BS: Do you think we'll ever have one, unified format for games? With movies, there's not just the set kind of conventions of time limit, but there's also... you use this kind of projector, this kind of film stock, and you have 16:9. It's all set. It's a standard format. But in games, it can be anything. Like when you make a mobile game, you have to make 10 different versions, because all of the screen sizes are different. Or when you make a game like this, you still have to be able to play it on standard definition as well as HD. Do you think it will ever unify? Like, a game format...just the conventions of how it's presented.

TM: I don't think so. Some game platforms are 16:9, but some platforms like the Nintendo DS are 4:3 dual screens, and touch games and things. And they've got the momentum. So I think the mainstream is like that, but the other one exists all the time. I think even arcade games present a format. I started my career from the arcade side, so my concept is always... I don't care about the format, so whatever's here and new is the experience.

BS: Unfortunately, you don't have as much freedom as in the arcade days to redesign the format each time, because with consoles, you have limited choices. You can do 360, PS3, DS and PSP... they all have certain conventions. Do you think there's any way to flip that and create a new type of paradigm? Say, with the PSP, some games have you play it vertically. Something like that, can that be done in the console space?

CN: I think you're toying with that with the Trance Vibrator, right? Using a function of the system in a way that probably has never been done before, and may never be done again, actually.

TM: Yeah. I think so. We need platforms now. Last generation, like PS2 and Dreamcast, we had only three. But now, I don't know how many there are. PSP, DS, mobile phone, PC... you know. I think we have many devices in our life, and I think that the game-free format... I think the next era, whoever has the big hardware, anyway, on a screen or not, we're always having some data. I don't know. Inside the body?

BS: Do you think it will always be attached to us somehow? Will we always have some form of entertainment with us?

TM: Not only entertainment, but we have a lot of data, anyway. Then we can connect. The next, next era, we may not have the hard disc anymore, because somewhere there are huge hard drives, and they just connect.

BS: Speaking of the arcade era, wanting to make mass-market games too, have you finally played the new Sega Rally?

TM: No.

BS: You hadn't last time. You still haven't?

TM: Yeah. I just watched.

BS: I was just wondering if you felt any connection. If you played it, would you be like, "I could've done this better!" or something like that?

TM: No. (laughs) What was it, 15 years ago?

BS: Yeah. I know. But there's still some connection. It's kind of like your baby.