Developer Disclosure: Feelplus (Lost Odyssey) = Nautilus (Shadow Hearts)

[duckroll]

Okay, I posted quite a bit of inform about this on the LO thread, but I definitely think this deserves it's own thread. It affects Shadow Hearts fans more than it has to do with LO, and it's generally an interesting topic.

Here's a history of Nautilus from Wikipedia:

Sacnoth was created in 1997 by Hiroki Kikuta, best known for composing the music to Secret of Mana series while working at Squaresoft and was set up with funding from the video game company SNK. The company suffered after their first major project, the RPG Koudelka, received poor critical reviews and little word of mouth. It was also soon revealed that internal quarrels within Sacnoth had led to a compromised product. Kikuta had wanted to develop an action-based battle system, citing Resident Evil as a source of inspiration. However, his employees were adamant about releasing something closer to the kind of games that Square had been making. Most people agreed that the game showed some promise, but had serious flaws, particularly in the combat system. Disheartened by the political friction within Sacnoth, as well as the financial condition of SNK, Kikuta resigned. Aruze Entertainment took control of Sacnoth after SNK folded in 2000. Sacnoth became Nautilus for the development of the sequel Shadow Hearts: Covenant and future video games. However, in early 2007 Aruze publicly announced dissolving Nautilus and various creative members have since left the company.

So what happened to Nautilus?

http://www.aruze.com/en/ir/release/2007/20071003_2e.pdf

This report indicates that as far as the company goes, as of 21 September this year it was renamed Azure Global Trading and is now in-charge of purchases for the parent company. It no longer has anything to do with game development.


So.... where did they go? Today many stores in Japan started selling Lost Odyssey a day early, and I managed to get a hold of the credits from the manual. Here is the complete list of ex-Nautilus staff that worked on the game as part of Feelplus:


Art Director: Takamasa Ohsawa

Program Lead: Nobuyuki Yanagisawa

Animation Lead: Takeshi Toyoda

Environment Model Lead: Junichiro Asakura

CG Cinematics Lead: Izumi Obata

Audio Lead: Hirotomi Imoto

System Program: Takaaki Ishikawa, Izumi Hamamoto

Battle Program: Masahiro Honma

World Map Program: Suguru Yokoyama

Battle Planner: Takehiro Ishida

Character Model Artists: Mieko Okuto, Kazuna Mikamoto, Hiroko Ito, Koki Nakadai, Yoshiyuki Yanagisawa

Motion Artists: Kazuya Nishimura, Hiroshi Mitsuzuka, Isao Takeuchi, Naohiro Endo

Background Map Model Artists: Ayumu Kuboya, Seiji Tokizawa, Hiroki Nakamura, Junichi Morita, Ikuo Yamazaki, Noriko Yoshida

Effect Artists: Hisaya Suzuki, Katsunori Ootsuka, Kumiko Takada

Visual Production Manager: Shinya Miyakawa

Cut Scene Visual Artists: Hideki Kubo, Masahiro Satou, Fumiyo Tanaka, Minoru Saegusa

CG Artists: Takayuki Higurashi, Hiroshi Yamamoto, Nozomi Sanada, Norio Tachikawa, Tomoaki Morizumi, Shigeru Kasai

Sound Artists: Masakatsu Tamura, Tomoko Imoto



Not all Nautilus staff made the transition to Feelplus, and there are some notable losses. The real time cutscene director Toshiyuki Terada and the creator of Shadow Hearts itself Matsuzo Machida are both missing in the transition. Various designers and planners also seem to not have made their way across. Still it is good to see over 40 members of the staff that have worked together since the first Shadow Hearts is still together. Hopefully Sakaguchi makes good use of their talent and experience to create even more ambitious RPGs in the years to come.

[Nolan.]

