SolidSnakex
Member
Super Ultra Sexy Hero!
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Japan going back to its roots according to Tales producer
- Thread starter cosmicblizzard
- Start date
Super Ultra Sexy Hero!
Riposte
Member
Ni no Kuni is pretty exceptional. Outside some CC2 efforts, it is a bit unprecedented. Dark Souls is often called a "WRPG" lol.
There is very little out that is quite like Quantum Theory (though I haven't actually haven't played the game, so I can't really talk about it). Binary Domain is probably the most similar to a western TPS, but that has quite a few distinct qualities thanks to Team Yakuza putting their mark on it.
Meccanical
Member
ZAN!
Best OP in any video game incoming.
Getting back on topic, while I'm glad they feel this way, this doesn't necessarily reflect the views of the industry as a whole.
But yes all devs, not just Japanese ones, should be doing their own thing.
Those robots break apart very satisfactorily. Team Yakuza can do no wrong.
Vane_MagicCity
Banned
I thought XII was to appeal to western gamers with it's MMO style gameplay and XIII was going back to linearity. XIII-2 felt like they were trying to be like Bioware or Bethesda with lots of meaningless side quests.
SolidSnakex
Member
It certainly doesn't meant that a Japanese developer in unable to create a western style game. BD is obviously fantastic, but then you have something like RE6. A game where the developer seemed to tick every western shooter bulletpoint. And the end results weren't surprising. I don't think anyone is against western influences. Look at something like Dragon Quest, which was influenced by Ultima and Wizardry. Then you have the Souls series. The key there is to just find a balance.
Final Fantasy has always had overt western influences. Yoshinori has described his game design as an extension of his childlike love of film, particularly Star Wars, and the influences Lucas's films had on the early FF games are pretty obvious. The idea of kicking off Final Fantasy 6 and 7 with action sequences came from the Indiana Jones intros.
The Final Fantasy XIII development process was an interesting mess. I'd love to get a postmortem, but Square would never breathe a word of it, so we have to go by scraps of information to know what that development process was like. Toriyama had said that for Final Fantasy XIII-2, they visited western studios and attended GDC panels to find out how they did things. What they learned about was the Scrum development process, basically a method of software development that iterates on the Agile methodology, where the team makes monthly milestones and "sprints" towards them. And so they applied that development method to FFXIII-2. That seemingly innocent reveal begs the question- wait, you weren't doing that before?
No, they actually developed FFXIII in chronological chapter order. Meaning, the programmers and artists finished chapter 2 before chapter 3, and so on. Of which you don't have to be a project manager to see how incredibly inefficient that is for any AAA-game production. It's fine for smaller 16-bit era games, but I'm stunned they went that long
Honestly, that's kind of what - I think - he's talking about. RE6 is still a highly unique experience with a combat system that is very uniquely Japanese.
Just because they want to make a big budget shooter and it's not low budget quirky anime stuff doesn't mean it's not Japanese. Capcom has always had games like this. Both RE6 and Vanquish evolved RE4's combat along somewhat similar lines. People could look at Metal Gear Solid and claim it's not Japanese if they wanted. It's kind of ridiculous sometimes. Was Kill.Switch not Japanese? What about urban open world games like Shenmue, is that not Japanese?
cosmicblizzard
Banned
They were talking about taking inspiration from western FPS games since early 2009.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
Can you show me an example?
Riposte
Member
I should really just not reply to people who don't read my posts.
Also, I think the a lot of stuff/excuses Japanese devs (including English PR of Japanese devs) say in interviews is almost always bullshit. They really should be disregarded out of hand instead of being kept around for years and years.
Also, I think the a lot of stuff/excuses Japanese devs (including English PR of Japanese devs) say in interviews is almost always bullshit. They really should be disregarded out of hand instead of being kept around for years and years.
Ghost_Protocol
Member
Good. Persona 4 and Dark Souls are niche as fuck and they blew up over here. Hopefully that says something.
Deadpandas
Member
change is good. the changes may not always be received well but it's better than pumping out the same crap all the time and going stagnant
cosmicblizzard
Banned
Looks like I'm not entirely correct. Still, I think it does point toward being inspired by the west in some ways and I don't think they're lying about the CoD thing.
Contrary to popular belief, Persona has still not "blown up" over here. Certainly not on the level of the Souls series which sells 6-12x what Persona does.
encephalon
Member
This reads more like PR after the fact than the reason why it was developed the way it was. In other interviews they suggested that they designed the game the limited way they did because of time constraints and because they made previously more complex maps more linear.
