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June 19th, 2008 @ 10:23
Update: There’s a brilliant piece on Kotaku suggesting Tecmo may not exactly be the paragon of virtue it’s claiming to be. Definitely read this.
Tecmo’s issued a press release outlining its position concerning what is calls employee unrest at the company, while claiming rumours about dozens of employees leaving the firm are not true.
“It is unfortunate that false and inaccurate reporting of our organization and employees’ actions have caused some unrest among our development staff members. Tecmo, LTD. would like to assure its partners and loyal fans that its teams continue to focus and work on several projects to be released and announced in the future,” said the statement.
“The company is committed to providing high quality, entertaining products for our fans around the world.”
Full press release through the link.
By Mike Bowden
“On and around June 15, 2008, various websites in the US reported a rumor about “dozens” of development staff members resigning and filing a lawsuit against Tecmo, LTD., following Tomonobu Itagaki’s departure from the company. The rumors are false and no such action is taking place at the company.
On June 16, 2008, two employees filed a lawsuit against Tecmo, LTD. with accusations of withholding overtime pay. Although a lawsuit was filed by the two employees, on April 1, 2008, Tecmo, LTD. did notify all affected employees that they would be appropriately compensated and is currently in the process of resolving the matter. There are several inaccurate reports stating that all 300 company employees are named in the lawsuit and the company would like to clarify that only two employees are involved in the suit.
In addition, there were reports that Tecmo, LTD., a publicly traded company on the Tokyo Stock Exchange, withheld information from its shareholders regarding the lawsuit filed in May 2008 by Tomonobu Itagaki. The company has observed the provisions defined by the Exchange and has released information accordingly and in a timely manner.
It is unfortunate that false and inaccurate reporting of our organization and employees’ actions have caused some unrest among our development staff members. Tecmo, LTD. would like to assure its partners and loyal fans that its teams continue to focus and work on several projects to be released and announced in the future. The company is committed to providing high quality, entertaining products for our fans around the world.”
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June 19th, 2008 at 10:32 am
Tecmo are totally screwed. It’s the end!
June 19th, 2008 at 10:33 am
It’s not looking hopeful, no. I’m looking forward to Ninja Gaiden 3. I bet it’s a cracker.
June 19th, 2008 at 10:35 am
Panic mode continues… now with boilerplate denials!
June 19th, 2008 at 10:40 am
Kotaku has a nice report today on the hundreds of hours of unpaid overtime, the dodgy working practices, the forced working hours, the various lawsuits that’ve been served in the last week. Sounds pretty bad - they’re like the Japanese EA.
June 19th, 2008 at 10:41 am
…and no link? For shame Blerk.
http://kotaku.com/5017831/hard-proof-that-tecmo-japan-is-lying-this-seems-like-it
June 19th, 2008 at 10:47 am
I read it on the rss earlier and couldn’t be arsed going to find it when I knew for a fact that you’d do it.
June 19th, 2008 at 10:48 am
I didn’t originally… but I knew you’d pull me up on it.
/eyes suspiciously
June 19th, 2008 at 10:54 am
I’ve added that link. Hilarious.
June 19th, 2008 at 10:57 am
“Tecmowned”.
June 19th, 2008 at 11:02 am
There are no tanks!
June 19th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
What’s so funny pat?
Serious question.
June 19th, 2008 at 5:48 pm
Just the general mess of the entire thing. I’m sure whoever’s “right” will come out in court, but I can’t help wonder how the hell they ever let a situation like this develop.
June 19th, 2008 at 6:09 pm
It started when Itagaki went straight to the media junket with his story - the day before his new game was due to hit the shelves. Which would have been about a month or more after it was finished and in submission. In my opinion it was blatantly manipulative and unprofessional.
As an employer, I wouldn’t piss on that guy if he was on fire.
June 19th, 2008 at 6:59 pm
As an employer you wouldn’t have been stupid enough to piss off your staff to point where they’re angry enough to do that. As an employer myself I’d fully expect those sort of consequences had I done the same thing.
June 19th, 2008 at 7:26 pm
innit
Reapin’ and sowin’
June 19th, 2008 at 8:37 pm
As an employer you can’t please all of the people all of the time. Whatever you do you’re going to piss people off. Where I work they removed a sporadic bonus scheme that was entirely company wide but wholly dependent on the whim of our client in favour of an overtime system that guaranteed to reward work done with overtime payments every single month and cut out the fickle client-dependent side of things completely.
You wouldn’t believe how many people that pissed off.
