If you owned a PlayStation in the mid-'90s to early 2000s, you'll likely be aware of PaRappa the Rapper. This wacky rhythm game from musician Masaya Matsuura sees you play as a hip-hop hound trying to win the love of his life, a humanoid flower (yes, really). It's often considered the title that kickstarted the rhythm genre and, if our brief description hadn't teased it already, it was properly weird.
The question is, why are we talking about this classic PS1 game on a Nintendo site? Bear with us, there is a connection here.
Our good friends over on our sister site Time Extension were recently lucky enough to sit down with Matsuura-san himself to talk all things PaRappa, game development and music. Towards the end of the interview, the conversation moved to Switch 2 and, as you might expect from the mind behind the rapping dog, Matsuura-san has some pretty trippy hopes for the upcoming console.
While the dev shot down any chatter about returning to the industry any time soon ("I don't have anything in mind, so I guess not"), he had the following to say when asked if Switch 2 could tempt him back: "I'm not interested in a 'switch' itself. I am interested in the darkness that is illuminated by the light that it turns on".
Woah. Not the kind of down-to-earth response we usually hear. And there's even more! Time Extension inquired whether this means Matsuura-san is more interested in the act of creation rather than the tools themselves, to which he replied with an equally out-of-the-box statement.
"That's true, but creation without tools is almost impossible, so tools are also important," Matsuura-san told Time Extension, "I want a mental switch that will turn on a new light inside me. I hope that Nintendo Switch 2 is that".
Crikey. Here we were hoping Switch 2 would land a decent 3D Mario game, while the PaRappa creator is after something that triggers massive inspiration. No pressure, eh Nintendo?
Of course, the "new light" that we're now all secretly hoping will be triggered inside Matsuura-san is a new PaRappa on Switch 2. It seems unlikely, we'll admit, but hey, we're getting Patapon, Everybody's Golf and Raidou, who's to say another PS joint won't join the list?
Be sure to head over to Time Extension to read the full interview with Matsuura-san. And if you want to hear what even more developers made of the Switch 2 announcement, we recently spoke to a bunch of them about reactions, dev kits and plans for the future.