The
1980s and 1990s was the “adolescence” of the game industry. Wanting to
find out more about the passionate, young, overeaching past of the game
designers that struggled during that time, this report manga was created. The first guest is Hironobu Sakaguchi, the creator of “Final Fantasy”!
Created by: Carius Date Released: Nov 2005 / Early 2007 (Demo Remake) Engine: RM2003
The
author Carius was usually known around the GamingWorld community as a
keen event programmer. Usually making tech demos for contests and
tutorials on how to tackle RM2K3’s many limitations. Despite this
reputation he did manage to crank out a more conventional JRPG called
Wings of Origin. Starting out as a DBS contest entry, it’s essentially a
visual novel with no player exploration with a few battles here and
there.
Angel-like people known as “Airfolk” rule the skies. However, the
protagonist Takeo is banished from flying ever again. An emotive and
vengeful story combined with the use of Brave Fencer Musashi tracks made
this small demo stick with me. It’s a ride full of twists and turns all
in 18 minutes. What I like most about the writing is that we’re never
quite sure of Takeo’s exact motivations for wanting to abandon his
grounded life for revenge. The plot presumably sets up Takeo’s son as
the actual protagonist. There’s a mysterious figure that appears at the
beginning and my hunch is that it might be Takeo’s son from the future.
This game will never be completed so we’ll never know! But it says a lot
about how much this game accomplishes in such a short time.
There’s actually 3 versions of the game. The DBS contest entry, the
2005 story demo, and the 2007 remake of said demo. The 2005 one is the
one I remember, even now I still prefer it though. The music choices are
just better in my opinion. The art/mapping might be slightly improved
in the 2007 one, but it’s still a general mishmash of Star Ocean / Tales
of Phantasia / Rudra. There is interesting DBS experimentation in it
but I really just like this demo for the story and the abundant night
sky atmosphere.
"Every RPG enthusiast can recall what game they were playing when they were struck by the fandom's universal epiphany: The realization that RPGs can treat us to rich stories and deep character rosters that rival classic fantasy novels. We don't say it often enough, but the people who translated those games and added flavor to their characters, stories, and worlds deserve some credit for these discoveries. It's fine to journey for 60 hours with wooden heroes; it's better to come come away from the adventure bright-eyed and stuffed full of one-liners like, "Don't tease the octopus, kids!" and, "You sound like a chapter from a self-help booklet."
The 16-bit era was a renaissance for console RPGs, especially for Westerners. Though RPGs wouldn't reach anything close to mainstream popularity until Final Fantasy 7 hit the PlayStation in 1997, the candy-colored sprites in Secret of Mana and the solemn, realistic backdrops of Final Fantasy 6—released in the West as Final Fantasy 3— turned some heads and won some hearts. In time, these newly-baptized RPG fans and the veterans who fell in love with the genre through Dragon Warrior came to the same observation: Many of the RPGs produced by Square Enix (then Squaresoft) boasted next-level translations in an era where video game localizations were still infamous for being shoddy.
Squaresoft's RPGs weren't just clear and competent. They built up the worlds they belonged to, gave life and character to hero and monster alike. In particular, the localization for Final Fantasy 6 is so ingrained in fans' minds that certain character quirks and bits of dialogue have carried over into modern Final Fantasy games. Professional authors even cite Final Fantasy 6 as a major inspiration for their works.
It's remarkable to realize Square Enix's ability to deliver such a powerful story about death, devastation, and the end of the world while under the watchful eye of Nintendo of America's content censors. That's why the man behind the translations, Ted Woolsey, is still celebrated for his work."
"We all have our petty personal crusades to fight. Mine is the endless battle in defence of RPG Maker, accused by many of being a bad engine only used by lazy developers. RPG Maker games tend to look the same, so this means that only untalented developers use it, right? I decided to prove people wrong. With science. That's why I took a deep dive in the Steam RPG Maker tag, gathering data about all 559 tagged games released to this day. Behold the results of my foolish research." Via EUROGAMER
(If you like Resident Evil,Shadow of The Colossus or Boris Karloff's Frankenstein, definitely check this out! Very pleased with how this is shaping out - spread the word!)
It was 1987. On the train back to Kyoto, Shigesato Itoi was weeping. "It wasn't because I felt sad It was because I felt powerless. Granted, I felt that way several more times later on in life. But I never felt quite as depressed as I did then… It was two years before 'MOTHER" (Earthbound Beginnings) was born.'
Via Denfaminicogamer