Entrevista do Kondo para o site Noisy Pixel
https://noisypixel.net/nihon-falcom-president-toshihiro-kondo-interview/
Algumas aqui, o resto no link:
BC: I’m sure that with every title in the series, you want to introduce as much as possible, and if you can, try to bring back what fans are familiar with.
TK: That’s precisely what it is. We want players to have new experiences, such as meeting new characters, but also enjoy familiar experiences, like bringing back previous characters, as well. So, in the end, when it comes time to finally decide what to include in the next installment, there are a lot of tears when deciding what to cut.
Going back to the point of limitations, some times, not even when we want to, we’re basically forced to cut out certain aspects. For instance, for
Cold Steel III and
IV, characters from across all the past titles, make a comeback, like characters from
Trails in the Sky, and overall, the number of characters that are included are between 80 to 90 characters. Even though we want to showcase all these characters, and make sure each character gets screentime, there’s surprisingly limitations on how many character models can be shown at one point, so that made us have to re-write certain scenes. This limitation is why for many scenes, the camera will actually just focus on one character at a time, rather than multiple.
BC: Do you have a conclusion in mind or has the ending changed over the years that the series has been in development?
TL: Oh, absolutely! Tons and tons of things have changed. One of the biggest changes, in particular, was that the main character for the
Cold Steel series, Rean, was originally intended to be a soldier in the military, like an officer. But, we realized as we were planning for that, is that since soldiers live such regimented lives, that wouldn’t exactly be suitable for the main character in a JRPG, for the types of things that JRPG characters should be able to do. Also, given what was popular back then, which were how JRPGs focused on having relationship-building elements, that also influenced us to change Rean to go from a soldier to a student, more specifically, a student in a military school.
BC: I can definitely see that. Did the Ys series, or maybe other JRPGs, influence the change for Cold Steel IIIto have speedier combat?
TK: For the more fast-paced action in
Cold Steel III, the
Ys series wasn’t exactly an influence. However, we decided to change the speed for a couple of reasons. One reason was that we still wanted to improve the speed of combat, but we also wanted to make sure we didn’t alienate any fans that liked the more traditional turn-based combat system, so we made sure to keep that in-tact but to just turn it up a little. Another reason we changed combat was that one of the recent games we looked at was
Persona 5, which did a good job of making turn-based combat a little more lively. These two reasons basically led us to make the combat system in
Cold Steel III the best it could be.
BC: This wouldn’t be a western Falcom interview unless we asked if there are plans to localize Zero no Kiseki and Ao no Kiseki in the west, at this point, I’m sure a PC port will suffice?
TK: So, that’s something that I have heard for years now and the truth is that this time the only way to play those games is on outdated hardware. As creators, we want as many people as possible to play these games, and also to give Japanese players a chance to replay them.
Although there isn’t anything to officially announce there, we are working internally to figure out how to get these games on newer consoles and once we do, I’m confident that NISA will translate them for you and release them in the west.
BC: Would you consider this to be the best time for new players to jump into the Trails of Cold Steel series?
TK: We’ve had this discussion internally recently, which brought up questions that gamers ask such as, “I’ve been hearing about this series for so long, but can I start here?” Well, because this series is story-focused, we had to think carefully about how to do that. So, to alleviate that, we have included a detailed story summary within the game. This doesn’t only tell the story of
Trails of Cold Steel either, we are talking about characters from all over
The Legend of Heroes series. Even players who are familiar with the series could enjoy this because it catches them up on characters that they might have forgotten about.
BC: Is there anything you’d like to say to new and old fans of Falcom?
TK: To the existing fans, thank you so much for waiting and sorry to have kept you waiting, but I can guarantee this is a title that will live up to your expectations and it all leads up to a big climax, so please look forward to that. For the new fans out there, even though this is an ongoing story, with a little bit of reading you’ll be ready to go, if this is something that you enjoy, I think you will find more enjoyment in playing the previous games as well. This is a series with a 15-year history, and I am confident with it. Not all the fans today have played every entry in the series, yet they have found enjoyment in it, which I hope you will too.
BC: Last but not least, who is your favorite character in the Trails of Cold Steel series?
TK: I’ve been asked this before and my answer seems to change from time to time. Generally, I would choose Jusis Albarea, but now I’m going to have to say Rean Schwarzer particularly because the story has reached its conclusion in Japan. Looking back at the entire game and seeing Rean’s growth, through all of his wins and losses, I can look at it all and say, “Good Job, Rean”.