Nintendo revealed today that Masahiro Sakurai, long time lead designer on the Super Smash Bros. series and fresh off of Kid Icarus: Uprising for the Nintendo 3DS, will be heading up a team of Namco Bandai developers for the next installment of the Super Smash Bros series.
The next Smash game will release for both the 3DS and Wii U and will feature some sort of cross play between the two. Working side by side with Sakurai will be Masaya Kobayashi and Yoshito Higuchi from the Ridge Racer and Tales development teams respectively.
It should be noted that Super Smash Bros. Brawl saw support from a handful of different studios, not entirely owned by Nintendo and that the company has entrusted key franchises to outside developers on occasion, notably Metroid: Other M with Team Ninja of Tecmo Koei.
[UPDATE]: Masahiro Sakurai has issued a statement regarding the collaboration between Nintendo and Namco Bandai Games:
Currently, the prototype prepared by Namco Bandai Games and Namco Bandai Studios' special team looks pretty good, and it's working great. In order to take advantage of the fact that there will be versions for two different systems, and to maximize and offer fun new gameplay elements, the entire team is going to work hard together.
So… Sakurai is the lead but… almost all the work is being done by Bamco? Namco's Masaya Kobayashi added:
In order to make Mr. Sakurai proud, we will take on this project with NAMCO BANDAI's best staff! Yoshito Higuchi, the producer and the director of the "Tales" series, Tetsuya Akatsuka, producer and director of "Mobile Suit Gundam: Extreme Vs.," the art director/sound director of the "SoulCalibur" series, the main development team staff from the "TEKKEN" series…and that's just for starters. All the top creators from NAMCO BANDAI are gathered here to create a never-before-seen dream team for this project. We will fully utilize our experience and knowledge in action/fighting game development, technical capability, and organizational strength, and we hereby promise you that we will develop the best and most powerful "Super Smash Bros." title ever! Don't miss it!
We'll have more as the story develops.
