“I think success in games comes when you satisfy all three pieces of the game business,” he said, “the players, the developers, and the links between them – the retail and media people. I’ve been making games for nearly 20 years and I’ve done that maybe two or three times.“It’s definitely hard, but it’s not impossible – all three groups are there for the games, after all." 

 "The thing is that I think the Japanese industry has made achieving that all but impossible these days. There’s an equation you can use to satisfy all three groups, but once money enters the picture, you start neglecting the things that’re most important and the equation winds up unsolvable. My friends and I went independent because we were wasting our time wrangling with issues like that.”

“Valhalla is about 50 people right now,”  “That may expand a bit, but it’s not going to be a 100-person company. Fifty people working for two years can produce something better than 100 people working for one year: 100 times one and 50 times two may produce the same number, but not in creative businesses like this one."
 
“I know nobody means any harm by it, but publicly-traded companies have to prove their worth to the stock market on a year-by-year basis, and that means they can’t focus all-out on quality. We’re creators here; we like making things more than doing math.”

"At this stage, I cannot say. However, I believe the game I'm making now will be a little bit like nothing anyone has ever seen."  

"If you ask who I've been developing for, it's for Earthlings."  

"There could new hardware released in the future. Also, not just consoles -- I'm interested in PC's also."  

"The highest selling of the games I've made is Dead or Alive 3".  "It was 2 million. So, this time, I'd like to make a game that can be played by, at the very least, 4 million people. I mean, there are people who make games that sell 10 million units, so 4 million isn't that reckless a number."

 "At my previous company, I made the best fighting game in the world, Dead or Alive. Fighting games have once again reached a dead end, although to be honest, if there was no Dead or Alive, fighting games would have ended a long time ago."   

Dead or Alive is the best fighting game in the world? 
 
Ummmm....

So, what happened to Itagaki's Tokyo Vikings development studio?  Weren't they working on something.  I'm pretty sure I read in one of the various James Meike/Itagaki interviews over on 1UP.com that there was something brewing in the stew pot. 
 
Also, Famitsu needed to ask the tough questions...will there be boobies in the new game and will they bounce?

Man this guy is delusional.

Honestly, I find it a bit odd that he specified that he wanted 4 million sales. That's pretty weird and bottom-line-ish I say. We don't know what the game is, when the game is, what platform the game is on, but we do know he wants 4 million sold. Excellent. 

Ah, so that's what happened with his 'Tokyo Vikings' studio. Either way it sounds like they've been busy for awhile so hopefully he'll have something to show soon (E3?). I'm fairly certain that the game will be on the Xbox 360 at the very least, and with a smaller studio it is hard to say if it'll be multi-platform. Perhaps whatever publisher picks it up will port it (ala Bayonetta, but hopefully do a better job).
 
And I also think many people confuse his PR persona with how he actually is. Itagaki likes to get a rise out of people, and is good at it through the media; from what I've read as a developer/director he is actually really nice to work with. I certainly get a kick out of his interviews :D

"At my previous company, I made the best fighting game in the world, Dead or Alive. Fighting games have once again reached a dead end, although to be honest, if there was no Dead or Alive, fighting games would have ended a long time ago."

Ummm..... yeah I may agree with alot of his other statements. But this? ....... :l I think that statement would fit more if he gave that credit to Ninja Gaiden since to me (or many atleast) thats where he really delivered making the best challenging and balanced hardcore action game.