Hello GAF,
This is Part 2 of the long GAMER interview SEGA conducted regarding Valkyria Chronicles 1 Remaster and Valkyria: Azure Revolution. Continued from Part 1 here.
This part of the interview deals entirely with Azure Revolution. Topics such as:
-The modern design of RPGs
-"Dark" and "Serious" RPGs
-Leveling in RPGs
-Battle systems
-Story ideas and concepts for VAR (wanting to create a large series)
-Message to Valkyria fans
I apologize in advance if the interview is too long... but there really wasn't a way I could break up the sections to make a Part 3 without posting a very short out of place section.
---------------------------
Let's talk about the latest reveal "Valkyira: Azure Revolution"!
---------------------------
Ozawa: From the beginning our aim was to place the game in a world and setting separate from the one in Chronicles, and to spring off the terms "Valkyria" and "Ragnite" to create a brand new world! That was our starting point.
The stage of the story takes place in a fictional 1850's European period. Rapid progress around the utilization of Ragnite has fueled an Industrial Revolution titled "The Azure Revolution" which has become the root of the Empire’s creation. The focus of the story is based on the monarchy Jutland and its survival.
In this series the main focus will be addressing the themes of warfare and creating a story that approaches those themes seriously.
GAMER: This time you're showing off and drawing way more from fantasy elements.
Ozawa: When it comes to VAR, it's very much a story with humans as a base, infused with military elements carried over from Chronicles and incorporated with magic elements which should be familiar to any Japanese RPG player.
Incidentally, we promoted Chronicles using a theme of a “realistic military”, but when mentioning its strong points we avoided relying on keywords like "guns" and "tanks". While military themes are accepted abroad, we did our best not to frame military terminology in a sense of good versus evil domestically.
Back during the domestic release of VC1, Alicia and Isara along with other cute girls were used as visuals during marketing, but the moment people noticed a tank, they'd comment "Isn't this a Western game? Won't there be clashing iron and bloodletting?" There were quite a few cases of this interpretation so in order to ease those concerns we placed VC2 in a school setting to redirect those notions. (Editor's Note: ouch. Please keep reading though, please. haha)
GAMER: I see! I personally like the grittier edge of military themes, but that's a fresh perspective.
Mikami: Of course, there are many people who share your opinion of enjoying the rougher side of the military. In addition to what Ozawa was talking about before, within Japan there is a lack of familiarity regarding gun culture. In the most extreme examples people would find them very frightening.
Ozawa: "Swinging a sword" is fantasy, but "shooting a gun" evokes a much more raw feeling, doesn't it?
Mikami: That may be true but saying something extreme like "I will never shoot a gun! Fire, consume my enemies!" is at odds with what we want to do. For Azure Revolution we will implement concepts that are easy to accept as part of its world while balancing each and every idea appropriately.
Ozawa: Right now this subject is certainly a big challenge with VAR. When making VC2 we received feedback that we had detached ourselves too much from themes of warfare. During our consideration and implementation of the feedback for VC3’s development I intently studied said themes and applied corrections to both the setting and the story. Azure Revolution was created out of a desire from me and Mikami to apply VC2 and VC3’s past ideas and considerations as a flavor onto a new work.
GAMER: If you look at the game's story synopsis, you can see keywords such as "Sinners", "Revenge", and "Grudges". Is this game aiming to become a dark, serious RPG?
Ozawa: It won't be dark, but it will be serious. The majority of the scenario was devised by myself. Azure Revolution's scenario is composed of the gunfire exchanges over a battlefield, conflict within the citizenship, and the general conflicts and concepts around military money and intelligence gathering. The starting proposal was to sketch out "the many faces and sides of war". Mikami and the staff also bandied about a bunch of additional fun and interesting ideas to include in the story. During the story progression we want to mislead some people into thinking "Is the plot really this simple?" to surprise them.
Mikami: Azure's "many sides of war" will include economics but the game is not an economics simulator. Those elements will all be part of the scenario and expanded thanks to the story because the foundation of the game is an RPG. The fact that warfare by its nature allows us to connect all sorts of story ideas like this together is very interesting to me. Though Azure is an RPG, it won't have "Using the mysterious power of ragnite, the mysterious main characters will defeat the mysterious final boss!" or any such thing.
