Marvel Rivals developer NetEase has been conducting unsparing mass layoffs for months now, brutally gutting – and, ultimately, shutting down – Visions of Mana studio Ouka one day after it released the JRPG remake. So former director Kenji Ozawa wants to make sure his newly announced Studio Sasanqua is one that, in his words, values game creators.
Ozawa, who served as Visions of Mana's co-director, survived Ouka's initial layoffs but decided to leave NetEase in October 2024. Now, speaking to Automaton in a new interview, Ozawa makes a point of saying "management needs to protect creators."
Sasanqua, named for "a flower that blooms in winter," Ozawa says on Twitter, is kind of a method for him to expel his frustration. He tells Automaton that he's experienced a list of issues in the industry as obnoxious and teeming as a swarm of flies; management that makes poor choices then lays off everyone who wasn't responsible, management that makes individual devs feel insecure on a psychological level.
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So, to safeguard against these unfair expectations that pressure cooks the entire games industry, Ozawa plans to take on full responsibility – professionally and financially – for any managerial slip-ups Sasanqua may make in the future.
"We are living in an age where everyone is wasting their time with an overabundance of entertainment," says the mission statement on Sasanqua's website, translated by DeepL. "The gaming industry is said to be expanding, but [...] both large organizations and small teams are feeling the walls between them."
"The attitude and the way of working with the whole body should be more important than the methodologies that are only based on the head," Sasanqua says.
Marvel Rivals developer confirms layoffs to a US-based design team, but insists "we are investing more, not less, into the evolution and growth of this game."
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