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Level 5 announces brand new game in Tokyo today

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C

Chris Michael

Banned
This game is looking very nice. Judging from the screenshots, it looks alot like Phoenix Wright with more puzzles and animated scenes. I'd really like to know if there's alot of animated FMV's throughout the entire span of the game. Dunno if the DS could handle that...

Though I wish the detective's sidekick was an old guy ala Watson from the Holmes novels, and not a little kid...
pedobearseal.jpg

Dragona Akehi said:
No, you're bitching for the sake of bitching. Yet again. You're trolling the DS. Yet again.

Hey I'm all for opinions but if one of MY favourite teams made a game for a system I don't like, I wouldn't be pissing all over it.

PS: SRPGs aren't RPGs. Jeanne D'arc is as much of an experiment as this game is. And you drooled like a fanboy over that so...

So stop being stupid.
Click to expand...

QFTx20! Seriously, the bold is *EXACTLY* what I said earlier in the thread!
You should like totally make someone else [me] a mod.
 
J

jj984jj

He's a pretty swell guy in my books anyway.
I don't care for the FMV, but I would like some VA outside of the FMV as well.
 
D

duckroll

Member
VVARIO said:
The official site got updated with:
http://layton.jp/wmv/layton_high.wmv
Click to expand...

That's a really good trailer. Most of the puzzles look pretty easy though, so I hope there are a lot of them. Also, it's really strange that they would choose to produce widescreen anime scenes when they should be using all the screen space they can on the DS. Hopefully they'll include a DVD of all the scenes as a pre-order bonus, or the quality is really going to be wasted.
 
E

ethelred

Member
Wow. That trailer really looks fantastic.

duckroll said:
That's a really good trailer. Most of the puzzles look pretty easy though, so I hope there are a lot of them.
Click to expand...

From Jonny's preview:

with Hino asking Tago to allow him to use freely more than 2,000 puzzles from the Head Gymnastics collection, as well as asking him if he could create another 30 or so brand new puzzles, some being specifically created to make use of the DS's touchpen functionality.
Click to expand...
 
C

Cheerilee

Member
Random thought: Dark Cloud was initially billed as a "Zelda Killer", and Zelda is usually defined as an Adventure game.

Which doesn't really mean anything, but it just occurred to me.
 
C

Chris Remo

Member
Holy ****ing shit, that artwork is awesome. Geez, it's so great to see something in the video game world with that kind of 2D European animation influence. It looks gorgeous. There's still some huge eye wackiness in there, but you can't win 'em all.
 
R

radioheadrule83

Banned
I took my time getting to this thread, and putting DS in the thread title would have gotten me here quicker. I thought it would be a next gen title... something I'm not joining for months!

It looks really nice :)
 
S

slaughterking

Member
VVARIO said:
The official site got updated with:
http://layton.jp/wmv/layton_high.wmv
Click to expand...
Took me an hour to load, but it was worth the time. Looks awesome.
But I'm concernd about the complexity of the puzzles - seems pretty simple and basic in the trailer and some of the pics if you ask. You can only hope these were some examples of earlier puzzles in the game.
But I'm sold on this game anyway, the art style is outstanding.
 
E

ethelred

Member
Chris Michael said:
Honestly, I wouldn't be able to tell that this game is essentially just a collection of some guy's puzzles (referring to Jonny's preview).
Click to expand...

That is not what Jonny's preview says it is.
 
L

LevelNth

Banned
Just watched the Famitsu vid, the cinemas look excellent, but I couldn't get a good view of the actual gameplay stuff. I'm downloading the direct link vid now, but so far the game looks ace.


jarrod said:
Er, RG barely topped 350k and was expected to sell close to double that... you can't self publish with those sorts of figures. Something tells me L5 likely made just a wee bit more off the lone multimillion seller they've been involved with. ;)
Click to expand...
One, final numbers are closer to 400k, and two, the game was never, ever expected to sell that many units. Hino stated in an interview in mid '05 that his dream is to become one of the very few studios that produces an original console RPG that sells over a million just in Japan, and that while he'd love for RG to be the title, he thinks they're still a little ways away from that, and the most reasonable amount he can hope for is 500k tops.