There's a pretty long post-mortem of FFXIII in Game Developer Magazine in one of the 2010 issues. One of the points that stood out to me is that although everybody was working on their respective portions of the game, no one knew what the final product was going to even look like. It wasn't until a demo was mandated when everybody finally had a common vision to work towards. Absolutely astounding.
SolarPowered
Member
Let's hope they plan to include good PC ports in all of this.
This is something I never see happening. As much as I'd like it to... unfortunately. ><
Sometimes the combat systems are significantly different: Tales of Destiny and Tales of Eternia (Tales of Destiny II here, not to be confused with Tales of Destiny 2 that's a direct sequel to the first) are both purely 2D, Tales of Symphonia moves to 3D though you can't move freely in 3D, though the targets are placed on a 3D field rather than a 2D plane, Tales of Legendia went with the 3D graphics on a 2D plane, Tales of the Abyss and Tales of Vesperia upgraded Symphonia's with an (unlockable) ability to move freely in 3D, and I think Graces f went full 3D while dropping the traditional MP/SP system.
Others can probably cover it better, and I'm only touching on major US releases.
Good. As a guy who enjoys Japanese and Western games quite evenly, I'm not a fan one seeing one (usually Japan) mimic the other. I want my diversity.
SolidSnakex
Member
I really want to see more B-level games from developers. And not just Japan. I want more stuff like Blue Stinger, Illbleed and Deadly Premonition. They really aren't good games from a mechanical point of view, but there's something oddly charming about them.
Warm Machine
Member
I'd love to see Japanese developers go back to the themes and ideas they had in the 1986-1999 era but properly modernized. Incedently that is the era when they shamelessly ripped off movies and worldwide popular culture but made it their own.
TurnipFritters
Member
He's responsible for about 75% of the JRPG output each year.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
It's not lying, it's spin.
If I was selling my linear game in the west, after a beating in the Japanese reception, I'd make comparisons to popular linear western games too.
But it was not in mind during development.
A very insular Japanese team, before their fall in reputation at the height of their hubris, looks to what was then a very fringe gaijin game in their home country, and chooses to incorporate an insignificant and divisive aspect of it (linearity)? It's just silly.
There's 14 mainline Tales games, and a bunch of spinoffs and side games. They've shown up on various platforms, but if you have a PS2 and a PS3, you can play 12 of the 14 games.
The games are handled similarly to Final Fantasy or whatever. Each game tells a standalone story and usually features entirely new worlds and/or characters, and the gameplay mechanics are significantly altered, if not scrapped completely with each game.
D
Deleted member 17706
Unconfirmed Member
Just get away from moe designs and otaku pandering. That's all I really want.
But that rate's dropped. It's just 25% now, versus just a few years ago where it seemed that if they weren't hitting every platform at once they weren't doing their job.
Honestly the design philosophies they seem to share (Kitase/Toriyama and Infinity Ward) aren't so different, for single player at least they want to make cinematic thrill rides, and Kitase has stated he's a fan of Half Life (wonder if that influenced FFX?) and CoD, along with other western shooters I think. How else do you think they came to the idea Dirge of Cerberus was a good idea?
MagiusNecros
Gilgamesh Fan Annoyance
And not a single Yggdrasil joke to be seen.
I hope Japan goes back to their old ways of just making the games they want. It's the best way to go.
Make great games and people will buy them. All there is to it. Have a vision and go all out.
Still waiting for my TALES OF BARBATIA: BARBATOS COUNTER ATTACK game.
I hope Japan goes back to their old ways of just making the games they want. It's the best way to go.
Make great games and people will buy them. All there is to it. Have a vision and go all out.
Still waiting for my TALES OF BARBATIA: BARBATOS COUNTER ATTACK game.
clay_ghost
Member
Finally tales of phantasia 3d remake!
HolyBaikal
Banned
I want to see it, too.
During the SNES days, I loved my console much more than my computer. During the PlayStation era, I still was more entertained by my PlayStation more, especially when it was so much easier and friendlier for new games. But the PC was getting there. The PlayStation 2 came, and both my console and PC were amazing boxes of awesome in their own right.
Now... I can safely say that they only, single thing about consoles to me that have any advantage to me over PCs, is all of the exclusive titles. Most of them, Japanese games.
That's really the major thing that sells me on consoles today. All of those Japanese games that never saw the light of PC. And there's no way that was nearly as true back in the 16-bit days, though I viewed my DOS computer as a bit of a playground in its own right.
From the sound of it, things could change a little bit. Touhou is probably the biggest PC hit Japan has ever had. And my, is it huge. MMORPGs are becoming pretty popular in Japan. And the Visual Novel market is still going strong with things like Umineko no Naku Koro ni.
