Bandai Namco Is Targeting 'Much Bigger Genres' In Effort To Expand With New Gaming IPs

Bandai Namco has established a solid track record with quality fighting games in its history and is further solidifying that with upcoming games like Jump Force and My Hero One's Justice. The major gaming publisher isn't getting comfortable, though. Bandai Namco's digital and marketing VP Herve Hoerdt says the plan is to create new brands and would like "50 percent of our business to come from new IPs."

These new revelations come via a conversation Hoerdt had with GameIndustry.biz at E3 2018, a conversation that addresses the publisher's status as an underdog in the West, the dependence on licensed products, and the creation of a new IP creation unit dedicated to fresh projects across multiple industries. Why get to the portfolio to 50 percent new IPs? First, it's "to build a sustainable business because most of our IPs are franchises and licenses".

"To be a sustainable business, you need to have your own IP; every publisher is building their own IP," Hoerdt told GameIndustry.biz. "The other thing is the IP we have are always reaching the same marketing segment, like fighting and anime, but there's much more to do in the video game market, much bigger genres."

The team wants half of its titles to be developed outside of Japan, as well. To escape from reaching the same audience, this makes perfect sense. Will it work? That's unknown for now but Bandai Namco is a big enough publisher to be able to take risks like this. The IP creation unit isn't just leaving things in-house, either, as the publisher is meeting with over 200 studios per year to see if their projects will be good fits with Bandai Namco.

Little Nightmares, Get Even, and Twin Mirror are all from separate studios and serve as the beginning of Bandai Namco's effort to balance out licensed content vs original work. Check them out and stay tuned to Shacknews for more updates.

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