Update:
Following the widespread response to the news he left Square Enix, Yuki Naka posted a tweet with a short update, below. We've also included a translation shared by Gematsu, which broadly aligns with machine translations of the text.
I resigned from Square Enix at the end of April,” Naka said in a tweet. “While I cannot share the reason right now, I hope to be able to discuss it when the time comes. As for what I’ll do in the future, I’m already 55 years-old, so I may as well retire.
Original Article:
Yuji Naka has an incredible legacy in gaming history, including his founding role and work on the original Sonic the Hedgehog games and a number of other SEGA classics such as Nights into Dreams and Phantasy Star Online. His independent studio, Prope, also produced some notable and fun titles in past Nintendo generations, intriguingly including StreetPass games.
Most recently, however, he's been at the forefront as director of Balan Wonderworld at Square Enix; the poor critical reception to that game has prompted plenty of debate. The high profile of the release was met by an extremely rough launch, though there are certainly vocal supporters of the game as well. Regardless of the various perspectives around Balan Wonderworld, it won't have been deemed a successful project.
It seems, based on Naka-san's online profiles, that he then departed Square Enix at the end of April, the news of which has recently been doing the rounds on social media.
Yuji Naka's most recent personal tweet highlighted that his company Prope, though largely inactive, recently celebrated its 15th Anniversary and is still supporting some of its title's online features. He also expresses a hope that he can put out another project in the future.
Whatever the future holds for Naka-san, his legacy in the history of video games will be ensured; it'll be interesting to see his next project if it comes to light.
Comments 114
I mean, what am I suppose to say?
When you release a flop, your job is on the line no matter how legendary you are.
It's a cold game 🤷
Saw this going around yesterday. A shame really. Somewhat interested to see what he does next.
I am still confused about the game and how Yuji Naka was the one who made it...
Interesting, I know he said this was his "one shot" at a platformer, but I figured he'd still be working at Square in some capacity. Can't say I'm surprised at the reaction tho, they probably lost millions over that mess.
And nothing of value was lost
Maybe one day he'll make another good game. But for now, suffer through Balan Wonderworld, Bob.
I really get the sense that there was a lot of tension between Naka and Square in the production of the game. I don't just want to blame Yuji Naka because, underneath it all, there was a lot of promise and there are some interesting elements to the game itself. Whether the mismanagement was on Naka's part, Square or (most likely) a mix I feel something happened behind the scenes.
He’s only one man, the entire team responsible for the game are all to blame for such a poor piece of software. I honestly don’t understand how they looked at it and thought ‘yes, this is fit to release to retail’
Not worried. He'll go back to the indie scene for a while.
I feel sorry for Square Enix having their name attached to Balan Blunderworld
@HamatoYoshi Bit harsh. Everyone releases a flop at some point.
Lmao, nice job editing your comment to something completely the opposite of what you originally said. This site should show an ‘edited’ tag.
Probably one of the most obvious unforced errors in gaming during the past 10 years, they did everything they could to make this bomb.
“Certainly vocal supporters of the game as well.” And certainly some people dump a cup of salt onto their well done steak , this game’s defense force is depressing mostly because you can tell how they haven’t bothered to play any or the quality 3D platformers released during the past 3 years and instead chose to fixate on this game like they probably also do for every trainwreck Sonic Team releases.
Yuji Naka? Huge balls up more like.
Hope he lands on his feet. I'm sure he will. He has quite the following it seems.
"though there are certainly vocal supporters of the game as well."
i'm one of them
It really is too bad what happened to this project.
Balan Wonderworld has massive potential, but a combination of not challenging the philosophy of "single button gameplay" and not having a talented team that was up to realizing that task lead to a failure.
Knowing about the history of Arzest, formerly Artoon, of how it's formed from SEGA / Sonic Team alumni particularly Naoto Ohshima, goes to show that this was a product of industry connections, and not talent. That said, looking out for one-another is very important, it's a shame that Arzest as a company just seem to lack any actual game design talent.
You know a lot of these "legendary" franchise creators seem to be running into hurdles lately, whether by their own fault or not. We have seem this with Kojima, this guy, the Rayman guy or Mighty Number 9 guy... Either they lose their touch with time or the studio screws them over. Balan seems like a case of both.
Stop giving this guy money to make games. Give it to people that show real potential instead.
That sucks but making a game that can trigger seizures (I know it was fixed in patches but still)...yeah I don’t feel too bad for this break up.
