Capcom: 'Novelty wearing off' among fans for brawler HD updates

It seems Capcom are drawing a close to their run of HD updates to brawlers as sales are slowing down, reveals Capcom’s SVP Christian Svensson. They won’t be giving all their fighting titles a HD makeover.

Svensson outlines a lot of the hurdles they must clear in order to get ”PS1, PS2 and PSP ISOs on PSN.” It’s not pretty. In truth they’ve ”probably run the course of feasible titles” getting onto PSN.

Sadly having more chats with SNK, EA and SEGA are unlikely to pave the way for more HD re-releases. The sun is setting on the revival of brawlers in high definition.

Christian Svensson breaks down three key points:

1. Rerelease of PS1, PS2 and PSP ISOs on PSN. There are three filters that must be passed in order for this to happen. First, Sony has to verify that the title in question works in their emulators (not all do). Second, all IP clearances must be had. That is to say, we must have digital distribution rights in the original agreements with middleware, voice actors, musical score, etc. Third, there must be an existing licence in force in the case of something that uses non-Capcom IP (e.g. SNK, Marvel, Xmen) and also no legacy IP issues. At times in the past teams have infringed upon other third party IP and new IP sweeps must be conducted to ensure that this is not the case in a given version. Once all three points are met, Sony takes control and it is up to them when and how it releases (though they do coordinate with us).

1. New development in the form of updated versions of SF2, SF3, MvC2, MvC1, Marvel Super Heroes, Darkstalkers, Puzzle Fighter etc. Sadly, I think we’ve probably run the course of feasible titles here given the droppoff we’ve seen in sales with each new introduction. It seems the novelty of such projects is wearing off even within just the fighting game community based upon the sales data of our last two launches. That said, we have been quite prolific in these areas (despite the assertion above that we haven’t) and it’s probably time for us to slow down anyway.

2. The digital releases of games that were previously only disc based at retail in the current generation. This would apply to SSFIV, SFxT, UMvC3, etc. As discussed previously on X360 this is easy. On PS3 this is more difficult however it’s being done as a matter of the planned development on all forthcoming titles.

”So in short, what we can bring to you in these forms, we are doing so,” wrapped up Svensson. ”That doesn’t mean EVERYTHING will show up and to set expectations, I think you should prepare yourself that not every fighting game we’ve made will receive even one of these treatments.” Darkstalkers was the latest to have a HD release on PSN.

”I do not believe that conversations with SNK, EA, Sega or anyone else is going to alter these issues.”