First Square Eidos collaboration under way

Square Enix president Yoichi Wada has revealed that the first true collaboration between Square Enix and Eidos is underway at the company's studio in Montreal, GamesIndustry.biz reports.

Few details were given on the project, which is in its early stages at the same location as the new Deus Ex and Thief games.

During Wada's keynote speech at the Montreal International Game Summit, Wada said that it was important that the entire Square Enix family - which includes Eidos studios in Europe and the Taito arcade business - works closely together on all aspects of games, and that regional boundaries should not be a barrier to game development.

"What is important is that we have all the elements that are able to cope with global issues and take into account different cultural identities," he said.

"When we talk about different areas we have to know about different cultures in the world, that's why our production centres are based around the world, that is going to be our strength. When we talk about global audience, it does not exist. There's not a land called global."

"Background culture might be different and technology may be different, but what's more important is that the movie, comics, arcade business and games are included in our group," he added.

Despite the collaboration, internal teams are encouraged to work competitively against one another, said Wada, in an effort to encourage creativity and innovation.

"Studios must compete within our group - who sold more copies? Those in a similar position will be competing and this will help innovation."

He also discussed the growing industry, and stated that while multiple genres, formats and services are helping to diversify the business, he had concerns that too much choice and expansion may confuse consumers.

"What's important is that whether it be the content or service there needs to be an image within the customer, and once that's finalised we will be able to spread the formats that we work on. Genres have diversified. The content and services are going to expand and that is good for the industry. It's a good thing, but if it spreads too much, new users for games will be puzzled by what games are going to be.

"It's not good to be consolidated. If there are too many [genres] the user will not be able to imagine what the game is going to be. It can cause confusion among users and could be detrimental to the market."