Ozawa: In this series up until now, ragnite has merely been a common form of energy. As previously explained, by associating ragnite with new magic elements and an industry born from this magic, we've been able to create a separate society and world from the Chronicles series. Players who were unfamiliar with the Chronicles series should be able to jump in without a problem because of the new world we created.
---------------------------
A game that aims to draw out the best elements of RPGs
---------------------------
Ozawa: As I mentioned previously, merely making a few trifling tweaks to the Chronicles systems would not allow us to exceed our goal for creating a completely new title.
Japanese gamers have a real attachment to the RPG genre, and the premise at the beginning of development was to challenge ourselves to appeal to that particular group of gamers.
Our aim is to combine the strategy elements of Chronicles along with the real-time action style of Azure and the RPG element of symbol encounters to express the series beyond its previous offerings.
GAMER: Please tell us what you consider to be the standard gameplay flow of Valkyria: Azure Revolution.
Ozawa: In the world of VAR you are selecting missions while traveling chosen maps on foot and aiming to clear the objective. While managing your characters from the battle map you hide behind sandbags and walls, lay down gunfire on enemies one by one and use items to crush enemy defenses. While approaching the enemies after lowering their defenses with the above tactics the game shifts into the action mode. The RPG battle system exists as these two parts with its ranged combat from afar and close combat after approaching the enemy.
The action elements become heightened regardless of how an encounter battle is setup beforehand by the player. Even though they are “field enemies”, they are not merely strolling around leisurely and mindlessly. If they notice you they will begin firing their weapons and head to cover behind sandbags while trying to gun you down. Before the encounter the goal is to exploit and aim for the enemy's weaknesses to gain an advantage in the battle. After the encounter is over and the battle begins, the goal is to inflict various status effects and begin the use of swords and magic. The foundation of an RPG lies in this flow of defeating enemies.
In the 1.0 demo of the game we currently don't have anything other than the battle portion playable, but the full version of the title will include the headquarters of the Jutland Kingdom where the gameplay of reviewing strategy, completing objectives and returning to base can flow without impedance. We are contemplating potential scenarios to accompany each mission, such as battles to seize ragnite mines, or strikes to control the routing of goods and materials. When comparing it to a "playstyle"... from the starting position it will feel very similar to entering a dungeon.
GAMER: I've had the privilege of being allowed to play the demo in advance, but the action part of the RPG battles really makes the game more interesting.
Ozawa: Our work VAR is an attempt to grasp the styles of the modern RPG. The traditional method of RPG control has almost entirely passed away and the player now has complete freedom over movement, attacking and evasion. However even within our company there are a few who voice their opinion that we're leaning too heavily towards action which is why we're included a mid-battle targeting system among other things while concurrently taking the opinions of our users with the demo feedback form in tandem with development.
GAMER: You've mentioned it before, but please explain the finer points of the relation between enemy encounters and the game's action style.
Ozawa: When it comes to types of gamers, there's a contingent that find multitasking movement, attacking, more or less everything all at once tough to do. To give examples, RTS games are games where the primary focus is how you multitask movement, attacking, environment control and such in real-time. RPGs divide up movement and combat separately, appealing to users who want to enjoy a more single-task game.
Valkyria Chronicles, in accordance with its central battle concept of “interception fire”, had a few enemies on field which became a multitude of threats when the real-time action began. However, with Azure Revolution’s battle system LeGION we want to fully commit the to the action element with both your friends and your enemies all visible and interactable at once in real-time.
In accordance with the name LeGION, the enemies will be waiting for you in large numbers military-style in rough areas, so if you attack them without a plan you’ll be overwhelmed by their numbers and you will need to defeat the entire enemy in one go.
GAMER: And how will the player defeat these overwhelming enemies?
Ozawa: When it comes to field encounters in RPGs, bumping into the enemy while your allies are in tow means the battle has begun, right? In VAR, a circular battle field will be set once the direct battle begins. We gave this mechanic the name "Severed Battlefield" internally.
