AusGamers: To start off with the big question: why exclusive to the Wii U for Bayonetta 2?

Atsushi Inaba: The big point is that Nintendo is publishing this game, so it’s on the Wii U. This was a topic that Nintendo had brought up with Platinum Games, if we would think about doing something on the Wii U system, and it wasn’t something that Platinum Games reached out to Nintendo about.

So we’re the development side, and Nintendo is the publishing side, so where we connected was at the Wii U.

AusGamers: My followup question then is about the challenges that you face building this game for the Wii U, and anything you can divulge in that respect.

Inaba-san: I wouldn’t say there was any challenges in particular to developing for the Wii U, but we did add a new feature for touch control on the Wii U, where you can switch from controller to touch controls seamlessly.

Another reason we added the touch controls, obviously to make full use of the Wii U’s capabilities and features, as well as we wanted to provide an environment or a method, for example, that I could hand to my mum and say “Here, play this!”, it’s very easy and very intuitive, and also you could lay back on your bed and play really casually, as if you were playing a game on your smartphone.



AusGamers: You’ve also just announced Xbox One exclusive Scalebound. Is making more games exclusive to different consoles something that you’re likely to be doing more of?

Inaba-san: I think that’s definitely a possibility if some kind of discussion like this time happens [again]. That’s definitely a possibility.

AusGamers: With Bayonetta now coming to the Nintendo landscape, is there any chance of her making an appearance in Super Smash Bros?

Inaba-san: [laughs] Honestly, my personal opinion, I would love to have Bayonetta in Super Smash Bros. I’m waiting; and with Amiibo! [laughs]

AusGamers: Is there potential to expand the universe of Bayonetta into things like comics and anime or anything like that?

Inaba-san: That’s actually already happened in Japan. There’s a comic book series and an anime. The basis of that anime movie is Bayonetta 1, and we were talking how it would be great if we could do another one based on Bayonetta 2.

AusGamers: One of the key features of Bayonetta is obviously scale -- everything is big and dramatic -- was it a challenge to make every scene, or every next step, bigger than the one that came before it?



Inaba-san: It’s a little hard to answer, but basically for the situations we call climax situations, we try to really focus on how we can make it very dramatic, but also interactive at the same time. This was something that occurred in the previous game as well, but we tried to cram as much of that into it as possible. There’s just a lot of it.

As you can probably see, it takes a lot to situation, just like a movie, to make a climax scene in a movie, it takes a lot.

AusGamers: And the combat is quite unique in this game as well, it’s very interactive. Were there certain focuses with the combat system that you want audiences to take away from it?

Inaba-san: As in the last iteration of Bayonetta, we put a lot of effort into… the basic concept is that you’re battling an enemy one to one, so we put a lot of effort into making it feel right when you’re controlling the character. That’s something that we put into Bayonetta 2 as well, but on top of that, we needed to make [the] concept evolve as well, so that’s where we added this concept of Umbran Climax, where you can summon demons and expand your area of attack. By adding that, we tried to heighten the intensity when battling enemies.

AusGamers: The game is very sexualised, with a lot of dominant femininity in there, and Nintendo has allowed you to play around with their properties, with the Legend of Zelda and the sexy Peach costumes that you’ve got in there. Was that very sensitive to work with Nintendo in that regard? Because Nintendo is known to be very family-friendly, and this is obviously more adult.



Inaba-san: In terms of the costumes, that’s something that [Platinum Games co-founder Hideki] Kamiya took charge of for the Wii U version of Bayonetta. He really likes this and wanted to put a lot of content into it, but to be honest, there were some concepts that were not approved by Nintendo.

For example, with Link’s costume, we had kept it kind of conservative with an undershirt underneath it, but then Nintendo said maybe that’s not Bayonetta’s style, so why don’t you just remove that? So we can say that Nintendo was the one that really took into consideration, the kind of worldview that Bayonetta has and gave us suggestions based on that. This is the first time I’ve actually divulged that information.

So if it wasn’t for Nintendo reaching out and giving us the opportunity, Bayonetta 2 would not be. So I wouldn’t say there was pressure that I felt, but looking at it from an end-user perspective, as a game player, I would want to see this because it was on Wii U, or I would want to see that, so I feel like I was able to put all of that into this game.

AusGamers: That’s fantastic, thank you. I really appreciate your time

Inaba-san: Thank you very much.