Fans were immensely pleased when Level-5 unveiled that it was working on a brand new entry in the Professor Layton franchise, Professor Layton and the New World of Steam. The game has seen a few set backs in regards to its release date, but judging from comments from Tokyo Game Show it seems to be shaping up rather nicely. Level-5’s CEO Akihiro Hino, has revealed in a new interview that he was hesitant about creating a new entry in the Layton series, but he was given a nudge by Nintendo who apparently really wanted the company to produce a new title essentially pushing for a Layton comeback from Level-5.
“There hasn’t been [a new title] in almost 10 years. The series concluded briefly.” He goes on to explain that he had qualms about making a new Professor Layton game, as the series had previously reached a “beautiful” conclusion.
“Certain individual(s) from the industry really wanted us to release a new game…we had a strong push coming from company “N.” By “N,” Hino is most likely referring to Nintendo. Professor Layton is one of the Nintendo DS’s most successful exclusive series, and Nintendo has been the overseas publisher for a number of Layton titles to date – so it would come as no surprise that someone from Nintendo pushed for the franchise’s comeback.
Thanks to MasterPikachu6 for the sending us the news tip!
Where’s Laytons nose, though?
Makes sense, although I think Level 5 should have taken a cue off Capcom and their recent Ace Attorney efforts and made the new Professor Layton game multiplatform. Capcom have found a good market for the Ace Attorney series on Playstation and Steam, and I’m sure Professor Layton would find a market on those platforms too. There was good reason for the original Professor Layton to be exclusive to the dual-screened DS, but there really is no good reason for a modern Layton game to be Switch-exclusive.
There’s potential money in exclusivity
Also Nintendo/Sony/Microsoft generally give exclusives free advertising. A Nintendo Direct/Sony State Of Play is worth a lot