The long and short of the combat organization is… if there are 10 enemies within your field of vision, it doesn't mean you'll be taking on 10 enemies in one go. You'll be fighting versus subdivided groups of 3, 3 and 4 inside the battle circle and defeating them within this cut-out battle system.
You'll be thinking up starting tactics like "I will fight the enemies in this direction, off to the right". In order to engage and draw out enemies with gunfire, you’ll check your minimap for the numbers of enemies and their current formation on the battlefield. This process is very important to the game’s tactical nature.
GAMER: It makes more sense now. After all I was quickly encircled and attacked by enemy soldiers in the demo.
Ozawa: If you look at the real-time instance of enemies moving simultaneously to attack, and add in the RPG elements, then the resulting concept of the "Severed Battlefield" can be called VAR's unique property.
However, at the end of the day, Azure Revolution is still an RPG. Battles whose core function can suddenly shift should be a concept that is simple to grasp and players should be able to easily comprehend the core battle tactics. Developing a mutual relationship between action elements and the RPG style that proceeds to cut into the action... that balance was our core aim above all else.
GAMER: Will the action gameplay be drawn out through the enemy encounter system?
Ozawa: I've always thought to myself when playing RPGs when finding enemies that "if they're just walking around doing nothing, that's such a waste!" If there are field enemies, I’d like to be forced to strategize different options to approach them.
As you lure out enemies and seek them out yourself while lowering their defenses with gunfire, you can properly apply your pre-battle preparations to the upcoming fight. In the retail release of the game, you'll be able to replace the sub-weapons for Amleth, Ophelia and Brigitte to expand your strategies more.
Mikami: When we were preliminarily discussing this subject it was my opinion that the enemies should mirror actual army corps in behavior.
When you view the symbols of potential enemy encounters on screen, the case where a single enemy symbol will represent multiple units will not happen. The number and type of enemies are viewable as they are and I would like the player's preparations and battle formations to reflect that.
The moment you see enemies or alerted to them, I want people to feel like... "Damn... that's a lot of 'em!"
Ozawa: The combined result of impressing upon players the large numbers of enemies, yet requiring them to take said enemies down concisely, can be definitively titled “LeGION”. Through using this system, you will understand the types of combat each of the ‘elite’ main characters can provide while feeling the ripple effect of their actions across the entire battlefield.
GAMER: If that's the way it works this won't be the kind of game where you can just bulldoze through enemies as you please.
Ozawa: That's true, and yet not true. VAR is an RPG after all, so if you get your level high enough you can start pulverizing your foes. The feeling of becoming stronger is the best part of playing an RPG.
For the demo, we haven't put forward a serious effort towards the character leveling system yet. However after the demo players test and have fun with the game, we expect to see surprised comments about the RPG system and how they plan to level up to overcome enemies they lost to before, and to take their feedback from within those comments and make subsequent corrections.
We got so caught up about how great LeGION is, I forgot to convey the more fantastic RPG elements in the game. In retrospect I apologize! Of course, for all the players out there who want to win purely using technique, please aim for low-level clears!
GAMER: Incidentally, because you have teammates assisting with this in the demo, can you overcome enemy encounters by purely firing guns?
Ozawa: You can, but even if you increase enemy weaknesses with gunfire, if the damage dealt isn’t favorable in terms of efficiency, won’t the result of such inefficiency speak for itself? So while the success of such a tactic depends on the weapons available or the enemies you are facing, you may find yourself wasting a lot of time. Whether you prioritize safety or time, that is all part of the strategy element.
In the trial version, there is an element that is not quite fully finished, the Conflict Gauge (red/blue gauge at the top of the screen depicting battle morale). With this system at the present time, this gauge reveals the effectiveness of your strategies on the battlefield.
GAMER: …I thought that gauge was telling me my stage rank based on resources remaining.
Ozawa: For the trial version of VAR, such a conclusion is not entirely mistaken. However, in VAR’s final form, the gauge will indicate you achieving superiority in battle by surprising enemies or forcing them to retreat and such. In the event of advancing bravely against enemies despite lack of numbers and other situations, the gauge will show the consequences of such developments. An idea we may implement is a Valkyria appearing on the battlefield and the enemy rallying behind her if the gauge gets pushed too far in one direction.
