Disclaimer: take this whole thing with a grain of salt; i was personally told all this stuff by a respectful source (keep on reading...), yet of course i cannot guarantee you this is the real truth. But to me it's waaaay more than a believable rumor.
So, long story short: i am and i've always been a die-hard third person action fan, and of course Tomonobu Itagaki holds a special place in my heart.
I loved his work with the Ninja Gaiden saga, and was really interested in Devil's Third (despite not being completely sold on the look and the art direction of the project!), so just like you guys i was truly disappointed to see the project going off the radar into that sad sort of limbo, even more after the bad destiny of THQ.
Last August i was at Gamescom (i work as editor for IGN Italy), and i was attending a behind closed doors meeting for Ryse: Son of Rome. Two devs from Crytek were showing me the game, with particular attention to the combat: they knew they did a shitty E3 reveal, and they wanted to actually prove that the product won't be the embarassing QTE galore people rightfully thought it would be.
The atmosphere is very relaxed, the guys are super kind and easy going, and we just talk about their game and the whole action panorama. At one point i start bashing Ninja Gaiden III, telling them how it offended me as a fan and how that trainwreck would have never ever happened under Itagaki's direction. I add that the whole situation of Valhalla Games Studios deeply saddens me, since i do miss Itagaki and his games. They pretty much say the same thing, they agree with me on NGIII as gamers, and we move on with the presentation.
After the preview is over, one of the two guys comes to me, and surprisingly starts to spill the beans due to the enthusiasm he saw in me when talking about Itagaki.
He tells me he has worked at THQ in the past, and that he was involved with Devil's Third on a pretty high level - he did tell me his role, but i forgot... sorry! It was something dealing with quality control, assistant Producer or stuff like that.
Anyway, the guy described me his whole experience with Itagaki, and was sooo passionate about that: he told me how Itagaki and his crew very VERY cold towards him at first (they were basically seeing him as a gaijin), and how things changed when he forced his translator to translate a few of his comments in Japanese with swear words and a sort of "fuck it" attitude.
That moment things changed, and they did accept him as a part of them (Itagaki even gave him a limited edition Zippo with the Valhalla Logo, claiming that he would have killed him with his own hands if he had ever found that item on sale on eBay, LOL!).
He said that Itagaki is basically a genius - not that i had any doubt - and he claimed that the guys around him (most of them people that left Team Ninja along with Tomonobu) really saw him as a true leader: they were ready to do whatever he said, and completely trusted his experience and his vision.
Regarding the game, one thing that really struck me was something he said about the art direction of Devil's Third: that's among the aspects i care the most in a videogame, and he said that when he entered the room the first time, the team had this huge wall full of concept arts, sketches, pics and whatever... but they were so random they made no sense.
He said there were crazy manga-style drawings, paintings similar to those you can find on ancient Greek pottery, the portrait of a dark cyber-old man, over the top characters taken from comics, reinassance paintings... Very diffente styles, that apparently had no coherence whatsoever as an ensemble.
So he asked what was the point of all that, why inspirations and concepts were so distant from one another (to his eyes there was no clear direction in what the team had come up with), and Itagaki basically answered "To us, it just makes sense. That's what matters, it's gonna be cool", and left him like that, without even adding a single word on that topic.
Anyway, he told me that the production was around 30% when shit got bad and the development met a sudden stop (way before THQ started going into shit, at least from a public POV). After a while they stopped receiving funds, and were eventually forced to pause the development.
But the Ninjas had faith in their leader, and Itagaki was motivated as hell to go on: so he went to THQ and asked the company to buy back his own IP.
At this point, the guy did not enter into details, but he basically said that the THQ guys behaved like true assholes, showing no respect at all towards Itagaki: they accepted to sell him the IP, but for a crazy high price. And Valhalla eventually did buy it, but not at an easy cost: Itagaki and his most trusted colleagues mortgaged their houses and personal belongings to get what they wanted.
Of course despite getting back their creature things were not going that great without a publisher, so the development went on veeery slowly for long. Yet, after a long search, a publisher was found: the guy did not know who (he said he wasn't told, despite still being in contact with his friends and ex colleagues), and at that point i made a joke about Nintendo being behind all this, to get some more hardcore love after their special relationship with Platinum.
He replied it would be quite an impossible scenario, since the game has always been very focused on graphics and performance (so at this point i assume it's safe to think Devil's Third is now a nextgen affair).
Our discussion endend after he added two more things:
1) not only the project is still alive, but Devil's Third is still meant to be a cross media property, with more than just a game in development. There will apparently be comics, dedicated apps, movies and whatever, and the guy said that Danny Bilson (former THQ frontman, the person that basically brought Itagaki inside the company and blindly believed in DT) is 100% still on board, specifically dedicated to these aspects thanks to his connections with the entertainment industry and his expertise.
2) last time he had heard about the game was two weeks before our meeting (so at the end of July): he said he talked to one of the devs who assured him things were going fine, and that Valhalla was just waiting for the right time to basically re-announce the game.
Of course this basically made my Gamescom, and pardon me if i forgot to share it before with you guys (but i did tell our Italian readers the day this happened during our live show, since i was SO pumped, LOL!). Oh and in case you ask, i am not being a dick towards the Crytek guy: after our chat i told him something along the lines of "thank you, you just made my day but i promise i will keep this to myself", but he told me i could go on and tell everyone i pleased, since it wasn't some sort of super secret nor a bad news.
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Tl;dr According to one of the devs of Ryse i met in Cologne during Gamescom, Devil's Third went through serious shit but it's still alive and kicking, with the IP in the hands of Itagaki and a brand new publisher behind the project.