It's so so bad... Not even a good bad game. There are several good bad games, like dumpster bear, and several others that I can't think of right now. I still can't believe that they positioned this thing to be an awesome great game. It was mediocre at best I played the demo for over an hour trying to like it.
@Ryu_Niiyama that was the last of the problems this game has...it's just boring and uninspired.
I guess that means no sequel
@Miyamotosan to be fair I can't blame Square Enix for giving him money and try to do something good...they tried, they failed, next time they will be more careful for sure.
I mean, yeah. Balan Wonderworld was an embarrassment to the company. Flops happen, but this wasn't just an unpopular game: it was incompetent on every level of its design, from what I've seen.
I'd LOVE to eventually see a behind-the-scenes tell-all about this game, though. You can't convince me SOME of the people working on this couldn't tell how bad it was going to be.
@SmaggTheSmug Well, look. A lot of the time, individual creators attached to legendary projects who develop cults of personality around themselves are helped out more by the people they're working with than the public might expect. Putting aside the rare indie game that is the passion of just one dude, most great games are the result of great teams of people coming together. I'd argue you saw that with the original Star Wars trilogy as well, versus the prequel trilogy in the noughts that Lucas was also heavily involved with.
Yuji Naka sucking at making video games since Sonic 06.
@DragotheKomodo and I have the game firmly on my wishlist since launch. It's a promising work and I have too much of a history enjoying games the loud fans and self-dubbed reviewers called "dull" or "broken".
No duh it's the worst game both he and Arzest have ever made by a long shot.
He's managed to make Arzest who can release half-decent functional games (Yoshi and Hey Pikmin). Somehow with a big budget manage to create finished product that plays like someone playing around in Unity or Unreal Engine.
Naka said platformers were his speciality but Kingdom Hearts 1 had better platforming than Balan and that's an RPG.
Why would SE even want him at this point?
I mean, what success has Yuji Naka really had previously? He wasn't the original creator of Sonic as much as he may like to proclaim - am I missing something? Was Balan really expected to be great?
@Dr_Lugae
Arzest weren't under the watchful eye of Nintendo working on this project, and this was apparently their first Unreal Engine project too.
It was under Yuji Naka's direction, who probably was not being challenged on bad decisions like excessive costumes or one-button play.
I mean that really sums up the problems succinctly.
Look up his games on Wikipedia. Not a single hit since 2001/2002
Its all been garbage shovelware. Its mostly Wiiware type games or filler games.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuji_Naka
@MaxiPareja I looked at his wiki. Last hit 2001 with Sonic Adventures 2. Everyone else after that is trash shovel type games
@Waluigi999 the original shouldn't even exist. It was a failure in every single sense of the word
@MaxiPareja The best game that Naka can claim full responsibility for, where you cam say that he designed the game is Chu Chu Rocket. Since he was director for it. Balan Wonderworld is actually the 2nd game he's ever directed.
Everything else was programming or producer(which while involved, is less hands on than directing and is more about project and team management than design).
@earthinheritor
I wouldn't go that far, it provided us all with a great Zero Punctuation review
name reminds me of banal no matter how many times I read it.. crap like that matters especially if the game is crap
I mean, has Yuji Naka been relevant for the last two decades? I'll freely admit my ears perk up when I hear he's involved with something, but that's the little kid in me from the mid-90s. It's kind of the same way with Yu Suzuki. Times have passed by a lot of the old Sega maestros.
@JuiceMan_V Cold, but honest truth. If you're horrible at your job, you'll get the boot.
In Hollywood they say you're only as good as your last movie. He'll probably recover from this, but it's not going to happen overnight.
He really made a turd here, which makes me wonder if the previous hits he was involved with were actually the result of a few other core people he worked with basically steering everything in the right direction, rather than him being a particularly important or necessary element of some of his greatest hits. A true genius of their field would be able to achieve great results again and again, even with different teams and so on, especially with the kinds of resources and talent available to him that he obviously had a Square Enix. If he truly thought he was making something great with this game then maybe he's not the right man for the job, despite the handful of classics that he's been involved with. And, to be fair, he's only been a director on a couple of those projects anyway, and was a designer on even less, and none of them were masterpieces. He was a programmer or producer on most of the other games he was involved with, which doesn't say much about how capable he is at actually designing and making great games.
It was such a bad game.
@earthinheritor Not a single good game since 2001? Move that forward about 5 years and you may have a point. Other than Shadow the Hedgehog, everything between 2001-2006 was solid.
@LaytonPuzzle27 Naka wasn't involved with 06. He left before it came out, and was working on Phantasy Star Universe at the time.