GAMER: Is it all right to tell us how many characters can be in your party at once, and whether or not you can issue direct orders to your teammates?
Ozawa: While we’re still finalizing this ourselves, we anticipate a maximum of 4 or 5 comrades will be able to join you in missions. The orders you give to your comrades will be AI functions, but we also intend to introduce a customizable action set on a per-character basis designed by the player.
---------------------------
From within the Valkyria Project, a brand-new Valkyria series
---------------------------
is difficult to interpret. Is there a particular reason it was used?
Ozawa: We've come up with a few specific reasons but those reasons will have to remain secret for now. Incidentally, the world of Azure Revolution can be described as a “A World without a Wheel”. The world itself has a realistic base with Valkyria, magic and more attached. It won’t get to the level where a dragon suddenly appears though as that would swivel the game into a full fantasy world.
GAMER: Will the main characters ever have to embark on missions to increase their magical strength?
Ozawa: There won’t be anything like that. Jutland was founded as a technological nation with technological attributes. In the beginning of VAR the resources for their kingdom are becoming scarce and the major powers of the world have trapped it in an economic blockade which has caused the ragnite stock to become heavily depleted, meaning that their research on magic has slowed. Well, it’s because of the economic blockade and its consequences that war has commenced in the first place.
GAMER: This is a personal question coming from a big fan of Hiro Kiyohara, but what is the story behind him joining as a character designer?
Ozawa: (Gestures towards Mikami) That designer was recommended by Mikami:.
Mikami: In the beginning of the project, design of everything but the characters, including the elegantly detailed mecha designs, had been drawn up by Takayama (Takayama Toshiaki and Kiyohara Hiro are the two-man team currently designing characters for VAR). However since we needed to spice up the game some more with the character design of enemies and allies it was decided ahead of time to bring in one more character designer. As for me I wanted to bring in an artist with a very strong personal style such as someone who designs the covers of novels, so I sent a request to Kiyohara-san to join our team.
Ozawa: When the staff convened to search for such an illustrator we pored over and tried comparing many pieces of art. Mikami then brought in Kiyohara’s work, and I heard quite a lot of good feedback from our staff regarding him. Due to that I became inspired to learn more about Kiyohara and his work. After that, so many people kept inquiring about Kiyohara’s artwork that we chose Kiyohara despite many who preferred his artwork despite not even knowing his name.
GAMER: On a final note, please leave a message for all the impatient fans of the Valkyria series out there!
Mikami: We at SEGA aim to use the PS4 as a pillar to restart the Valkyria series. Our new title Valkyria: Azure Revolution can be considered as part of the “overall series”, but we’re creating VAR as a new series within the scope of the “Valkyria Project” to increase the breadth of Valkyria as a whole.
Ozawa: It’s been 8 years since we’ve begun this series… I’m deeply moved. This may sound biased coming from one of the creators, but I really do think Valkyria Chronicles is a very fun and interesting game. Thanks to BLiTZ and CANVAS, this game hasn’t aged one bit in the past 8 years. I really am going all out singing its praises now! Everyone reading this, I really hope you have a fun time playing Valkyria Chronicles.
Our new title Azure Revolution shares some of its design with Chronicles, but you’ll be able to have brand new experiences with its gameplay, story, and more. As Mikami said earlier, we have a goal of developing a new series thanks to VAR’s new world. For example, ideas such as “It’s been 10 years, so I wonder what’s happened since then”, “It’s the same time period, but the events are happening in a different country”, “What are the origins of ragnite”, are ones that we think we can have a lot of fun with if we can do them in the future. A long extended history sort of like a large, single picture scroll.
We’re still in the midst of balancing the game components LeGION and GOUACHE and are working fervently to aim for a winter release, so we await everyone’s opinions and feedback from the demo version. I look forward to everyone enjoying Valkyria: Azure Revolution and Valkyria Chronicles Remastered together.
GAMER: Thank you so much for discussing these two titles with such great depth.
--------------------------------
I know the fanbase for Valkyria games is very niche but I had fun translating it just for self-practice so I hope people will enjoy.
This is Part 2 of the long GAMER interview SEGA conducted regarding Valkyria Chronicles 1 Remaster and Valkyria: Azure Revolution. Continued from Part 1 here.
