Ono: "[Companies] need to continuously provide fans with information."

It's easy to be a fan of Dead or Alive if you're a fan of the fighting game genre. In that regard, it's nice to hear from other company developers and directors from time to time.

In a Capcom company interview with Yoshinori Ono (Director of Street Fighter IV and Street Fighter X Tekken), Ono commented on the necessity of communication with your fans (and consumers) as well as a few other notable quotes:

Yoshinori Ono said:
- What’s the regional distribution of fans for this series like?
"Ono"
Generally, North America accounts for about 60%, Europe 30%, and Japan and Asia 10%.

- It seems that Street Fighter has been widely popular in North America for a number of years.
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"Ono"
Part of this popularity stems from the past success of the series, but I think the major reason can be attributed to the strategy we adopted. In North America establishing a connection with fans and their communities is considered to be extremely important, so that means companies need to continuously provide fans with information. For a series like Street Fighter, which has such a large and loyal fan base, maintaining that fan community is probably the most important issue for marketing. One of the ways in which we do that is by regularly holding what we call "Fight Club" events. Although fans can interact with each other online, what they want to do most is see some "super play" fighting action and have a chance to talk with developers about the game. That’s why we’re always trying to create opportunities for them to do just that. We've set up various kinds of large and small events that demonstrate our support for fans, such as fighting game competitions, and will continue to do so in the future. I feel that these consistent efforts are what have solidified the series’ popularity in North America.

Check the interview for more comments.

In regard to the fanbase distribution, I can honestly believe it is not that different for the Dead or Alive series. Itagaki went on record saying a few years back that North America had the best players and largest market for the franchise.

Hopefully Team NINJA has learned a similar business strategy - one can hope.

Original Japanese transcript located below (link):

小野 said:
―   シリーズユーザーの地域別分布割合を教えてください。
小野  全体として、北米が約60%、欧州が約30%、日本およびアジアで約10%程度です。

―   北米では昔から根強い人気があるのでしょうか。
小野  昔からのものもありますが、現地での施策によるところも大きいと思います。北米ではコミュニティーやファンの方々との繋がりを非常に大切にしています。一般的に、売り手としてはファンへの継続的な情報提供が非常に重要なのですが、特に「ストリートファイター」のように固定ファンの方々に強く支持いただいている場合、そのファンコミュニティーを維持することがマーケティング上の最重要課題となります。その中で、北米では「ファイトクラブ」というイベントを定期的に開催しています。ユーザー同士の交流はオンライン上でも可能ですが、やはり「面と向かってスーパープレイを見てみたい」、「開発者とゲームの話がしてみたい」というのがファンの皆様の第一の希望ですので、そういった場を提供することを心がけています。大小様々なイベントの開催や、格闘ゲーム大会への協賛などによるユーザーへのサポートはここ数年ずっと続けていますし、今後も継続していきます。このような地道な取り組みが北米での人気を着実なものにしているのだと思います。
 
Well, considering that DOA has long since left its arcade roots behind, it would definitely be in Team Ninja's interests to do a similar outreach. Especially when they are fully aware of where their largest audience is.

You want the highest possibility of crafting a game your public will delight in? Then by all means...
 
Well, we're slowly going in that direction. . . they are chattier then they've ever been.

One of the reasons I've played Eve for so many years is the direct interaction the devs have with the community.

To give you an idea...

https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=topics&f=258

Any thread marked with a blue dev flag has had at least once response from a developer. You can see several of these on nearly every page.

Look here, and you can see that every week they release one or several "dev blogs" to let the community see the results that certain teams have been focusing on, or to announce new features.

http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp

Team Ninja's twitter action lately has been very exciting as far as progress goes, although if we got them to that level of communication it would be astounding.
 
Hopefully they they listen to input from us from the beginning and attempt to show of their games at trade shows. This period is like a rennaisance for fighting games.
 
They would kind of have to at this point, wouldn't they?

When even SNK and Atlus saw the merit (re: need) of showcasing KOFXIII at the likes of EVO and Otakon this last year, and KOF is pretty niche at this point, an arguably "bigger name brand" like DOA can't afford to not follow Capcom, Netherrealm and Namco's pattern of hyping their game up whenever and wherever they can.

The main thing I'm hoping for is that they'll be willing to work with you guys in that area. Allow for you guys to spend some quality time with the game and ideally make it better. And hey, it's inevitably free advertising, that way.
 
One can only hope. TN definitely seems to be trying and taking steps in the right direction at least.
 
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