Hideaki Itsuno has been pumping out beloved games at publisher Capcom for over three decades, from multiple Devil May Cries to both Dragon’s Dogmas, but he’s now leaving the company to make new games in a “new environment.”
The long-time DMC director revealed his departure in a tweet from earlier today. “At the end of August 2024, I will be leaving Capcom after 30 years and 5 months,” Itsuno writes. “Thank you for your long-term support of the games and characters I have been responsible for. I hope you will continue to support Capcom’s games and characters.”
“From September, I will start developing a new game in a new environment,” he continues. “I hope to create fun, beautiful games that are as memorable as, or even more memorable than, the ones I have created so far.” There’s currently no word on what type of game Itsuno is working on next, what this “new environment” could be, or why he’s leaving Capcom, but whatever the famed director makes next deserves to be paid attention.
After working on some oft-forgotten fighting games in the late 1990s – who remembers Power Stone? – Itsuno took over the directing reigns of the most contentious game in the stylish slasher series, Devil May Cry 2, which was struggling with a turbulent development cycle at the time.
From there, Itsuno directed every single entry in the influential series, minus the Ninja Theory-led reboot, all the way up until 2019’s acclaimed Devil May Cry 5. He was also in the director’s chair for RPG Dragon’s Dogma, which became a cult classic for its hilarious physics and knack for letting players scale big monsters before hacking at their eyeballs. His last game at the company was this year’s Dragon’s Dogma 2.
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