Capcom's president says ditching auteur-led development is what turned the company around

Capcom president and COO Haruhiro Tsujimoto has explained the company's recent run of hits in an interview with Famitsu, published as part of Capcom's 43rd anniversary celebrations. His answer: ditching auteur-driven development in favor of a team-based approach.

Tsujimoto described how game series tend to become dependent on a single creator — if that person steps away, the series stalls. He and the key figures behind each franchise agreed to abandon that model entirely, rebuilding every title from the ground up. He said Capcom was willing to accept a temporary sales dip to make the shift work.

It's easy to forget how rough Capcom's early 2010s were. Street Fighter V launched in a poor state, Resident Evil 6 was widely criticized, and DmC: Devil May Cry divided fans. Riskier bets like Asura's Wrath and Lost Planet 3 underperformed badly. The turnaround started with Resident Evil 7 in 2017 — its first-person pivot marked a clean break from the action-heavy direction the series had drifted toward — and was quickly followed by Monster Hunter World and Resident Evil 2 Remake.

There's an irony worth noting: Capcom's most iconic franchises were built by auteurs — Shinji Mikami created Resident Evil, Hideki Kamiya created Devil May Cry, and Hideaki Itsuno's Dragon's Dogma was one of the few bright spots in that difficult period. All three have since left the company, which may explain both the mid-2010s slump and why Capcom's leadership decided a structural change was necessary.