Cool your jets – the father of Street Fighter has not left Capcom

Post by： in
By Brenna Hillier

Cease your panicked screaming; Yoshinori Ono, the man driving the Street Fighter franchise, has not resigned his place at Capcom.

The Internet briefly went into panic mode earlier today when Ono announced his departure from Capcom Vancouver, commenting that he would take some time to relax before thinking about what to do next.

Naturally this inspired immediate reactions of horror, as Ono has openly admitted he’s the one pushing Capcom to continue support for fighters. Happily, Ono hastened to explain that he remains part of the publisher’s staff and projects – he’s just leaving the Vancouver director’s role.

We don’t know who’ll be taking over from Ono yet, but whoever it is will be stepping up as head of a mature studio with plenty of experience under its belt; Vancouver has had several years under Capcom’s aegis now, and likely no longer needs such a high-placed Capcom Japan executive to watch over it.

Ono’s main role is as corporate officer at Capcom Japan. If you’re wondering why fans might fear his departure from the company, remember that Ono was taken seriously ill due to overwork, and went so far as to publicly criticise Capcom for the way it treats its staff.

We don’t know what projects Ono is currently involved in, although he usually has a finger in a lot of Capcom’s pies. We have heard that Street Fighter 5 is in the early planning stages; unfortunately, there’s been no word on a sequel to Darkstalkers: Resurrection.

Update: Ono’s LinkedIn profile mentions his involvement in two upcoming projects – Deep Down and another, mysterious PS4 title, both listed for release in “201X”.

Comments

Post a Comment