This part of the interview deals entirely with Azure Revolution. Topics such as:
-The modern design of RPGs
-"Dark" and "Serious" RPGs
-Leveling in RPGs
-Battle systems
-Story ideas and concepts for VAR (wanting to create a large series)
-Message to Valkyria fans
I apologize in advance if the interview is too long... but there really wasn't a way I could break up the sections to make a Part 3 without posting a very short out of place section.
---------------------------
Let's talk about the latest reveal "Valkyira: Azure Revolution"!
---------------------------
GAMER: Let's begin discussing Valkyria: Azure Revolution.
Ozawa: From the beginning our aim was to place the game in a world and setting separate from the one in Chronicles, and to spring off the terms "Valkyria" and "Ragnite" to create a brand new world! That was our starting point.
The stage of the story takes place in a fictional 1850's European period. Rapid progress around the utilization of Ragnite has fueled an Industrial Revolution titled "The Azure Revolution" which has become the root of the Empire’s creation. The focus of the story is based on the monarchy Jutland and its survival.
In this series the main focus will be addressing the themes of warfare and creating a story that approaches those themes seriously.
GAMER: This time you're showing off and drawing way more from fantasy elements.
Ozawa: When it comes to VAR, it's very much a story with humans as a base, infused with military elements carried over from Chronicles and incorporated with magic elements which should be familiar to any Japanese RPG player.
Incidentally, we promoted Chronicles using a theme of a “realistic military”, but when mentioning its strong points we avoided relying on keywords like "guns" and "tanks". While military themes are accepted abroad, we did our best not to frame military terminology in a sense of good versus evil domestically.
Back during the domestic release of VC1, Alicia and Isara along with other cute girls were used as visuals during marketing, but the moment people noticed a tank, they'd comment "Isn't this a Western game? Won't there be clashing iron and bloodletting?" There were quite a few cases of this interpretation so in order to ease those concerns we placed VC2 in a school setting to redirect those notions. (Editor's Note: ouch. Please keep reading though, please. haha)
GAMER: I see! I personally like the grittier edge of military themes, but that's a fresh perspective.
Mikami: Of course, there are many people who share your opinion of enjoying the rougher side of the military. In addition to what Ozawa was talking about before, within Japan there is a lack of familiarity regarding gun culture. In the most extreme examples people would find them very frightening.
Ozawa: "Swinging a sword" is fantasy, but "shooting a gun" evokes a much more raw feeling, doesn't it?
Mikami: That may be true but saying something extreme like "I will never shoot a gun! Fire, consume my enemies!" is at odds with what we want to do. For Azure Revolution we will implement concepts that are easy to accept as part of its world while balancing each and every idea appropriately.
Ozawa: Right now this subject is certainly a big challenge with VAR. When making VC2 we received feedback that we had detached ourselves too much from themes of warfare. During our consideration and implementation of the feedback for VC3’s development I intently studied said themes and applied corrections to both the setting and the story. Azure Revolution was created out of a desire from me and Mikami to apply VC2 and VC3’s past ideas and considerations as a flavor onto a new work.
GAMER: If you look at the game's story synopsis, you can see keywords such as "Sinners", "Revenge", and "Grudges". Is this game aiming to become a dark, serious RPG?
Ozawa: It won't be dark, but it will be serious. The majority of the scenario was devised by myself. Azure Revolution's scenario is composed of the gunfire exchanges over a battlefield, conflict within the citizenship, and the general conflicts and concepts around military money and intelligence gathering. The starting proposal was to sketch out "the many faces and sides of war". Mikami and the staff also bandied about a bunch of additional fun and interesting ideas to include in the story. During the story progression we want to mislead some people into thinking "Is the plot really this simple?" to surprise them.
Mikami: Azure's "many sides of war" will include economics but the game is not an economics simulator. Those elements will all be part of the scenario and expanded thanks to the story because the foundation of the game is an RPG. The fact that warfare by its nature allows us to connect all sorts of story ideas like this together is very interesting to me. Though Azure is an RPG, it won't have "Using the mysterious power of ragnite, the mysterious main characters will defeat the mysterious final boss!" or any such thing.