I wonder if Naka would go back to work with SEGA, to set Sonic Team straight. It might be good for, say, a compilation of Sonic Team's Classics, like NiGHTS into Dreams, NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams, Billy Hatcher & The Giant Egg, and even Burning Rangers.
Seems like Balan Company, which Naka formed for the sake of creating this game, disappeared faster than PS5 or Xbox Series X stocks..
Balan was a bust. Naka might have been a great developer back in the day, but sometimes you just lose it.
I canot imagine that a »legend » like him made a game this bad, my only hope is that he never release another game like that, maybe he should just retire.
@mousness It was developed by Arzest, who also developed Yoshi's New Island
For me this is good news.Maybe now he will do Rodea the sky soldier 2.Or at least port the first one on Switch.
I'm maybe the only one here, who liked Balan's Wonderland, but I really hope that Mr. Naka finds his way and has not too many problems because of that.
His mistake was going to work for Square Enix when he could had go for Nintendo or Capcom or any other company that value good platformer. Square Enix was not known for platformer and they take priority in triple a games. When you can't deliver what was expected then I'm not surprise they gave you the boot. Hopefully he move on to better things.
@SmaggTheSmug Aw, leave ol' Kojima off that list. Death Stranding was definitely an acquired taste, and I don't blame anyone for not clicking with it, but at least it very much sought to do something new and hade a genuine (and very weird) vision as opposed to just making worse versions of past triumphs like the others. And it was a critical and financial success, too.
But yeah, Balan and Mighty No. 9 are really sad, unfortunate blemishes on formerly legendary creators that are so bad they make you wonder, which was the real fluke, the masterpiece or the disaster?
@Whitestrider How one feels about the game content is subjective; I find creating a health hazard to be a bigger issue.
@Haltlock I think they've not kept up with the progression of game design conventions.
Like in the 80's 90's or late 90's early 2000's for 3D you could kind of get away with bad controls or convoluted gameplay(e.g. Shenmue) because everyone was trying to figure things out. I'd wager some designers could get away with weird gameplay systems and outright ignoring the competitions games.
But nowadays people know what's good and the cream has already risen to the top. So you need to be ontop of modern games you need to know which games have done what right. Which is why some big names from the past may struggle to compete in terms of game design even compared to indie devs.
@SwitchVogel I doubt they spent a full million developing and marketing it.
Look I’m just trying to give them the benefit of the doubt, because the other option is that they’re just utterly incompetent...
@mousness He had another team help make the game. Matt Mcmuscles "Wha Happun?" video explains it more thoroughly than I could, but the studio that helped develop the game, the same studio that made some mediocre games like Yoshi's new Island 3DS and Hey Pikmin, provided art assets and programmed the game.
This game being split between two studios most likely contributed to the game turning out the way it did, but from the initial concepts of the gameplay, it looks like it was doomed from the start.
@LaytonPuzzle27 He didn't work on Sonic '06, in fact the only thing he has done (Sonic related) after Sonic 3/NiGHTS is throw money at the projects up until Sonic Riders. And considering those games have really high production value, (just look at the SR op, it's by Production IG no less) I'd say he didn't waste anyone's time.
@Doofenshmirtz https://youtu.be/IVXJmfd3cmg
Not sure how to feel about this, though.
@Ryu_Niiyama the game was patched on day 1, so the health hazard was fixed almost immediately...too bad no patch could fix the other problems of this game!
The Mega Drive Sonic games (1, 2, 3&K) are masterpieces of the fourth generation. I played Balan Wonderworld demo. It's a very rough game, like a very early built so I guess it's not all his fault. Why the demo and the game were released in such state is beyond my comprehension. I wish him the best.
Game should have been cancelled
despite the memes, its a lil sad to see the people and business side behind the game. but then you remember the product and wonder how it it went so wrong
Balan Wonder why that happened?
@Orpheus79V Imma try to defend Shadow, aside from fulfilling the requests of a dumb part of the fandom (gun-loving children) I think the game shouldn't discredit Naka, in the end it was just fanservice, and the game had some cool things to offer besides being a sequel to SA2, it's the first time the CG cutscenes look so good and the OST is considerably bigger than previous games. For a 2005 multi-platform game it's very high quality. Gameplay-wise it fixed some notable issues from the previous games, the lightdash no longer conflicted with other moves that could end in an "accident" and the grinding mechanics were made more straightforward. I can't think of any mechanic in the game that required too much skill and precision, unlike in Heroes.