There's also the fact that multiple PSP titles like ClaDun X2 and Half-Minute Hero have come to the PC. And there has to have at least been some small spike in the PC market in Japan thanks to Final Fantasy XIV. Then there was the huge Dark Souls petition.
If it's true that the Orbis and Durango are using x86 architecture... that and the advent of the Oculus Rift may cause Japan to consider the PC platform more strongly. Really, the only reason the console is dominant in Japan is because of Nintendo. A tendency that has had several decades to fade. I think that slowly but surely it is being chipped away to demise.
Riposte
Member
On XIII:
The "linear" maps are nothing new to the series. See FFX. The fact is if you make a linear game, it is easier to make it pretty. Given how long it took them to make the game as it is, I can't imagine them handling even more areas like Gran Pulse.
It is a pretty empty association altogether. Linearity in Call of Duty =/= linearity in FFXIII. In CoD linearity has a very strong effect on the combat, whereas it doesn't matter much at all for XIII. XIII doesn't even have set pieces.
The "linear" maps are nothing new to the series. See FFX. The fact is if you make a linear game, it is easier to make it pretty. Given how long it took them to make the game as it is, I can't imagine them handling even more areas like Gran Pulse.
It is a pretty empty association altogether. Linearity in Call of Duty =/= linearity in FFXIII. In CoD linearity has a very strong effect on the combat, whereas it doesn't matter much at all for XIII. XIII doesn't even have set pieces.
I think it's great that more devs come to realize that cultural diversity is a way to go. Actually the thing that bothers me the most and I could never understand it, is why do most of the gaming community keep comparing Japan to the rest of the world. It's just pointless and quite unfair - it's only one country, even if it's very influential one, vs such behemots like USA, Canada, UK, France, Poland, Germany, Sweden among many others, all wrapped together.
Chie Satonaka
Member
Fantastic.
One would hope that Capcom would also be doing this, but I'm sure instead they're trying to buy out Slant Six and Ninja Theory so they can co-develop the Mega Man reboot.
One would hope that Capcom would also be doing this, but I'm sure instead they're trying to buy out Slant Six and Ninja Theory so they can co-develop the Mega Man reboot.
I don't think XIII even had talkable NPCs, just idle chatter heard in the background.
BocoDragon
or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Realize This Assgrab is Delicious
But that's different. If you're saying that they both just happened to value making linear thrill rides, then I agree.
But their linearity did not come from looking at FPS, or to the broader point, from western inspiration.
I agree completely.
Well, I also think it's because consoles can be cheaper, reliably work (less of a key advantage now), and can incorporate some things that don't work as well on PC like certain controllers being mandatory and expected along with same system multiplayer. Which is part of why the idea of a standard, very expensive and high end console seems like a dead end: you lose the cheap angle, and if you go with a standard controller I can just stick one into the PC now (usually the 360 one) and use that. Hell, many of those games had been abandoning offline multiplayer, further ruining the edge consoles have.
Although I do wonder if the Wii U is a dead end with how slow sales are. I guess more software needs to come out first or something, and for us to see what the next gen consoles even DO.
Well, it's possible they feel it enables them, or they look and see what else they could do with that. But yeah, it does seem primarily for ease of development and to more easily make the games look really nice. And since those two specifically seem to value story and the cinematic experience more they really may've looked at freedom as being a nuisance to what they want to do.
Though, keep in mind Toriyama talked about how he wanted to do things like Uncharted IIRC for the next FF he made, IE a cinematic sequence where you played out jumping from dragon to dragon or whatever.
Actually they just said they're going to hire 1,000 new employees and move most development back to their own internal studios.
I wouldn't be surprised if they work with Ninja Theory again though. They'd be good on any of their own new IPs, and they know how to work with Japanese publishers (Sony, Namco).
Are Kitase and Toriyama fans of tabletop RPGs? I feel like games made by them tend to overlook DnD/tabletop philosophies whereas someone like Yasumi Matsuno understands where RPGs originally came from and thus makes his games more in tune with the expectations of the genre.
Kitase maybe. Toriyama? Hell no. Just guesses though.
I completely agree. FF13 sucks, but it's a natural evolution of JRPGs and Final Fantasy in particular. The problem with FF13 isn't that it's sufficiently Japanese it's that it would be next to impossible to create an RPG that is as large as say FF7 but as detailed as FF13 is without it taking a decade to make and millions and millions in the process. Square is also creatively bankrupt, but that's a different issue.
Riposte said:
I don't even think of Dark Souls as being an "RPG" to begin with. It's a modern platformer and is derived more from games like (NES) Ninja Gaiden and Castlevania than any RPG. It's also super Japanese. Just like you can look at Skyrim and tell it's Western you can look at Dark Souls and tell it's Japanese.
Uhh what?