Ozawa: In this series up until now, ragnite has merely been a common form of energy. As previously explained, by associating ragnite with new magic elements and an industry born from this magic, we've been able to create a separate society and world from the Chronicles series. Players who were unfamiliar with the Chronicles series should be able to jump in without a problem because of the new world we created.
---------------------------
A game that aims to draw out the best elements of RPGs
---------------------------
GAMER: Since the previous games are so different to Azure, what was the reason behind tightening Azure Revolution’s focus around the RPG genre?
Ozawa: As I mentioned previously, merely making a few trifling tweaks to the Chronicles systems would not allow us to exceed our goal for creating a completely new title.
Japanese gamers have a real attachment to the RPG genre, and the premise at the beginning of development was to challenge ourselves to appeal to that particular group of gamers.
Our aim is to combine the strategy elements of Chronicles along with the real-time action style of Azure and the RPG element of symbol encounters to express the series beyond its previous offerings.
GAMER: Please tell us what you consider to be the standard gameplay flow of Valkyria: Azure Revolution.
Ozawa: In the world of VAR you are selecting missions while traveling chosen maps on foot and aiming to clear the objective. While managing your characters from the battle map you hide behind sandbags and walls, lay down gunfire on enemies one by one and use items to crush enemy defenses. While approaching the enemies after lowering their defenses with the above tactics the game shifts into the action mode. The RPG battle system exists as these two parts with its ranged combat from afar and close combat after approaching the enemy.
The action elements become heightened regardless of how an encounter battle is setup beforehand by the player. Even though they are “field enemies”, they are not merely strolling around leisurely and mindlessly. If they notice you they will begin firing their weapons and head to cover behind sandbags while trying to gun you down. Before the encounter the goal is to exploit and aim for the enemy's weaknesses to gain an advantage in the battle. After the encounter is over and the battle begins, the goal is to inflict various status effects and begin the use of swords and magic. The foundation of an RPG lies in this flow of defeating enemies.
In the 1.0 demo of the game we currently don't have anything other than the battle portion playable, but the full version of the title will include the headquarters of the Jutland Kingdom where the gameplay of reviewing strategy, completing objectives and returning to base can flow without impedance. We are contemplating potential scenarios to accompany each mission, such as battles to seize ragnite mines, or strikes to control the routing of goods and materials. When comparing it to a "playstyle"... from the starting position it will feel very similar to entering a dungeon.
GAMER: I've had the privilege of being allowed to play the demo in advance, but the action part of the RPG battles really makes the game more interesting.
Ozawa: Our work VAR is an attempt to grasp the styles of the modern RPG. The traditional method of RPG control has almost entirely passed away and the player now has complete freedom over movement, attacking and evasion. However even within our company there are a few who voice their opinion that we're leaning too heavily towards action which is why we're included a mid-battle targeting system among other things while concurrently taking the opinions of our users with the demo feedback form in tandem with development.
GAMER: You've mentioned it before, but please explain the finer points of the relation between enemy encounters and the game's action style.
Ozawa: When it comes to types of gamers, there's a contingent that find multitasking movement, attacking, more or less everything all at once tough to do. To give examples, RTS games are games where the primary focus is how you multitask movement, attacking, environment control and such in real-time. RPGs divide up movement and combat separately, appealing to users who want to enjoy a more single-task game.
Valkyria Chronicles, in accordance with its central battle concept of “interception fire”, had a few enemies on field which became a multitude of threats when the real-time action began. However, with Azure Revolution’s battle system LeGION we want to fully commit the to the action element with both your friends and your enemies all visible and interactable at once in real-time.
In accordance with the name LeGION, the enemies will be waiting for you in large numbers military-style in rough areas, so if you attack them without a plan you’ll be overwhelmed by their numbers and you will need to defeat the entire enemy in one go.
GAMER: And how will the player defeat these overwhelming enemies?
Ozawa: When it comes to field encounters in RPGs, bumping into the enemy while your allies are in tow means the battle has begun, right? In VAR, a circular battle field will be set once the direct battle begins. We gave this mechanic the name "Severed Battlefield" internally.