And you can self publish with those figures, and they are. You're grossly overestimating how much L5 received to do DQVIII, though that doesn't really surprise me. But don't take my word for it, do some research yourself.


jarrod said:
600k worldwide isn't exactly stellar for a SCEI project of Chronicle's scale and when it moved just 250k in Japan that was largely considered dissapointing for a game with it's level of promotion and budget. Dark Cloud got lucky with PS2's early drought (at least in the west, it rightfully tanked in Japan), Chronicle wasn't nearly so lucky given the more competitive marketplace.
Click to expand...
More of GAFs assinine 'what is good sales and what isn't'. DC2's sales were only disappointing in relation to DC1's, which, as you say, benefitted from it's release early in the PS2 lifecycle. And you're first sentence would look significantly less foolish if you actually knew DC2's budget.


jarrod said:
It was greenlit in 2001? ;)
Click to expand...
Nope, it was greenlit in the summer of '02, prior to both the MS and SE deals, which happened later that year (MS first, then SE in late October).


jarrod said:
You seem to be confused again... if anything DQ8 held with tradition. That's precisely why it's so good really.
Click to expand...
Er, the gameplay wasn't the reason VIII was such an improvement over the previous DQ's.
 
F

Fady K

Member
Nah, thisll game will most definitely come to the US, heck, maybe even Level 5 will go the path of NIS and create their own studio in the US.
 
E

ethelred

Member
LevelNth said:
One, final numbers are closer to 400k, and two, the game was never, ever expected to sell that many units.
Click to expand...

Where are you getting that, by the way? The game sold 299,310 in 2005, according to Famitsu; it may have sold more in 2006, but it definitely sold under 60,000 (the lowest number in Famitsu's 2006 half year chart). So going by Famitsu, it'd be impossible for Rogue Galaxy to be near 400k -- 359,310 is the absolute maximum, and that's assuming that Rogue Galaxy was #101 through the first half of 2006. I think it's a safe bet it wasn't. :) Regardless, the last thing the monthly charts showed it at was 350,490.


Anyway, the reason I bumped the thread. GamesAreFun (the other GAF) posted a complete translation of the interview Famitsu did with Tago and Hino. It didn't seem worth creating a new thread since Jonny's 1up preview contained an overview of this... but I figured I'd pass it along for anyone interested in the details.

GamesAreFun said:
Famitsu: First I’d like to ask about how exactly you two first came to meet.

Tago: I heard from someone that a big fan of my puzzle books wanted dearly to meet with me, so I accepted. Two people came to meet me, one in a formal suit, and the other man didn’t even have a jacket on. I thought then that the underdressed man was certainly Mr. Hino’s assistant but right then he introduced himself as the president of Level 5, Mr. Hino.

Hino: I remember that day well. I had planned to dress formally for the meeting but somehow I didn’t expect him to see me like that.

Tago: Mr. Hino said he had been a big fan of my book since he was a small child. He told me how he wanted to make a game based on my books. I couldn’t imagine what kind of game he would make based on my books so I told him, for the time being, we should set up another meeting.

Hino: When I met with Prof. Tago he showed me a magic trick and I thought that he seemed to have a playful heart. I felt that if we could work together we could really make something fun.

Tago: That was why I went to Level 5 meet with them, but when I actually got to their office I was terribly surprised. I was guided into a conference room that was wide open and even had a traditional heated table with sunken floor in the center. There were various game props lying all around the room. It was a very informal atmosphere. Just looking at the conference room I thought how interesting a company Level 5 must be. The staff were meeting and talking all around the room. At any rate, everyone in the company seemed to be full of youthful vigor. I thought to myself that working with these people would be a very interesting experience.

Famitsu: I’d like to ask you about when you made definite plans to work on “Prof. Layton and the Mysterious Village.”

Hino: Firstly we came up with the puzzles and then worked on the story line. While we were in the middle of our work we had talked about making a new type of game that would be based on Prof. Tago's books, but recently in the game industry “brain training” games have become a huge thing and we decided to change directions

Famitsu: They certainly have.

Hino: We were talking about making that kind of game before it came into fashion, but when we actually started working on fitting his books into a game the “brain training” trend had already started. Even though the Prof. Tago is one of the originators of the genre, we didn’t want to be buried amongst many other similar games, so we decided to add a story to the game along with the puzzles. That’s how this game has taken its current form.

Famitsu: Until now there hasn’t been a game quite like it.

Hino: Yes. I wanted to make a completely new type of game. There are even traces of Prof. Tago that I’ve put into Prof. Layton such as his fondness of magic. While of course they’re both Professors, Prof. Layton also wears a top hat much like a magician does.

