“I wish hardware like the Xbox Series S wouldn’t come to market” – former Tekken director Katsuhiro Harada destroys Microsoft’s console in front of Xbox executives

Katsuhiro Harada, former director of the Tekken series, is known for not pulling his weight. This truth was reinforced recently, as he said he wished the Xbox Series S “wasn’t released” during a developer panel. All while a member of the Xbox team was in the room.

According to Inven Global, Harada was part of a panel at the Console Game Developers Conference 2026 in South Korea. The panel was moderated by former Sony President Shuhei Yoshida and included Shift Up CTO DongKi Lee (Stellar Blade), Too Kyo Games CEO Kazutaka Kodaka (Dangenrompa), CD Projekt Red Associate Game Director Paweł Sasko (Cyberpunk 2077), Ludeon Studios CEO Tynan Sylvester (Rimworld), and of course the CEO of the new VS Studio, Katsuhiro Harada (Tekken).

The panel was asked about the benefits of console development, as well as the specific challenges of creating games for certain platforms. Harada led the charge, speaking about the advantages consoles offer fighting game developers, as the hardware is ideal for tournaments and esports events. Following this, he took the opportunity to talk about a console which earned him wrath.

“That said, there is something I really want to say while I have the floor. Since a high-ranking Xbox executive is here today, I would like to see hardware like the Xbox Series S not released,” Harada said (English translations via Inven Global). Harada then asked Sasko from the CD Projekt Red team if he was “internally upset” because of the Xbox Series S.

Sasko then “burst out laughing” according to Inven Global, before responding: “It constantly challenges us and forces us to optimize our code in a very clean way.”

Harada followed up with additional thoughts: “You just used a very polite and elegant way of saying ‘Xbox Series S sucks,’ didn’t you? (laughs) Low memory is a problem, but the hard part is that this is a very similar device to the Series X while having strangely lower performance. When porting to Switch 2, developers can change their mindset to “Switch 2 is a separate device for Nintendo fans!” » But with Xbox, after you deliver your absolute best result, you feel like you have to do extra work for a slightly weaker child.

“Plus, in markets like the US, there are more Series S users than Series X users, so we can’t just cut corners. Yet after launch, Series S users are directing their complaints to us developers rather than Microsoft, asking “Why is the texture resolution lower only on Series S?” »

Sasko stepped in to provide some benefits to the Series S. While acknowledging that many gamers knew all the technical background behind the Series S’s weaknesses, he pointed out that optimizing for weaker hardware like the Series S allowed games to run “considerably better” on all platforms. He even had an example of Cyberpunk 2077, since the optimization work done for the Switch 2 version was applied to all platforms “to great effect.” Sasko also highlighted the affordability side of the argument, saying that the cheaper price of the S series allows for market expansion.

Harada replied: “Director Paweł introduced the Series S so gracefully that the Microsoft representative in the audience keeps nodding his head. I’m afraid they will feel reassured and also release a successor like “Helix S” for the next generation Xbox (laughs).”

Here, Shift Up’s DongKi Lee ended the topic with some optimism for Microsoft’s future consoles: “Personally, I’m looking forward to the next-generation Xbox ‘Helix’. From an engineer’s point of view, if you provide us with a development kit first in Korea as soon as possible, we will try our best to develop it.”

Earlier this year, Harada founded Vs Studio with support from SNK, with other veterans from Bandai Namco’s Tekken team joining him for whatever he works on. As for the Xbox Helix consoles, in this current hardware environment with inflated costs for RAM and other components, they seem a bit expensive. Perhaps a Series S equivalent is being considered?