The long and short of the combat organization is… if there are 10 enemies within your field of vision, it doesn't mean you'll be taking on 10 enemies in one go. You'll be fighting versus subdivided groups of 3, 3 and 4 inside the battle circle and defeating them within this cut-out battle system.
You'll be thinking up starting tactics like "I will fight the enemies in this direction, off to the right". In order to engage and draw out enemies with gunfire, you’ll check your minimap for the numbers of enemies and their current formation on the battlefield. This process is very important to the game’s tactical nature.
GAMER: It makes more sense now. After all I was quickly encircled and attacked by enemy soldiers in the demo.
Ozawa: If you look at the real-time instance of enemies moving simultaneously to attack, and add in the RPG elements, then the resulting concept of the "Severed Battlefield" can be called VAR's unique property.
However, at the end of the day, Azure Revolution is still an RPG. Battles whose core function can suddenly shift should be a concept that is simple to grasp and players should be able to easily comprehend the core battle tactics. Developing a mutual relationship between action elements and the RPG style that proceeds to cut into the action... that balance was our core aim above all else.
GAMER: Will the action gameplay be drawn out through the enemy encounter system?
Ozawa: I've always thought to myself when playing RPGs when finding enemies that "if they're just walking around doing nothing, that's such a waste!" If there are field enemies, I’d like to be forced to strategize different options to approach them.
As you lure out enemies and seek them out yourself while lowering their defenses with gunfire, you can properly apply your pre-battle preparations to the upcoming fight. In the retail release of the game, you'll be able to replace the sub-weapons for Amleth, Ophelia and Brigitte to expand your strategies more.
Mikami: When we were preliminarily discussing this subject it was my opinion that the enemies should mirror actual army corps in behavior.
When you view the symbols of potential enemy encounters on screen, the case where a single enemy symbol will represent multiple units will not happen. The number and type of enemies are viewable as they are and I would like the player's preparations and battle formations to reflect that.
The moment you see enemies or alerted to them, I want people to feel like... "Damn... that's a lot of 'em!"
Ozawa: The combined result of impressing upon players the large numbers of enemies, yet requiring them to take said enemies down concisely, can be definitively titled “LeGION”. Through using this system, you will understand the types of combat each of the ‘elite’ main characters can provide while feeling the ripple effect of their actions across the entire battlefield.
GAMER: If that's the way it works this won't be the kind of game where you can just bulldoze through enemies as you please.
Ozawa: That's true, and yet not true. VAR is an RPG after all, so if you get your level high enough you can start pulverizing your foes. The feeling of becoming stronger is the best part of playing an RPG.
For the demo, we haven't put forward a serious effort towards the character leveling system yet. However after the demo players test and have fun with the game, we expect to see surprised comments about the RPG system and how they plan to level up to overcome enemies they lost to before, and to take their feedback from within those comments and make subsequent corrections.
We got so caught up about how great LeGION is, I forgot to convey the more fantastic RPG elements in the game. In retrospect I apologize! Of course, for all the players out there who want to win purely using technique, please aim for low-level clears!
GAMER: Incidentally, because you have teammates assisting with this in the demo, can you overcome enemy encounters by purely firing guns?
Ozawa: You can, but even if you increase enemy weaknesses with gunfire, if the damage dealt isn’t favorable in terms of efficiency, won’t the result of such inefficiency speak for itself? So while the success of such a tactic depends on the weapons available or the enemies you are facing, you may find yourself wasting a lot of time. Whether you prioritize safety or time, that is all part of the strategy element.
In the trial version, there is an element that is not quite fully finished, the Conflict Gauge (red/blue gauge at the top of the screen depicting battle morale). With this system at the present time, this gauge reveals the effectiveness of your strategies on the battlefield.
GAMER: …I thought that gauge was telling me my stage rank based on resources remaining.
Ozawa: For the trial version of VAR, such a conclusion is not entirely mistaken. However, in VAR’s final form, the gauge will indicate you achieving superiority in battle by surprising enemies or forcing them to retreat and such. In the event of advancing bravely against enemies despite lack of numbers and other situations, the gauge will show the consequences of such developments. An idea we may implement is a Valkyria appearing on the battlefield and the enemy rallying behind her if the gauge gets pushed too far in one direction.