Okay, I posted quite a bit of inform about this on the LO thread, but I definitely think this deserves it's own thread. It affects Shadow Hearts fans more than it has to do with LO, and it's generally an interesting topic. Here's a history of Nautilus from Wikipedia: So what happened to Nautilus? http://www.aruze.com/en/ir/release/2007/20071003_2e.pdf This report indicates that as far as the company goes, as of 21 September this year it was renamed Azure Global Trading and is now in-charge of purchases for the parent company. It no longer has anything to do with game development. So.... where did they go? Today many stores in Japan started selling Lost Odyssey a day early, and I managed to get a hold of the credits from the manual. Here is the complete list of ex-Nautilus staff that worked on the game as part of Feelplus: Art Director: Takamasa Ohsawa Program Lead: Nobuyuki Yanagisawa Animation Lead: Takeshi Toyoda Environment Model Lead: Junichiro Asakura CG Cinematics Lead: Izumi Obata Audio Lead: Hirotomi Imoto System Program: Takaaki Ishikawa, Izumi Hamamoto Battle Program: Masahiro Honma World Map Program: Suguru Yokoyama Battle Planner: Takehiro Ishida Character Model Artists: Mieko Okuto, Kazuna Mikamoto, Hiroko Ito, Koki Nakadai, Yoshiyuki Yanagisawa Motion Artists: Kazuya Nishimura, Hiroshi Mitsuzuka, Isao Takeuchi, Naohiro Endo Background Map Model Artists: Ayumu Kuboya, Seiji Tokizawa, Hiroki Nakamura, Junichi Morita, Ikuo Yamazaki, Noriko Yoshida Effect Artists: Hisaya Suzuki, Katsunori Ootsuka, Kumiko Takada Visual Production Manager: Shinya Miyakawa Cut Scene Visual Artists: Hideki Kubo, Masahiro Satou, Fumiyo Tanaka, Minoru Saegusa CG Artists: Takayuki Higurashi, Hiroshi Yamamoto, Nozomi Sanada, Norio Tachikawa, Tomoaki Morizumi, Shigeru Kasai Sound Artists: Masakatsu Tamura, Tomoko Imoto Not all Nautilus staff made the transition to Feelplus, and there are some notable losses. The real time cutscene director Toshiyuki Terada and the creator of Shadow Hearts itself Matsuzo Machida are both missing in the transition. Various designers and planners also seem to not have made their way across. Still it is good to see over 40 members of the staff that have worked together since the first Shadow Hearts is still together. Hopefully Sakaguchi makes good use of their talent and experience to create even more ambitious RPGs in the years to come.

Flipping heck thats interesting. I remember hearing a while back about one key guy from SH that was on the team but had no idea feel plus was made up of so many of those guys. Also i'm guessing it shouldn't affect SH too much since feel plus isn't a ms studio anymore no.?

[MassiveAttack]

The rest of Feelplus is largely made up of staff from Scarab after AQ Interactive (then Cavia) disbanded the studio and funded Feelplus.

[Hs2000]

Also i'm guessing it shouldn't affect SH too much since feel plus isn't a ms studio anymore no.?

Was Feel Plus ever a MS studio? I thought they were independent from the beginning, except for the fact that MS funded them.

[MassiveAttack]

Was Feel Plus every a MS studio? I thought they were independent from the beginning, except for the fact that MS funded them.

Feelplus has never been an MS studio. It's belonged to the AQ Interactive group under ex-Sega President Hayao Nakayama from the beginning.

[jarrod]

Feelplus has never been an MS studio. It's belonged to the AQ Interactive group under ex-Sega President Hayao Nakayama from the beginning.

I thought a good portion of the MGSJ teams ended up there also though? So wouldn't it be more like Nautilus + Scarab + MGSJ = Feelplus?

[MassiveAttack]

I thought a good portion of the MGSJ teams ended up there also though? So wouldn't it be more like Nautilus + Scarab + MGSJ = Feelplus?

Plus some ex-SE staff too. It's the largest studio within AQ by far. The other studios are Artoon and Cavia.

[Nolan.]

Feelplus has never been an MS studio. It's belonged to the AQ Interactive group under ex-Sega President Hayao Nakayama from the beginning.

Yeah, what I meant to say that a lot of ms employees that worked on LO internally were rehired into feel plus which is independant. Which i'm guessing was made up of quite a few nautilus members. Though thats speculation on my part.

[Barakov]

Good to see at least some of the guys from Nautilus have found some work elsewhere.

[ivysaur12]

After Nautilus was disbanded, I thought we would never hear from these guys again. I'm happy I was wrong.

[Nolan.]

Anyway it's nice to know Sakaguchi has all that talent to create stuff with, just hope they do great things.

[duckroll]

The rest of Feelplus is largely made up of staff from Scarab after AQ Interactive (then Cavia) disbanded the studio and funded Feelplus.

I don't know where you keep getting your material from, but I guess it's hearsay and stuff because the credits in LO sure as hell don't reflect that.

The rest of Feelplus is made up of 11 Phantom Dust staffers, 2 Legend of Dragoon staffers, and 3 ex-SE staffers. There's actually a part of the credits under Feelplus that says "Scarab Studio Staff" but there are just 4 guys listed there.

While it's true that as far as AQI management is concerned, Scarab was "merged and rebranded" into Feelplus, I have a feeling that the majority of people in Scarab simply just lost their jobs.

[jj984jj]

So awesome!