Famitsu: I see. Prof. Tago, when working with Mr. Hino, did you have any special requests of him?

Tago: I wanted the game to be fun for the whole family as well as mentally stimulating.

Hino: He certainly said so. Prof. Tago explained that we should make a game where parents can tell their children, “Play this!” I had the exact same opinion. Making a game that can actually be recommended for children to play is a big theme of this project.

Tago: In making this game Mr. Hino also made some special requests of me. First, he wanted to be free to use any of the more than 2,000 puzzles that I’ve created for my books. That I didn’t quite mind, but he had another request on top of that. He wanted me to create more than 30 new puzzles specifically for this game. When I heard that I was amazed. It’s not that easy to create the puzzles I have done for my books.

Famitsu: I see.

Tago: So, thanks to that, I got down to work. Right away I assembled a team to work on the puzzles. We stayed together for 3 days and thought up 15-20 puzzles each, but not without running into some trouble in the process.

Famitsu: What kind of trouble?

Tago: We were shown the Nintendo DS, but it also comes with a stylus, does it not? Mr. Hino’s other request was that we use this functionality in our puzzles. Most of the puzzles I’ve made before were logic problems. Certainly some puzzles could be designed using letters and characters, but considering the game, we were confused about what other types of puzzles we could make that involved moving something with the stylus. Then Level 5 showed a number of puzzle samples. Seeing those examples, we said to ourselves, “Oh! We can do something like that.” So, with numerous visits from Level 5, we racked our brains and came up with our new puzzles for the game.

Hino: I’ve made many games but "Prof. Layton" is something completely different than before and hence was a lot of fun to make. Before actually incorporating the puzzles into the game we decided to try them ourselves with our development staff in order to loosen up a bit. While we were attempting them we kept saying to each other, “Tell me the solution!” These were problems that we didn’t know either so we were able to play through them, too. Even if it was for the reason of developing the game, we had a lot of fun playing through the puzzles.

Tago: We both had fun while working on this game. Well, even if parts of the process were painful. For making these new puzzles I was thinking of taking everyone in the team to Europe. But besides that motivation, making a puzzle just works naturally with how the brain is structured. It’ll make you stop and say, “Ah! I can do this kind of puzzle.” Really, a good puzzle is something that makes your mind concentrate to its very limit combined with a time constraint.

Famitsu: Since you were in charge of making the puzzles, what do you think of the finished product?

Tago: I frantically worked on these problems but feel that Level 5 has given back just the same effort. When I worked on my books everyone in the team would discuss the project, and at the same time, little by little, things would get a bit more interesting and a bit closer to the finished puzzle. With about that same energy Level 5, too, has worked hard towards finishing this project.

Hino: For us too this has developed into something that’s certainly nothing to be shy about. All of us at Level 5 are really happy with the game. If for some reason this game became different than our expectations, even with Prof. Tago’s work with it, there would be absolutely no excuse. With that said, I really think we’ve made something we can be really pleased with.

Famitsu: Well, this is fun, huh? Lastly, could you please give a message to all the gamers out there that are interested in your game?

Hino: This is our first time using the Nintendo DS hardware so we had many ideas about how to use its functionality. With Prof. Tago being a tremendous aid to us, we’ve mixed his puzzles with a storyline and made a completely new type of game that’s truly something to be proud of. With his help, we’ve made an extremely fun game that I would like many people to play.

Tago: From the beginning I’ve been critical of games that involved random meaningless killing. However, this time is different. When talking with Mr. Hino and Level 5 we all agreed that this game should be something positive instead. I don’t know why I even need to say it, but this game is not the kind that I would make criticisms of. There’s plenty of story and, moreover, there are portions that really make you think. It’s a game that everyone, family and friends, can enjoy. I certainly want everyone to have fun with it.

Hino: Actually, it’s not common for a game to be released with this kind of satisfaction. I feel that this game is really going to make it. Let’s work hard to do it!

Tago: Yes, let’s make it happen!
Click to expand...
 
A

amrum

Member
Japanese Boxart

B000JLCL7A.09._AA280_SCLZZZZZZZ_V50022843_.jpg

Professor Layton wifi compatible ?
 
J

jj984jj

He's a pretty swell guy in my books anyway.
krypt0nian said:
Because the new boxart is out?
Click to expand...
He could've made a new topic, the title makes this one misleading. Also, the boxart was posted before in other topics.
 
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