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Keita Takahashi, the widely lauded creator of Katamari Damacy, is moving from Tokyo to join a Canadian social games studio.
Vancouver-based Tiny Speck will be Takahashi’s new employer, and will seek his expertise for its promising social game project, Glitch.
Glitch is an MMO game that has clear similarities to social games such as Farmville, but bears a distinct appearance that matches Takahashi’s own peculiar artistic preferences.
“Takahashi has always been a hero to everyone on the Glitch team,” read a Tiny Speck blog post.
“His power of imagination and ability to realise something wholly unique and different stands out in the history of games. We know how hard it is to defy convention and make something entirely new
“A few months ago we were lucky enough to start talking to him. We played some Glitch together, batted ideas back and forth and found that we shared the same values — deep beliefs in curiosity, humour, absurdity, and above all a belief in the positive power of play.”
Since Takahashi shot to fame in 2004 with Katamari Damacy, the creative head has been outspoken in the press about industry standards and values. He has always appeared to be close to quitting games altogether, and since 2004 has participated in a number of non-game related art projects.
He quit his former employee, Namco Bandai, in 2010.