So, long story short: i am and i've always been a die-hard third person action fan, and of course Tomonobu Itagaki holds a special place in my heart.
I loved his work with the Ninja Gaiden saga, and was really interested in Devil's Third (despite not being completely sold on the look and the art direction of the project!), so just like you guys i was truly disappointed to see the project going off the radar into that sad sort of limbo, even more after the bad destiny of THQ.
Last August i was at Gamescom (i work as editor for IGN Italy), and i was attending a behind closed doors meeting for Ryse: Son of Rome. Two devs from Crytek were showing me the game, with particular attention to the combat: they knew they did a shitty E3 reveal, and they wanted to actually prove that the product won't be the embarassing QTE galore people rightfully thought it would be.
The atmosphere is very relaxed, the guys are super kind and easy going, and we just talk about their game and the whole action panorama. At one point i start bashing Ninja Gaiden III, telling them how it offended me as a fan and how that trainwreck would have never ever happened under Itagaki's direction. I add that the whole situation of Valhalla Games Studios deeply saddens me, since i do miss Itagaki and his games. They pretty much say the same thing, they agree with me on NGIII as gamers, and we move on with the presentation.
After the preview is over, one of the two guys comes to me, and surprisingly starts to spill the beans due to the enthusiasm he saw in me when talking about Itagaki.
He tells me he has worked at THQ in the past, and that he was involved with Devil's Third on a pretty high level - he did tell me his role, but i forgot... sorry! It was something dealing with quality control, assistant Producer or stuff like that.
Anyway, the guy described me his whole experience with Itagaki, and was sooo passionate about that: he told me how Itagaki and his crew very VERY cold towards him at first (they were basically seeing him as a gaijin), and how things changed when he forced his translator to translate a few of his comments in Japanese with swear words and a sort of "fuck it" attitude.
That moment things changed, and they did accept him as a part of them (Itagaki even gave him a limited edition Zippo with the Valhalla Logo, claiming that he would have killed him with his own hands if he had ever found that item on sale on eBay, LOL!).
He said that Itagaki is basically a genius - not that i had any doubt
- and he claimed that the guys around him (most of them people that left Team Ninja along with Tomonobu) really saw him as a true leader: they were ready to do whatever he said, and completely trusted his experience and his vision.Regarding the game, one thing that really struck me was something he said about the art direction of Devil's Third: that's among the aspects i care the most in a videogame, and he said that when he entered the room the first time, the team had this huge wall full of concept arts, sketches, pics and whatever... but they were so random they made no sense.
He said there were crazy manga-style drawings, paintings similar to those you can find on ancient Greek pottery, the portrait of a dark cyber-old man, over the top characters taken from comics, reinassance paintings... Very diffente styles, that apparently had no coherence whatsoever as an ensemble.
So he asked what was the point of all that, why inspirations and concepts were so distant from one another (to his eyes there was no clear direction in what the team had come up with), and Itagaki basically answered "To us, it just makes sense. That's what matters, it's gonna be cool", and left him like that, without even adding a single word on that topic.
Anyway, he told me that the production was around 30% when shit got bad and the development met a sudden stop (way before THQ started going into shit, at least from a public POV). After a while they stopped receiving funds, and were eventually forced to pause the development.
But the Ninjas had faith in their leader, and Itagaki was motivated as hell to go on: so he went to THQ and asked the company to buy back his own IP.
At this point, the guy did not enter into details, but he basically said that the THQ guys behaved like true assholes, showing no respect at all towards Itagaki: they accepted to sell him the IP, but for a crazy high price. And Valhalla eventually did buy it, but not at an easy cost: Itagaki and his most trusted colleagues mortgaged their houses and personal belongings to get what they wanted.
Of course despite getting back their creature things were not going that great without a publisher, so the development went on veeery slowly for long. Yet, after a long search, a publisher was found: the guy did not know who (he said he wasn't told, despite still being in contact with his friends and ex colleagues), and at that point i made a joke about Nintendo being behind all this, to get some more hardcore love after their special relationship with Platinum.
He replied it would be quite an impossible scenario, since the game has always been very focused on graphics and performance (so at this point i assume it's safe to think Devil's Third is now a nextgen affair).
Our discussion endend after he added two more things:
1) not only the project is still alive, but Devil's Third is still meant to be a cross media property, with more than just a game in development. There will apparently be comics, dedicated apps, movies and whatever, and the guy said that Danny Bilson (former THQ frontman, the person that basically brought Itagaki inside the company and blindly believed in DT) is 100% still on board, specifically dedicated to these aspects thanks to his connections with the entertainment industry and his expertise.
2) last time he had heard about the game was two weeks before our meeting (so at the end of July): he said he talked to one of the devs who assured him things were going fine, and that Valhalla was just waiting for the right time to basically re-announce the game.
Of course this basically made my Gamescom, and pardon me if i forgot to share it before with you guys (but i did tell our Italian readers the day this happened during our live show, since i was SO pumped, LOL!). Oh and in case you ask, i am not being a dick towards the Crytek guy: after our chat i told him something along the lines of "thank you, you just made my day but i promise i will keep this to myself", but he told me i could go on and tell everyone i pleased, since it wasn't some sort of super secret nor a bad news.
-----
Tl;dr According to one of the devs of Ryse i met in Cologne during Gamescom, Devil's Third went through serious shit but it's still alive and kicking, with the IP in the hands of Itagaki and a brand new publisher behind the project.
