Hideki Kamiya has no plans to retire, haunts Platinum’s car park in a lambo

This man’s clearly enjoying unemployment
Hideki Kamiya has no plans to retire, haunts Platinum’s car park in a lambo
Hideki Kamiya has no plans to retire, haunts Platinum’s car park in a lambo /

Platinum Games co-founder Hideki Kamiya recently left the company in a surprise move and has now opened a YouTube channel.

In his first video, he updated fans on what he’s been up to since his exit from the studio. “I’m out of a job, so please subscribe,” the Bayonetta director opened up the video. He went on to state that he’s been watching lots of Netflix, Disney Plus, and YouTube, feeling very refreshed after being out of a job for three months now. That indicates that Kamiya actually exited the company some time before the official announcement was made.

The game developer didn’t want to go into the reasons behind his exit from Platinum, saying: “How should I put it. Uhm. There’s no way I can put it. You guys understand, right?”

Make sure to enable subtitles when watching the video!

He continued: “I’d say, I left the company because I wanted to follow my beliefs as a game creator. And to choose the path I think is right and move on.” Reading between the lines, it seems like there were stark differences in opinion as to the creative direction of the studio.

Kamiya also said that while he has no plans of retiring – “to be super clear, I’m not retiring, as long as there’s a place that would hire me, so you know… I’m gonna wait for the offer” – he’s unable to go back to work straight away for a year, so it seems like he’s signed a non-compete agreement upon leaving that’ll take him out of action at least until next year.

For any company that wants to hire him after that, Kamiya has already shared his expected salary: “I will consider any offer above 100 million yen a year.” That’s around $670,000 USD.

Hideki Kamiya sitting in his red Lamborghini Countach.
He doesn't look especially needful of the unemployment office's help like this / Hideki Kamiya on YouTube

Kamiya ends his video by leaving the Platinum Games car part in his Lamborghini Countach (current prices go between $500,000 and $1,000,000 USD), saying: “Off to the unemployment center. See you!”

Seeing his car, it’s doubtful that he needs the unemployment office’s help – and it’s quite clear that he’s enjoying his newly found free time way too much to be bothered to work, at least for now.


Published
Marco Wutz
MARCO WUTZ

Marco Wutz is a writer from Parkstetten, Germany. He has a degree in Ancient History and a particular love for real-time and turn-based strategy games like StarCraft, Age of Empires, Total War, Age of Wonders, Crusader Kings, and Civilization as well as a soft spot for Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail. He began covering StarCraft 2 as a writer in 2011 for the largest German community around the game and hosted a live tournament on a stage at gamescom 2014 before he went on to work for Bonjwa, one of the country's biggest Twitch channels. He branched out to write in English in 2015 by joining tl.net, the global center of the StarCraft scene run by Team Liquid, which was nominated as the Best Coverage Website of the Year at the Esports Industry Awards in 2017. He worked as a translator on The Crusader Stands Watch, a biography in memory of Dennis "INTERNETHULK" Hawelka, and provided live coverage of many StarCraft 2 events on the social channels of tl.net as well as DreamHack, the world's largest gaming festival. From there, he transitioned into writing about the games industry in general after his graduation, joining GLHF, a content agency specializing in video games coverage for media partners across the globe, in 2021. He has also written for NGL.ONE, kicker, ComputerBild, USA Today's ForTheWin, The Sun, Men's Journal, and Parade. Email: marco.wutz@glhf.gg