GAMER: Is it all right to tell us how many characters can be in your party at once, and whether or not you can issue direct orders to your teammates?
Ozawa: While we’re still finalizing this ourselves, we anticipate a maximum of 4 or 5 comrades will be able to join you in missions. The orders you give to your comrades will be AI functions, but we also intend to introduce a customizable action set on a per-character basis designed by the player.
---------------------------
From within the Valkyria Project, a brand-new Valkyria series
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GAMER: The kanji used in "Magic" (咒
is difficult to interpret. Is there a particular reason it was used?Ozawa: We've come up with a few specific reasons but those reasons will have to remain secret for now. Incidentally, the world of Azure Revolution can be described as a “A World without a Wheel”. The world itself has a realistic base with Valkyria, magic and more attached. It won’t get to the level where a dragon suddenly appears though as that would swivel the game into a full fantasy world.
GAMER: Will the main characters ever have to embark on missions to increase their magical strength?
Ozawa: There won’t be anything like that. Jutland was founded as a technological nation with technological attributes. In the beginning of VAR the resources for their kingdom are becoming scarce and the major powers of the world have trapped it in an economic blockade which has caused the ragnite stock to become heavily depleted, meaning that their research on magic has slowed. Well, it’s because of the economic blockade and its consequences that war has commenced in the first place.
GAMER: This is a personal question coming from a big fan of Hiro Kiyohara, but what is the story behind him joining as a character designer?
Ozawa: (Gestures towards Mikami) That designer was recommended by Mikami:.
Mikami: In the beginning of the project, design of everything but the characters, including the elegantly detailed mecha designs, had been drawn up by Takayama (Takayama Toshiaki and Kiyohara Hiro are the two-man team currently designing characters for VAR). However since we needed to spice up the game some more with the character design of enemies and allies it was decided ahead of time to bring in one more character designer. As for me I wanted to bring in an artist with a very strong personal style such as someone who designs the covers of novels, so I sent a request to Kiyohara-san to join our team.
Ozawa: When the staff convened to search for such an illustrator we pored over and tried comparing many pieces of art. Mikami then brought in Kiyohara’s work, and I heard quite a lot of good feedback from our staff regarding him. Due to that I became inspired to learn more about Kiyohara and his work. After that, so many people kept inquiring about Kiyohara’s artwork that we chose Kiyohara despite many who preferred his artwork despite not even knowing his name.
GAMER: On a final note, please leave a message for all the impatient fans of the Valkyria series out there!
Mikami: We at SEGA aim to use the PS4 as a pillar to restart the Valkyria series. Our new title Valkyria: Azure Revolution can be considered as part of the “overall series”, but we’re creating VAR as a new series within the scope of the “Valkyria Project” to increase the breadth of Valkyria as a whole.
Ozawa: It’s been 8 years since we’ve begun this series… I’m deeply moved. This may sound biased coming from one of the creators, but I really do think Valkyria Chronicles is a very fun and interesting game. Thanks to BLiTZ and CANVAS, this game hasn’t aged one bit in the past 8 years. I really am going all out singing its praises now! Everyone reading this, I really hope you have a fun time playing Valkyria Chronicles.
Our new title Azure Revolution shares some of its design with Chronicles, but you’ll be able to have brand new experiences with its gameplay, story, and more. As Mikami said earlier, we have a goal of developing a new series thanks to VAR’s new world. For example, ideas such as “It’s been 10 years, so I wonder what’s happened since then”, “It’s the same time period, but the events are happening in a different country”, “What are the origins of ragnite”, are ones that we think we can have a lot of fun with if we can do them in the future. A long extended history sort of like a large, single picture scroll.
We’re still in the midst of balancing the game components LeGION and GOUACHE and are working fervently to aim for a winter release, so we await everyone’s opinions and feedback from the demo version. I look forward to everyone enjoying Valkyria: Azure Revolution and Valkyria Chronicles Remastered together.
GAMER: Thank you so much for discussing these two titles with such great depth.
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I know the fanbase for Valkyria games is very niche but I had fun translating it just for self-practice so I hope people will enjoy.
