I think Capcom is one of the J-devs that's actually doing this generation right, in addition to Sony, and recently (CATHERINE WHAT) Atlus. Also, smaller devs like Platinum and, uh, Q Entertainment (and Sega, to a certain extent because they're publishing Platinum).
Re: RR, basically Namco are giving its core fans a big "fuck you," outsourcing a flagship title to a European developer who has apparently thrown out everything it was built upon to attempt to make that scrilla and generate sales off the franchise, which won't happen. Nobody gives a fuck about Ridge Racer, people who already don't like it will just assume it's the same game and skip it, and the core fanbase won't buy it because they feel betrayed. It'll sell no better than RR6/7, at best IMO.