Shinji Mikami talks about his life before games and after Capcom

Tango Gameworks head Shinji Mikami tends to be reticent in interviews, but he opened up to Famitsu in a recent talk (translated by 1UP), discussing abuse from his father, and how he ended up at a Capcom job fair mostly out of interest in free food.

He also talked at length about his displeasure with moving into a producer role at Capcom after the first Resident Evil. "There was a time when I wanted to leave Capcom because of that," Mikami said. "I joined Capcom in order to create things, and I thought that going away from that would be counterproductive. It was hard, not being directly involved with the development process." Even so, it was with some reluctance that he took over directing for Resident Evil 4. "I had been a producer for eight years, and the moment I finally get a chance to return to development, it's on RE. That sure wasn't what I intended!"

Discussing his future at Tango, he didn't put quite the sense of finality on his next game as he had in a previous interview with Famitsu. "Sooner or later, I'll have to shift my attention to raising new talent and handing the baton over to them. Joining the ZeniMax family puts me in a situation where I can leave the more boring details of that to other people. I'm trying not to expect too much, but I do feel that this is a chance for me to keep working in the front lines of development."

[Image: Tango Gameworks]