Don't expect Pacific Rim director Guillermo del Toro to make another foray into game development. Del Toro said in a new interview that he's done with the industry.
The director pointed out to Shacknews that he's had some extraordinarily bad luck in game development. His horror games inSANE and Silent Hills were both cancelled after years of work due to circumstances outside his control: THQ's bankruptcy and the closing of Kojima Productions.
I have proven to be the albatross of video games I joined THQ, and THQ goes broke. I join Kojima, and Kojima leaves Konami. I have decided, in order not to destroy anyone else’s life, I have decided I will never again get involved in video games. Otherwise, I’ll join someone and his house will explode, or something.
Del Toro had also tried to make a Left 4 Dead-like game called Sundown back in 2006. After three failed game projects in a row, I'm not surprised he would give up on development. He probably figures that it's better to focus his attention on film and TV, two industries where his projects actually get released
There was some hope that Guillermo del Toro and Hideo Kojima would start a new project together. However, del Toro says that he doesn't want to join another game because if he did, "World War III will start."
Del Toro put a positive spin on his experiences with video game development, though. He added that he learned a lot during his time working with THQ and Kojima Productions. He also says that he's still learning from Hideo Kojima - though "as a friend" rather than a collaborator.
His retreat from development doesn't mean we won't see new video games based on Pacific Rim 2, The Strain or his other projects. He's willing to advise studios doing these kinds of adaptations but he won't be involved in the day-to-day development:
I can be creative about it, and I can be educated about it, and talk about it in a way that helps them make the video game. But no - I can’t.
I was hoping that del Toro and Kojima would start on a new horror game in the vein of Silent Hills and P.T.. Considering the vast following each of them has, they probably could have raised plenty of funds for the game through Kickstarter. In doing so, they could've avoided the publisher problems that doomed Silent Hills and inSANE. The scale of the game might've been smaller than Silent Hills to accommodate a Kickstarter-sized budget but a pared-down Kojima/del Toro game would've been better than no game.
Like I said, though, del Toro has no shortage of options in TV and film so I can understand why he wouldn't bother with game development anymore. The gaming industry's been all work and no payoff for him to date.
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