Monster Hunter World director Kaname Fujioka spoke about Capcom’s approach to its development projects in an interview with Eurogamer, stating that the publisher prioritises a work-life balance.
When prompted about crunch, Fujioka said, ‘There’s always the tough periods at the end of development, in particular, where there’s a lot of work to do and not much time left to do it in, but as a company we do value people having core time.’ Monster Hunter World: Iceborne will release at the end of this week, but he assured that the team was not grinding to produce the new expansion. ‘People are so passionate about the games they’re making that if you left them to their own devices, sometimes you’d have to tell them to go home because they really want to keep working on it and keep making it better,’ Fujioka explained.
Although the going gets tough toward the end of development projects, Capcom is ‘really serious’ about getting the job done while taking care of its staff. Fujioka stated that the responsibility for avoiding crunch and encouraging a positive working culture is shared: ‘part of our job as the heads of the development team is to make sure no-one’s overdoing it and causing themselves health issues or anything like that.’
Obsidian Entertainment is of a similar mindset, and The Outer Worlds senior designer Brian Hines said that, ‘Obsidian is not a crunch studio, which is one of the things that keeps people staying there for a long time.’ Kojima Productions has struggled with the pressure of delivering Death Stranding on time, and former and current Rockstar Games employees have described the difficult development of Red Dead Redemption 2.
Monster Hunter World: Iceborne is set for release on September 6 on Xbox One and PlayStation 4 with a PC release soon after.
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