Felyne fast

As Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate ticks closer to open season in the West, the steady trickle of collaborative content news released to fans runs the full gamut between Awesome and Ridiculous: you can dress as Link, have Isabelle and Mr. Resetti run alongside as sidekicks, or get a Felyne who's apparently a really, really big fan of Sonic the Hedgehog.

Over on Siliconera, Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate producer Ryozo Tsujimoto pulls the curtain back a bit on how these crossovers were brought to fruition. In Sonic's case, Tsujimoto said the game's western release was a significant consideration, and the blue blur's wide-ranging popularity made the idea of tapping connections at Sega a no-brainer:

Since we’re doing an overseas version of this game, it made sense to do some sort of collaborative crossover that would make sense globally. So I had an associate of mine at Sega introduce me to the person in charge [of licensing]. We shook hands, made the deal, and there you go.

Getting Nintendo on board sounded just as easy a proposition, according to Tsujimoto:

As you know, Nintendo helped a lot with development and they’ve been very good partners, so we wanted very much to take some kind of a Nintendo IP and do some sort of crossover that seemed to make sense from our point of view. And of course, with us on the development side, when you think of Nintendo, the first thing you think of are Mario and Zelda characters. Certainly, for those of us on the devteam that are in our 30s and 40s, that’s exactly the first thing that comes to mind.

Capcom went to Nintendo, asked nicely, and an agreement was worked out to add some N-fluence into the game. And yes, this does include Mario and Luigi.

There are additional crossovers that have a decidedly Japanese flavor, such as the adorable hunting horn based on Taiko: Drum Master, but it's nice to hear the international audience has been in mind. You never know what other crossovers may be getting cooked up for this game; hopefully the upcoming Nintendo Direct will give us an idea.

[source siliconera.com]