Akihiro Hino, the CEO of Level-5expressed a desire to make more games erotic and violentvery different from the company’s typical productions such as Yo-Kai Watch and Inazuma Eleven. The opportunity to do so was an interview granted to Denfaminicogamer together with Goichi Suda, the head of Grasshopper Manufacture. Naturally we are talking about personal ambitions, which are not guaranteed to lead anywhere. So don’t expect Professor Layton to be a little happier than usual in the immediate future.
Hino wants to do more
Hino and Suda are long-time friends, with the former always expressing a certain admiration for the latter’s more extreme productions, such as Silver Case, Killer7 and No More Heroes. In short, they are very close to each other, so much so that during the interview they let themselves go a little.
Hino explained that he founded Level-5 because he didn’t like the idea of taking orders from others: “I didn’t want my superiors to give me orders, I wanted to do what I wanted, especially on the role-playing side.” He then again expressed admiration for the work of Sweat, stating that “Authors who can publish such extreme games are fantastic.” And this is where he let himself go, confessing amused: “If I can say it explicitly, I confess that I would like to do things like erotic games or 18+ games full of violence,” adding then that the situation he finds himself in does not allow him to do exactly what he wants, because he has to manage historical series and has to develop new intellectual properties with his collaborators.
Suda then asked him if he already has some ideas in mind, to which Hino explained that he has an “anomalous world” inside him, but that he fights not to go there, producing only things that come from his virtuous half: “But deep down, I feel to want to visit it.” His hope is to be able to do so, sooner or later, when he feels that Level-5 is in a stable situation. Suda commented that a Hino game for adults could be revolutionary and expressed hope to play it.
