Stranger's Wrath is heading to the eShop

Oddworld Inhabitants has a couple of games heading to the Wii U eShop. During E3 the developer - which has turned its attentions to more indie games in recent times - announced it would be releasing Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee New 'n' Tasty, a Playstation classic, and Oddworld: Stranger's Wrath HD, which was a popular title on the Xbox, on a range of download stores.

In an interview with Venture Beat, Lorne Lanning, the founder of Oddworld Inhabitants, said he wanted to stay indie for as long as possible and won't be tempted into becoming a triple-A developer until it's affordable.

On top of this, he spoke of his admiration for Nintendo CEO and President Satoru Iwata over his staff restructuring policy. Whereas other development studios are cutting back on staff to save on costs in the name of keeping revenue and profits stabilised for the all important shareholders, Nintendo has chosen not to take out the carving knife and is retaining the vast majority of its staff.

During Nintendo's latest Annual General Meeting of shareholders, Iwata said more advanced and complicated products naturally require a larger workforce and higher costs, but cutting back on the people in these departments could hurt the company's overall development.

Lanning admires this standpoint greatly and said he would work with Nintendo's President "in a second":

Satoru Iwata came out and said people were asking him, "When are you gonna lay off your development staff?! I don’t remember exactly what he said, but it was basically, "Laying off development is not going to solve our problems. Building great games is what we do and we’re going to continue doing it." When he said that, in my opinion, he was immortalised in the creative community. I would work with him in a second. When a man in that type of position, in a world where the golden rule is the rule and that’s what’s expected at public companies, he stood up and said, "That’s not what we’re about. We’re about building great stuff. We have great people to build great stuff. We’re gonna do that."

He's certainly impressed with Nintendo's business model and believes its forward-thinking will allow it to be in the video games industry for a very long time - something he couldn't say for other companies:

When I look at the history of Nintendo, I say, "Nintendo is gonna be here in 100 years." I have no doubt. I doubt Microsoft will be here in 100 years. I know Zynga won’t be here in 100 years. I’ve been here longer than Zynga. (Laughs) We’re not making headlines in the Wall Street Journal, but we’re still building what we set out to build. Now we have to be clever and smaller in how we think, but we’re more self-empowered than we’ve ever been.

Very kind words indeed from the founder of Oddworld Inhabitants. Perhaps Nintendo will pick up the phone - going off what Lanning's said the company wouldn't have to wait long to hear a "yes".

Would you like to see Oddworld Inhabitants work more with Nintendo in the future? Let us know in the comment section below.

[source venturebeat.com]