[ethelred]

As one of the handful of people who's deeply interested in credits, let me say thanks for doing the yeoman's work on this one, ducky.

Feel+ is a really talented team, and it'll be great to see what they get to work on in the future. I'm actually really impressed in general with the talent Nakayama seems to be assembling at AQI. He could really end up turning this into a fantastic development house. And hopefuly Yukio ends up there, too! Kusunoki and Futatsugi together again...

[duckroll]

As one of the handful of people who's deeply interested in credits, let me say thanks for doing the yeoman's work on this one, ducky. Feel+ is a really talented team, and it'll be great to see what they get to work on in the future. I'm actually really impressed in general with the talent Nakayama seems to be assembling at AQI. He could really end up turning this into a fantastic development house. And hopefuly Yukio ends up there, too! Kusunoki and Futatsugi together again...

Sure, I'm pretty obsessed with credits myself.

I don't actually think Nakayama does anything as far as recruitment goes. He's just a money man that funds whatever he feels is a worthwhile investment. Feelplus was put together by Ray Nakazato, and probably with help from Sakaguchi too.


Edit: Here are the Phantom Dust crew in FeelPlus. They are listed by their role in Lost Odyssey, with their role in Phantom Dust in brackets.

Character Model Lead: Atsushi Miyazono (Character 3D Artists) Cut Scene Lead: Ichiro Sato (Character Animation Lead) Object Model Lead: Ken Karube (Character 3D Art Lead) VFX Lead: Nilubol Tarit (Effect Artists) Background Map Model Artists: Junko Mimori (Map 3D Art Lead), Takatoshi Kobari, Hiroyuki Hoshino (Map 3D Artists) Character Model Artists: Masaaki Sato, Masaaki Amano (Character 3D Artists) Motion Artists: Masaya Kusunose (Character Animator) Visual Effects Technical Artist: Takenobu Tomita (Boss Effect Artist)

[MassiveAttack]

I don't know where you keep getting your material from, but I guess it's hearsay and stuff because the credits in LO sure as hell don't reflect that. The rest of Feelplus is made up of 11 Phantom Dust staffers, 2 Legend of Dragoon staffers, and 3 ex-SE staffers. There's actually a part of the credits under Feelplus that says "Scarab Studio Staff" but there are just 4 guys listed there. While it's true that as far as AQI management is concerned, Scarab was "merged and rebranded" into Feelplus, I have a feeling that the majority of people in Scarab simply just lost their jobs.

You're probably right, duck. I was simply referring to how Feelplus was formed. As far as what has happened to the staff over the past two years and who has come and gone during LO's development cycle, the manual you have is the only solid evidence.

[Amon37]

After hearing this news, my excitement for LO has increased much more.

[maskrider]

When I saw the attack timing rings in gameplay videos, I sensed a judgement ring vibe. I thought someone else took the idea and incorporate it into another system. Good to see SH guys work on another RPG, I miss SH and the SH vibe.

Hope the game is good enough, I won't buy a 360 unless there is a must have game for me.

[duckroll]

Oh and for completion's sake, here're the former S-E members and LoD staffers that I know for certain are part of FeelPlus.

Square Enix dudes Director: Daisuke Fukugawa (FFT Battle Planner, LoM World Map Design) Technical Director: Katsuhisa Higuchi (Battle Programmer: FF3-5, CT, CC, XG; Battle Director: FFXI) Camera Program: Tatsuya Yoshinari (PE Battle Effects and Manhatten Map Program, FF9 World Map Program) Legend of Dragoon dudes Production Manager: Takehiro Kaminagayoshi (Event Director, Event Script) Concept Art Lead: Hirohiko Iyoku (Assistant Art Director, Dragon Design)

Does anyone have leads on Eiichiro Ishige, Fumihiro K@nehira (stupid censorship) and Taro Hiwatashi? They're holding lead roles but I can't seem to source any previous works. ^^;

[Karakand]

No fuckin' way!

My hype for this game had dwindled considerably the more I saw of it but I'm definitely 180ing again. Game of the Forever (along with Operation Darkness).

[SRG01]

So, is this the reason why SH:FTNW was released so quickly after SH2? (Nautilus dissolving, I mean)

[Mefisutoferesu]

How's the game so far, ducky? Any good?

[Datschge]

I was simply referring to how Feelplus was formed.

Maybe you missed this interview (Lost Odyssey development staff aka Feelplus needed to be created due to the Microsoft's corporate culture standing in the way of development, see page 2 of the interview): http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20...field_01.shtml

[Mashing]

This explains why the timing based combat reminded me of Shadow Hearts so much.