Several EA games released a motherlode of information about how the train wreck came to be. Of course I'm talking about Anthem and ME: Andromeda. It would be interesting to see the same kind of postmortem on Balan. I had high hopes for the game, and now I'm just wondering, how did it get to this state?!
I hope for the day Yuji Naka makes a new Fishing Resort game for the Nintendo Switch when he comes back to PROPE. And yes, Balan Wonderworld was a trainwreck that was supposed to be good. Yooka-Laylee was (surprisingly) better than this, and the same can be said to A Hat in Time.
After playing Balan it's obvious where the Sonic series went wrong.
He reminds me a lot of Masuda at Gamefreak, they've both had great ideas but in the end they have no clue what made those concepts great in the first place which results in making the most lack luster games.
@nessisonett I agree, even Miyamoto
I bought Balan Wonderworld. My biggest problem with it is that I have no idea what's going on. Even after watching the opening cinematic I have no clue what the point is. It seems to be a case of finding the statues in each level using the costumes to do so.
The game itself is a little rough but nothing absolutely terrible to me. It's just a quite basic kid's game, really.
All of Naka's games have the same or similar problems to Balan Wonderworld. They all have weird, bad controls, they are all weirdly oversimplified to the point where they feel like they're supposed to be coin op arcade games (or bite sized cell phone games for that matter) rather than console games with a long story mode you're supposed to spend several hours playing through. They are all EXTREMELY unpolished and janky but they always have really good music and really appealing character design that tricks people into thinking the game itself is good when its actually a complete mess.
It would be hilarious if Naka ends up at Nintendo.
@ecco6t9 Word.
@Orpheus79V Take a look at his wiki list:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuji_Naka
He does not have a good history as producer. Billy Hatcher in 2003 was decent. But the rest is street pass or DS/Wii shovel content. Most of them are super obscure. A bunch of Wii waggle type games too..the bad kind.
@Waluigi999 ooo he did one for Balan? I am absolutely going to watch that
Not surprising when you make a platformer worse than Sonic 06
I almost have to think he was set up..
I mean...how do you make a game THIS bad...?? And you are the father of Sonic the Hedgehog?? HOW?
Sad to hear but the game was absolute garbage...🤷♂️
This guy worked at Square? Did he have any RPG experience? Seems like if so, Nintendo could jump at snatching him and putting him to work as a second party rpg director or something.
Blame the person not the company that's how it's played. He was the creator but laying the blame just on one person is disingenuous of SQE.
@SigourneyBeaver That is because the fact that in order to Understand the game, you'll have to purchase the Balan Wonderworld Novel that came the same day and have even the dialogues that were supposed to be on the game itself
I think he needs to retire as a game developer. He had his time in the 90's/early 2000's and I think he doesn't understand how to make a good video game anymore
It'll be hilarious if Square Enix pulled this game from sale. I honestly hope they do so.
@Arkantos2990 Thanks. It's only £5 on Kindle. I might get it.
Seems as though legendary creators are struggling to keep up with the modern advancements in gaming. Had Balan released during the GameCube era it would have been seen as just another meh Billy Hatcher esque game but since it released in this day and age...the gameplay and design was just dated. Hopefully he lands on his feet but it might also be time to just hand the reigns over to younger blood.
@BlubberWhale Could be! All I know is that game dev is often way more expensive than you'd think; I remember there was a post a few years ago from Yacht Club Games that broke down the numbers and it was shocking how quickly everything can add up.
There's simply no way this was at all a beneficial project for them, though. Terrible sales and reviews guaranteed it didn't make money, and all the bad press around it caused priceless amounts of soft damage to the company reputation. Definitely not the kind of thing to sink a company as big as Square, but I don't blame them for swiftly deciding to pull the plug here.
The game deserves better. Even if it's not perfect. What poor news😔
How often does this happen? I’m reminded of the man who created the Virtual Boy.
Retirement huh? Not even kicking back with small digital projects?
Whatever happened at Square Enix, they weren't even looking to salvage the game with post-release patches or an overhaul.
"I can not share the reason"
Haha, you lost them a boat load of money by releasing a crap game they were against from the start?
Should had stay with Sega longer and collect that 401k money before he retired.
None of this surprises me. Naka doesn't have it, he might not have had it to begin with. A disaster of this magnitude will just forever taint your reputation. It's sad, but that's business.
It’s a shame how Balan Wonderworld ended up. I hope he’ll get another chance at directing someday.
@LaytonPuzzle27 I don't think he had much involvement in 06. He left nearly a year before it was "completed."
