In what might be the least necessary confirmation in recent gaming history, Koei president Kenji Matsubara told Famitsu (via IncGamers.com) that there would be no seat at the table for former Team Ninja boss, Tomonobu Itagaki. This suggests Itagaki would have wanted to go work for the company that cranks out countless sequels every year in the first place, which is plausible only if he's dying to make Gundam Gaiden Orochi Musou 5 XL Empires.

Itagaki, you may recall, left Tecmo and filed a lawsuit against his former employer back in June, alleging that Tecmo refused to pay him a bonus he was owed upon completion of Dead or Alive 4. Even after leaving and suing the company, though, rumors still sprang up that he might want to rejoin after the merger between Tecmo and Koei went through, prompting Matsubara's statement.

As for the merger itself, we've heard word on the inside that many internal executives at Tecmo have quietly rebelled at the idea of the Koei/Tecmo merger -- which is in an advanced state of negotiation -- going so far as to discuss merging with other companies (but not Square Enix, which was involved in the merger talks before Tecmo refused their offer and chose to merge with Koei instead). Despite the internal turmoil, though, the family that controls the majority stake in Tecmo Ltd. seems determined to go through with the proposed merger, as evidenced by the announcement in November (via Reuters) that they would establish the Tecmo Koei Holdings company on the Tokyo Stock Exchange Market in April.

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