I don’t trust Itagaki because of the way he talks about his co workers and the strategic and manipulative announcement of his grievance. He took a private employee/employer issue and publicised it on the internet at precisely the time when he knew his plea would get the most exposure and sympathy from people that know absolutely nothing about the situation other than “oh, this guy is the name behind a videogame so I guess I’ll root for him.”
Nah. Sorry. I don’t feel sorry for him one little bit and I find his actions and methods lacking in both professional conduct and integrity.
June 19th, 2008 at 8:48 pm
As an employer you should pay people what they’re owed and keep your agreements.
June 19th, 2008 at 8:55 pm
Shatner… they put an exec in the position of union rep who then (pretending that he was voted for by the workers) signed off on agreements to not pay overtime etc.
If this is even vaguely true (and there’s documentary evidence) then there’s no way you can defend Tecmo.
June 19th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
I’d like to see Itagaki’s other contracts. Such as a company practice non-disclosure one he would have invariably signed with his employer. I don’t doubt for one minute that contracts have been broken by BOTH parties concerned.
I should add that I don’t give a shit for Tecmo. But I absolutely don’t give a shit to Itagaki and the way he’s playing this one out. There’s proper and professional ways of dealing with this without playing the internet popularity contest at the same time.
I wouldn’t keel over and die to protect my employer. But, as someone who considers themselves a professional, I’d not attempt to make this into a publicity event either. And I’ve been pretty heavily wronged by my previous employers AND had friends who write editorial for newspapers so I’ve had the chance if I’d wanted to take it.
Mud sticks. The way Itagaki talks about his collegues and employers doesn’t make me think anyone would want to employ him or work with him if they had the choice. I’d have more respect if he was taking this issue with Tecmo on behalf of all the employees affected. But he’s not - he’s looking out for himself.
I feel absolutely no sympathy for him whatsoever. And I don’t like this david-and-goliath play he’s running either.
June 19th, 2008 at 9:28 pm
Shatner: He gave a single press release and (no doubt at the request of his lawyers) said nothing at all afterward. The more recent news was because other Tecmo employees filed suits against them.
I think mostly here you have a more general issue with Itagaki (for whatever reasons) because you’re blowing his actions out of all proportion.
June 19th, 2008 at 9:41 pm
I have no issues with Itagaki at all. I’m sure he’s a lovely guy. But anyone who behaves in the manner he’s chosen to strikes me as unprofessional, unethical and selfish. Those are character traits I have “issues” with.
But his press release was on the day before the release of Ninja Gaiden 2 in the stores.
Now, I know it takes a few weeks to go from gold master to stock on the shelf. So I have to ask myself, if his grievance is so sever, why not air it immediately? Once the title has received manufacturer approval then the project as it stands would be complete - in other words he’d have known his position weeks before his press release, months possibly.
Yet Itagaki seemed to be fine up until the precise moment when all the industry press just happened to be talking about his new product.
That’s one hell of a whopper of coincidental timing, don’t you think? Or should I believe that, on that day, Itagaki woke up and suddenly felt aggreived enough to quit from his employer and also sue them??
I also don’t believe in baselessly slagging off people you work with (such as the Ninja Gaiden Sigma team) for the sake of promoting your newer title.
I’ve got ethics and morals. I respect the people I work with presently and in the past. From the way that this person has chosen to behave publicly, I don’t see any such undemanding traits of basic civility.
As I also just said, if this was Itagaki doing this for the greater good of his colleagues as well as himself then I’d have more respect for it. But it’s clearly not.
As I also said: I’d love to see the contracts Itagaki signed with Tecmo. If they’re remotely like a standard industry contract then, by his actions, he’s broken some pretty basic and fundamental terms and may be subject to penalty clauses that he would have agreed to.
I’m not saying any of this puts Tecmo in the right. But there’s this implication that this mess (which should never have become public fanboy fodder anyway) is potraying Itagaki as some innocent. His attitude, ethics and exposure of this suggests to me quite the opposite.
I mean, who the fuck makes a PRESS RELEASE that they’re quitting a company and suing them? Think about it.
June 19th, 2008 at 10:47 pm
I can’t stand the fact that Tecmo has become “the Ninja Gaiden” company, home of Itagaki.
Fuck that they were working on a new Rygar and the new Project Zero. I could’nt give a shit about NG after how crappy the second game turned out. Now theres a chance that the company might fold and neither of those titles will see the light.
and then theres the gloating. Oh No Doomed! Tecmowned! AH HO HO HO
June 19th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
I liked Tecmowned. I thought it was quite good.
Oh well…
June 19th, 2008 at 10:54 pm
It was quite clever, I’ll give you that ;p
June 19th, 2008 at 10:57 pm
“quite”?! Pfft!