[reriel]

Oh and for completion's sake, here're the former S-E members and LoD staffers that I know for certain are part of FeelPlus.

what's happened to hiroshi kawai and hiroshi arai ?

[FromTheFuture]

What

[Speevy]

How's the game so far, ducky? Any good?

I'm sure it's the same as Blue Dragon and Eternal Sonata. You'll have one of the Japan GAFers hating it, one loves it, and it'll get mostly 8s when released.

[rpgfan16k]

I'm sure it's the same as Blue Dragon and Eternal Sonata. You'll have one of the Japan GAFers hating it, one loves it, and it'll get mostly 8s when released.

lol what? JGAF loved BD, pretty much hated on ES (especially Bebpo), and while ES did get mostly 8's from the Western press, BD has some of the most erratic scoring of any recent video game, period. There's just about as many 90% scores as 60% scores.

I think JGAF will like LO, but I expect the technical issues and short game length to cause a backlash of "not as good as BD" from both Ducky and others. The Western press will probably dig the story and English lip-synching, causing them to give it higher scores (if only slightly higher) than they gave to BD.

Oh, and I predict just above 100k first week sales for LO in Japan, landing just behind Minna No golf (number 1) and TOI (no2, if only because of low shipment numbers).

As for the actual topic of this thread, I hope this means good things in th efuture for the former SH staff. I hope Sakaguchi employs some of them again for Cry-On...who has he hired for that project thus far, btw? I recall hearing something about Cavia...

[ethelred]

Oh, and I predict just above 100k first week sales for LO in Japan, landing just behind Minna No golf (number 1) and TOI (no2, if only because of low shipment numbers). As for the actual topic of this thread, I hope this means good things in th efuture for the former SH staff. I hope Sakaguchi employs some of them again for Cry-On...who has he hired for that project thus far, btw? I recall hearing something about Cavia...

Unfortunately, "just over 100k" will still probably only be enough for fifth place next week. Professor Layton 2 and WiiFuckt can both be expected to have strong sales in their second week, and will most likely come out ahead of Lost Odyssey.

And yes, Cavia is making Cry On.

[FateBreaker]

I'm sure it's the same as Blue Dragon and Eternal Sonata. You'll have one of the Japan GAFers hating it, one loves it, and it'll get mostly 8s when released.

That...was pretty retarded.

[Speevy]

The most common review given to BD was 8.x, same as ES.

And the first impressions of BD were, as I recall, that it was a very old school RPG, and would not appeal to some.

It's definitely not the case that everyone LOVED Blue Dragon when it released in Japan.

So how was that retarded?

[Takuhi]

Awesome discovery, duckroll! Nautilus was a pretty strong team... I wonder if AQI made any effort to secure the Shadowhearts license?

The Western press will probably dig the story and English lip-synching, causing them to give it higher scores (if only slightly higher) than they gave to BD.

I'm predicting horrible scores. The western press seems to demand that every next-gen RPG reinvent the wheel and show tons of original play mechanics (even though it's perfectly fine for Halo 3 to be exactly the same as Halo 1 and Halo 2). And Lost Odyssey seems to have even fewer original mechanics than Blue Dragon did. Hope you're right, though...

[Takuhi]

I was just reading the other LO thread... Isn't it crazy that everyone's reaction to this news is to be MORE excited about the game, and yet MS/AQI/feelplus+ hid it from the world, leading us all to assume they were a bunch of Tose-esque hacks?

Is there some reason that publisher and developers can't publicize these things, and the Japanese media doesn't report it?

[Mefisutoferesu]

I think JGAF will like LO, but I expect the technical issues and short game length to cause a backlash of "not as good as BD" from both Ducky and others. The Western press will probably dig the story and English lip-synching, causing them to give it higher scores (if only slightly higher) than they gave to BD.

Not to argue with you or anything, but as I recall the technical problems in BD were part of the reason it got a less than favorable score from the western press.

[rpgfan16k]

Not to argue with you or anything, but as I recall the technical problems in BD were part of the reason it got a less than favorable score from the western press.

Yet JGAF didn't mind nearly so much...and the issues here regarding loading times are more significant than Blue Dragon, at least from what we've seen so far. I didn't say that the Western press wouldn't nag about them either (they will), but every LO hype thread here keeps getting bogged down with technical issues in ways BD JGAF threads didn't.

BD's "kiddy"/"baby" (remember EGM's reviews?) storyline were a major factor in the low scores in the West; LO is at least changing that, and given that the Western audience has been given the priority for the lip-synching and dialogue, we can also hope that the pedestrian dialogue from BD won't be an issue this time.

