made .. :P

[Cagar]

-

[Skykid]

Time to reprint that Mushihimesama poster.

[matrigs]

Also I think there is a certain degree of arrogance

I'd rather call all those "fans" arrogant who know so much better than cave how to do business and good games.

[Cuilan]

To add to what I said in a previous thread...

http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.ph ... 79#p756179

It seems like one of the major causes of Cave's decline is that the higher-ups gave some of the divisions way too much creative freedom. Games like Akai Katana (arcade version) and Instant Brain never should have been developed, or at the very least, not released in their final state. In any case, that time and money would have been better spent developing Mushihime-sama 3 and Espgaluda 3.

And then there was Deathsmiles 2, which while successful, also led to a waste of resources as a result of that cheap PC-based arcade system they put together for it. They should have just swallowed their pride and gone with something already established like the Type-X2, which would have been far cheaper (and would have also resulted in better-looking games).

I guess the warning signs have been there for a while, back when Cave allowed Yagawa to release 3 bombs in a row.