How Shuhei Yoshida wound up as a playable character in Super Time Force Ultra

The head of Sony's worldwide game studios, the affable, frequently tweeting Shuhei Yoshida, is coming to the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita versions of Capy Games' time-twisting shoot 'em up Super Time Force Ultra, Sony revealed at its PlayStation Experience today. And the story of how Yoshida came to appear in Capy's game is surprisingly ... short.

To hear Capy co-founder and president Nathan Vella tell it, the process of getting Yoshida's likeness in-game was maybe the most painless high-level corporate decision ever. Vella says the team at Capy were working on a way to differentiate the PlayStation versions of Super Time Force Ultra from their Xbox and PC predecessors. They proposed putting Shu in the game, sending a mockup of how the PlayStation veteran might look and play.

The process boiled down to — and we're paraphrasing here — "You cool with this, Sony?" "Sure. Go ahead." "OK." It may have actually involved a few more steps, but Vella said he marveled at the ease of the request.

In Super Time Force Ultra, Yoshida fires weaponized tweets from his smartphone. Tap the attack button and Shu will shoot heart emoticons. Hold it down and release, and he'll fire a tweet, like "I LOVE PS4" or "#STFU." Vella says Shu's tweets will be about 10 characters or less and they're working to source short tweets in English and Japanese for use in the game.

Yoshida is, naturally, a PlayStation-exclusive character. Vella said to expect other new playable characters in the PS4 and Vita versions of Super Time Force Ultra, which are due in 2015.

For more on Super Time Force, read Polygon's review of the Xbox 360 and Xbox One version.