Naka is an overrated game designer, and hasn't been a good programmer since the 90's. He's better off retired.
Maybe its for the better. If you don't have that touch anymore, its time to stop. Those terrible games only taint your legacy.
Don't quit. This game is gonna age well. Give it updates and love. Modding community.
May as well retire? Poor guy sounds defeated. Hopefully he will reflect and reconsider. One poor game does not topple a legend.
@Ooyah
It's more like 'retirement may be on the table' rather than a defeated 'I may as well retire'.
If something's important, don't pick a translation based on whether it "broadly aligns with machine translations of the text".
@Ooyah One poor game? Look through his gameography and name his last good game.
@ecco6t9 Nintendo has standards.
I am sad this one has received the negative attention it has. I kind of want to give it a go someday to see how the game is for someone like me.
@Longondo Yes definitely.
Strange. Balan was such a GOOD game.
@10neBee Too little too late. Let it die off
Sad that his career is going to end at such a low point.
Hard to believe this man created an IP that was once going toe-to-toe with Mario in popularity and relevance.
Wish this was one of those times when I was proven wrong and that he would try at least one more time but yeah, as I was saying it seems he's struggling to find his footing in the modern era of gaming. Gonna be a shame he couldn't end on a high note but at least he left behind a very influential legacy.
@SwitchVogel No you’re completely right about all that. I was only speculating based on how unfinished it seemed... like it was just a side project a few people were doing in their spare time. Also Japanese developers can be very cheap (or the employees will work for less... sort of a dedication, cultural thing, as you probably know) and they can also be very efficient. Buuuut, I over exaggerated, it probably was a good few million spent.
Anyway, dang shame, amiright? Maybe someday it will be polished... perhaps by the modding community...
@SalvorHardin Not a fan of Puyo Puyo Tetris?
What about Rodea the sky soldier...give this guy some hope at least.
55 and retirement? Must be nice.
Well, it was nice, Mr. Naka. Thank you for everything and enjoy your retirement. I know for sure that I will miss him
@Dpullam I'd say try the demo but they pulled it from the eShop. Which should speak for itself.
Annoyingly due to Internet hyperbole there's probably people who'd say Mario Odyssey, 3DWorld+Bowsers Fury, or Yooka Laylee are bad games. That it becomes tough to distinguish gameplay failure on Balan's level through words alone.
But this game had zero hope. It'd be one of the worst designed 3D platformers of its generation even if it had come out in 1997. Its not Busby 3D bad but its stiff controls, lack of momentum and restrictive actions lands somewhere between Bubsy and those lazy 3D licensed movie games. It's joyless to play.
I'm not surprised seeing how garbage Balan Wonderland turned out to be
As someone pointed out already, the dude’s directing credits are super light. I don’t know what everyone expected. Sonic was a LOT more than just this guy’s programming chops. And having a storied career as a producer doesn’t necessarily translate to being a game director.
Edit: this isn’t anything new in this industry, though. It’s an industry that really suffers from trying to prop up old veterans as heroes and legends of the art form and throwing money at them based on one or two seminal projects, and not necessarily their entire track record, often ignoring some really bad output. If anyone else pitched this game, they would have been laughed at.
@outsider83 The guy who made Virtual Boy, Gunpei Yokoi, then went on to make the WonderSwan which was a very decent handheld for the time. He also invented the Game Boy. VB was a failed experiment in an otherwise stellar career (also did Metroid, Kid Icarus, and hand in hand with early Miaymoto arcade games) where Yuji Naka has the inverse: one “blip” of a success and everything else is just exquisitely failed potential. And I’m saying this as a fan of Burning Rangers and Rodea Wii.
I kinda feel bad. Maybe he heard me screeching about how bad BW is? (ok probably not lol)
Hi I just had to log in and comment and back Naka up, I actually got his game called fishing resort for the wii and I have to say I put over 200 hours into that game it’s so fun it’s almost addictive to play and I don’t even fish that much. I only hope (wish) that before Naka retires he would go back to Prope and rerelease this great game with updated graphics on the switch, last time I checked he still had one guy working there lol, I think he’s better off running his own company but it’s just hard to make money with small company’s now.
I really enjoyed some of the games he made as "PROPE", most noticably Let's Tap and Ivy the Kiwi.
I see that he hasn't closed PROPE yet, but also that he's the sole employee. Aside from that, he's still relatively wealthy, so I wouldn't blame him for retiring, rather than spend another three years on a game that everyone will badmouth. :v
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