Masaya Matsuura made a name for himself when he introduced the Parappa the Rapper series and set off a growing trend in the rhythm-based video game genre. The founder of NanaOn-Sha talks about the potential of the now flourishing game genre and how developers should explore its vast potential. You can read about his interview in the full article after the jump.

More speakers have been added to the 2008 D.I.C.E. Summit's speaker roster. Joining the roster for next year's event are PaRappa the Rapper creator Masaya Matsuura, who is currently working on a new music title for the Nintendo Wii, and newly-appointed Entertainment Software Association president Michael D. Gallagher. More new speakers at the full article.

Masaya Matsuura, creator of the PaRappa the Rapper series of video games, was one of the keynote speakers at the recently-concluded GO3 conference in Australia. During his speech, his message was rather simple and direct: the gaming industry should come up with less violent titles and produce games that are more accessible to non-traditional players instead.

PaRappa the Rapper was first released on PlayStation 1 (PSOne) back in 1996 by video game development studio NanaOn-Sha. It is a rhythm-based title and was probably the inspiration behind today's hit Guitar Hero and upcoming game Rock Band (for the Xbox 360 and PS3). However, despite the success of Parappa Matsuura still has some concerns about this genre, especially for his homeland of Japan, since according to him,

It's very difficult to make brand-new systems for music-based games that involve more than just pressing buttons according to rhythm. Of course, we've tried several already, but unfortunately some of them are not successful. Another reason, everyone is buying flat displays. Flat displays have a delay, but sound doesn't delay.

The creator then commented that one solution for this is to come up with various alternatives to audio. However, he also cautioned that the musical game industry collaboration will not be initiated by the artists as most of them are highly conservative and want to do things by themselves, therefore developers may have to take the initiative.

Lastly, Masaya Matsuura couldn't help but applaud Nintendo for its stance during this cycle of the console war. He implied that the industry will not grow if focus will be given on traditional players as they are already a "captured audience." He explained,

Making good games that everybody can play is a very high priority for the game industry, because if we make games like X-rated videos, the industry won't grow. Nintendo is very smart to appeal to a much wider group of people because it is what's required now.