Advertisement

PaRappa creator contemplating return to PlayStation


Masaya Matsuura isn't a household name for PlayStation fans, but his games are: PaRappa the Rapper and (to a lesser extent) Vib-Ribbon became icons of the early era of PlayStation. However, since the release of Vib-Ripple in 2004, Matsuura hasn't touched a single PlayStation platform, choosing to work on various Nintendo games, most recently Major Minor's Majestic March for Wii.

It seems Matsuura is ready to end his years-long hiatus on PlayStation systems. He told Edge Online that PS3 is the platform he would "most like to explore at the moment" because "PS3 has a very high potential to appeal to the market." He notes that "very few people can do good creation for PS3. I think, for example, that Flower is a very good example. It requires a very high level of knowledge, experience and ambition to work on, so perhaps these kind of things are required for PlayStation."

The indie spirit seems to be drawing Matsuura to the house that Sony built, but he acknowledges that it is a company that "is struggling with its conservativeness." While Sony has made great strides in making PlayStation Network a burgeoning field for indie developers, he hopes to see Sony become even more aggressive. "If a company like Sony is not aggressive in the industry, it's very bad for the unique creator, like Jenova Chen or me."