Reggie Fils-Aime talks about E3, industry change, and what Nintendo is doing for a comeback (interview)

GamesBeat: Splatoon is very interesting. It’s a brand new IP there. It reminded me of a small game THQ published, De Blob, but the difference is that De Blob didn’t have multiplayer. It’s a nice reminder that creativity is often just one small idea.

Reggie: I say this with no disrespect to any other developer, but I really do believe that our EAD teams are second to none. I think Splatoon has a number of gameplay elements that make the game incredibly fun and incredibly addictive. It has the ink-squirting mechanic, but on top of that, the ability to turn into the squid and travel through the ink, using it as camouflage, being in the ink while the other team is coming about and getting them—The strategy component of going for space, going for the other team, choosing which weapon to use, it’s an incredibly deep game. We’ll be showcasing more depth. All we’re showing at E3 is the four-on-four multiplayer, but the developers have a lot more modes that they’re working on and that they’ll be revealing in the future.

GamesBeat: Is there a single-player campaign?

Reggie: We’re not showing single-player, but as I said, the developers have a lot more modes coming.

GamesBeat: I’ve seen quite a few games that have multiplayer only, is why I ask. In some ways that seems like a good way for smaller companies to cut budgets and save time. But it also seems like it’s a direction gamers are going in.

Reggie: I’d disagree on that last point. I think gamers want a full-featured experience. I think it’s actually a mistake to cut out modes. Now, certain games, in the way they’re conceptualized, they are what they are. I played Rainbow Six: Siege, Ubi’s five-on-five game. The innovation there is that it’s a one-shot kill. Now there’s strategy to it, which makes that interesting. I don’t know if they’re going to have a mode where all of the other entities are non-playable characters. That doesn’t seem like a lot of fun to me. I think it needs to be that online multiplayer to bring it to life.

So it depends on the game. But in the first-person shooter genre, I would argue that not having a fully featured campaign mode, in this day and age, would be a bit of a mistake. Even though all of the hours played are likely going to be in multiplayer.

GamesBeat: Splatoon also seems like an interesting thing to do because you have so many brands, so many characters. You probably have teams enough to cover some fraction of them. Then you dust off different ones every four or five years and people go crazy. It doesn’t seem like you necessarily need more new intellectual property.

Reggie: The interesting thing there is that in fact we’re constantly generating new IP. The introduction of Miis with the original Wii is a form of new IP. At times I’m disappointed that people don’t think about it that way, but these customizable characters that you can now play across a range of different games and do a range of different things with is incredibly compelling. Tomodachi Life incorporates Miis, but we think it’s a whole new type of game. It was quite effective in the Japanese market, and we’re optimistic that it’s the first step in creating the same type of effectiveness here in the western market. That game’s off to a nice start, having just launched this past Friday.

We believe it’s important to invent new franchises, just as it’s important to reinvent our franchises — the next Zelda game, the next Mario Kart game, the next Super Mario side-scroller. We believe we have to be able to do both.

GamesBeat: Is it correct that you have Valhalla’s game?

Reggie: Correct. Devil’s Third, exclusive to Wii U.

GamesBeat: Is that on the horizon?