The Last Guardian Was Named For Western Audiences, Despite It's Strictly Eastern Principles.

The man leading the ambitious The Last Guardian project told game makers at the DICE Asia summit to go Western or die.
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“There are so many issues we have to solve, and the biggest challenge is that the market in Japan is shrinking – they key is gaining success in the US and Europe,” he said.

“At the time of the original PlayStation the Japanese market was one third of the global market, and production costs weren’t that high – so we were able to generate profit from that market alone.

“But now we’re in the era of the PlayStation 3, and the Japanese market is only one fifth of the global market – when it comes to production costs, those are swelling, so it means that unless we gain success in the overseas market our studio will go bankrupt. It’s a crisis we recognise,” he added.</blockquote>

Kobayashi added that the title "The Last Guardian" was chosen in an attempt to appeal to Western gamers.