As for Speevy, I'm not sure what source you're using, but to claim that BD and ES are somehow near-equals in terms of overall reception from either the West or JGAF is absolutely ridiculous. I'm honestly surprised Ducky and Bebpo (among others) haven't called you out on it themselves...

[jj984jj]

I'm predicting horrible scores. The western press seems to demand that every next-gen RPG reinvent the wheel and show tons of original play mechanics (even though it's perfectly fine for Halo 3 to be exactly the same as Halo 1 and Halo 2). And Lost Odyssey seems to have even fewer original mechanics than Blue Dragon did. Hope you're right, though...

I don't think so, the battle system seems a bit faster which western audiences generally like. Though I think there will be complaints about the load times from some people, regardless of region.

[Speevy]

As for Speevy, I'm not sure what source you're using, but to claim that BD and ES are somehow near-equals in terms of overall reception from either the West or JGAF is absolutely ridiculous. I'm honestly surprised Ducky and Bebpo (among others) haven't called you out on it themselves...

I didn't say they were near-equals, at all.

I said they generally. received scores around 8, FACT. Check Gamerankings.

And some people liked them upon their Japanese releases, some people didn't, also FACT.

I did NOT say they received the same reception.

[ethelred]

Not to argue with you or anything, but as I recall the technical problems in BD were part of the reason it got a less than favorable score from the western press.

As I recall, while the technical issues triggered the backlash to the demo, most of the review negativity centered around the game itself (the design, scenario, and music).

[duckroll]

Hey guys, this thread really isn't about LO the game, I'll appreciate if you guys take you comments about the game and trolling and what not into the official thread. Thanks... I want to keep this topic about the development staff involved at FeelPlus.

what's happened to hiroshi kawai and hiroshi arai ?

I don't know what happened to Hiroshi Kawai. It's possible that he's at FeelPlus but simply didn't work on this game, or maybe he left. Not sure. Hiroshi Arai on the other hand was never a part of FeelPlus. He's been the main concept 3D artist at Mistwalker internally since the start. He's credited with concept 3D art on Blue Dragon and ASH as well.

Awesome discovery, duckroll! Nautilus was a pretty strong team... I wonder if AQI made any effort to secure the Shadowhearts license?

That's a good point actually. Shadow Hearts as an IP matches up very well with AQI's products in general. Offbeat, unique, quirky. Unfortunately unless they bought the IP and Matsuzo Machida is actually at FeelPlus but quietly working on the scenario and groundwork for Shadow Hearts 4, I doubt so. We'll see. :/

[Error]

Professor Layton 2 and WiiFuckt can both be expected to have strong sales in their second week, and will most likely come out ahead of Lost Odyssey.

tsk tsk

that's pretty childish.

anyway, Im uh... glad they have new jobs I guess.

[ethelred]

tsk tsk that's pretty childish. anyway, Im uh... glad they have new jobs I guess.

sorry, typo. hard to post from phone

[Error]

haha

[KyanMehwulfe]

Great digging, duckroll.

[Hs2000]

Sure, I'm pretty obsessed with credits myself. I don't actually think Nakayama does anything as far as recruitment goes. He's just a money man that funds whatever he feels is a worthwhile investment. Feelplus was put together by Ray Nakazato, and probably with help from Sakaguchi too. Edit: Here are the Phantom Dust crew in FeelPlus. They are listed by their role in Lost Odyssey, with their role in Phantom Dust in brackets.

The Phantom Dust ppl were pretty talented. The character models looked great, and the animations were incredibly smooth.

[clashfan]

I love Shadow Hearts, hopefully LO will turn out just as good...

[Phthisis]

This is awesome news. The closing of Nautilus was a huge blow to me as the Shadow Hearts series were my favorite PS2 RPGs. Lost Odyssey will be even more of a day 1 purchase for me now.

[speedpop]

Very interesting. Shadow Hearts (and the sequel) as a whole was quite an excellent RPG in it's variation to the typical modes in a JRPG. It'll be nice to see if these guys keep the ball rolling and do something original without Sakaguchi leaning over their shoulder.

[Karakand]

Wait Phantom Dust people too? I need to start reading everything people type instead of what I want to read. :-/

omfg greatest staff ever!!!

[duckroll]

I found two more Phantom Dust staffers in the credits:

Background Map Planners: Takayuki Satsuma (Scripters)

Field Map Scripters: Masao Suganuma (Battle Game Designer)

[ShmarthurShmooner]

great info there mate! i didn't know about nautilus dissolving and was fully expecting a new shadow hearts on ps3/wii.