PlatinumGames has offered updates on two of its upcoming games. The developer says Bayonetta 3, due to arrive on Switch this year, will feature "new types of gameplay" and isn't being made with any restrictions from Nintendo. Project G.G. has found "the right direction", but won't be ready to be shown anytime soon, with an update planned for the end of the year.
Speaking to IGN Japan, Platinum president and vice-president Atsushi Inaba and Hideki Kamiya offered insights into their much-anticipated projects.
Asked for an update on Bayonetta – which was announced in 2017 but was notably silent for many years – Kamiya made clear that the first gameplay trailer (below) gives a sense of what's to come. The game is due to be released this year.
“If you look at the [trailer we released in September]," he said, "hopefully that should reassure you that we have been hard at work on development, and it should also show you that there are a lot of new elements in this game that were not in Bayonetta 1 and 2. I hope the footage released so far will fuel your expectations for this game.”
“At the beginning of the trailer," he continued, "viewers might have been confused about what game it was for, and then we introduced some enemies, and still it was kept unclear, and then Bayonetta appeared. I think the fact that we were able to pull off this misdirection in the trailer shows that the new game has its own colour. Bayonetta 3 looks a little different, and it includes some new types of gameplay, so I hope players will find it fresh.”
Kamiya also sought to play down some fears from fans that Nintendo's role as publisher meant that Platinum would be forced to tone down some of Bayonetta's more adult elements: "When we released the previous trailer, some fans thought that maybe working with Nintendo had meant we were under some kind of restrictions in terms of creative expression, but that is absolutely not the case. This will be a very Bayonetta-esque Bayonetta game."
Inaba also hinted that the Nintendo-centric elements that made it into Bayonetta 2 – allowing Bayonetta to dress as Princess Peach, for example – would not be making a return in the sequel: "We already did a lot of that in Bayonetta 2, so it wouldn’t be much fun to repeat ourselves every time."
Kamiya's next game is Project G.G., described as a spiritual follow-up to Viewtiful Joe and The Wonderful 101. After being announced in 2020, the project went quiet, but Kamiya explained that development has made significant progress:
“It’s at a stage where we have tried out all the things we need to try to get a feel for it, but visually it’s not at a stage that we can show anyone yet. But we’re confident that we have found the right direction and we can start full production as a team.”
Inaba added that they're hoping to give an update on the game "sometime at the end of the year," but didn't make clear if that would include actually seeing gameplay.
It remains unclear exactly when Bayonetta 3 will arrive, but we know the Switch exclusive is set for this year. Project G.G. is even less clear, but Kamiya has previously made it clear that there's no outside input on what it becomes: "For everything from its setting and characters, to its game design and story, to how it’s promoted – PlatinumGames is in full control."
This same IGN Japan interview also saw Inaba and Kamiya tackle an entirely different Platinum creation – appealing directly to Microsoft to begin discussions around returning to Scalebound, the exclusive action-RPG cancelled in 2017.
Joe Skrebels is IGN's Executive Editor of News. Follow him on Twitter. Have a tip for us? Want to discuss a possible story? Please send an email to newstips@ign.com.