This is the final part of a three-part interview series with Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero Scenario Writer Kento Jobana. For previous parts, see here: Vol. 1 and Vol. 2.
How to Create an Appealing Game
ーFor Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero, did you pay any special attention to the unity of the gameplay (combat) and the story?
If the gameplay and story aren’t unified, it would feel very wrong, so I paid special attention to this aspect.
Specifically, I thought about the length of the story sequences. In Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero, there are story sequences both before and after battles, and those sequences cannot exceed a certain amount of time. If the story parts are too long, the player will feel like they want things to hurry up so they can play, rather than read the story.
Another thing I paid attention to was connecting the story segments with the battle segments. For example, if the characters are having a friendly conversation and then there’s suddenly a battle, it would be so incongruous that the player would wonder why there’s a battle happening. It was really important in Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero to clearly give a reason as to why you are fighting in the story segment before going into battle.
ーIn this game, each island has its own episode while still being part of a larger, overarching story. Was it difficult to fit these two aspects together?
Personally, I enjoy writing short stories, so I didn't have any trouble with writing the episodes for the individual islands. I’m also the kind of person who lays out detailed documents for my scenarios, so I was able to piece things together while thinking about things like foreshadowing in the islands. Honestly, I quite enjoyed it!
ーThat’s very strategic of you. (laughs) Especially since you said earlier that you aren't good at strategy games! (laughs)
When writing game stories, I can always manage to recover if I make a mistake. (laughs) If I mess up in a battle, one of my allies dies! Writing game scenarios doesn’t require as much strategy. (laughs)
Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero Limited Edition
ーWithout spoiling anything, is there one episode in the game you think is really good, or one you particularly like?
When I write character dialogue, I deliberately write details that are strange and then make it so that the strangeness becomes evident later on.
In this game in particular, there is a character who seems like they're going to be a bad guy, but I've written their lines so that the player can get a whiff of their values before the truth comes out later. I’d like for players to be on the lookout for that.
Since the first game in the series, Phantom Brave does a good job of depicting the sordid parts of the human heart. Beyond that, the message of the series is that there’s not only the sordid, but also the beautiful, and no one is truly evil to their core. I made sure to keep this in mind and depict it with care in the story.
ーIn other words, the message is that humanity is fundamentally good?
Yes. I can’t say the idea that humanity is fundamentally good is absolutely correct, but human beings have the capacity for both good and evil, and I think showing both is necessary to portray appealing human characters. I’d like to continue to focus on that aspect in order to depict people more an appealing way.
A desire to continue to pursue “fun” with players
ーIn the future, I’m sure Nippon Ichi Software, Inc. will continue to try its hand at various genres, but do you have a vision for how to evolve the strategy RPG genre going forward?
With the experience of being the Scenario Writer for Disgaea 7: Vows of the Virtueless and Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero, I’d like to delve deeper into the animations that can be used in the story sequences.
For example, there are many 2D and 3D animations used together in Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero. However, since the 3D combat models for the characters are in the “chibi” style, there were many things that couldn’t be expressed through animation since the models were so small.
ーWhat specifically makes it difficult to express things if the character models are small?
First, it's difficult to have small characters make big movements. Also, if, for example, there’s a serious scene, small characters tend to look cute, so it can be difficult to get the gravity of the situation across.
一On the other hand, for realistically-proportioned 3D characters, it can be strange when you have a group of characters together but only one is talking and the others are standing there staring blankly.
ーThere are definitely advantages and disadvantages to everything.
I also don't think that simply having realistic animation is the right move for a game’s story. Having characters constantly move around beautifully like in an anime is difficult from a budget standpoint, as well. Particularly for strategy RPGs, as I mentioned earlier, you have to show the story in small chunks.
I think that in the future, it will be necessary to deeply consider whether using realistic 3D or 2D is better for the game’s story, or a strategy RPG’s story.
ーWhat kind of fun do you want to convey to players of strategy RPGs?
The quality of games is getting better and better.
Although we live in an era where people want complex control schemes as well as complex and beautiful animations, I personally don't think that complexity and graphical beauty are what make a game fun. I think it’s more about the game’s systems and how the game itself uses its graphics in an appealing way that make it fun.
In Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero, we used chibi characters and put them in a combat system with a high degree of freedom. I think this is indicative of the fun I’m trying to convey. But of course, I don’t think that Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero is the only or best way.
Rather, I think that there are many new ways of expressing things, more fitting modes of expression, and more interesting game systems yet to be discovered in game development.
I very much want to get players' opinions and thoughts so that we creators can work together with players to evolve the game industry to the next dimension.
The Phantom Brave: The Lost Hero Limited Edition is available in the NIS America Online Store. Please check it out here!
