What’s up everyone?
Alex here!
Sakura Wars fans, do I have a treat for you!
I was fortunate enough to be given the opportunity
to interview Sakura Wars’ director Tetsuya
Ohtsubo and producer Tetsu Katano via email,
so I gathered some of your questions from
YouTube, Twitter, and reddit and sent it over
for them to answer!
I will warn you that there’s one question
here that can be considered as a spoiler for
the latest game, so I’ll be giving you a
warning both in audio and on screen so you
can mute the sound for that section if you
haven’t finished the game yet!
Reading both these questions and answers myself
would sound kinda silly though.
So I reached out to my good friend eurothug4000
here on YouTube to read these questions for
me!
She makes great introspective videos on some
of my favorite games, such as Animal Crossing
and Death Stranding.
I highly recommend checking out her channel
if you like deep dives into the games we play!
Thanks for helping me out, Maria!
Maria: Thanks Alex!
Glad to be here!
Now let’s get right into the questions!
What was the reason why Sakura Wars was turned
into an action game?
Alex: In light of today’s PS4 gaming scene,
we thought that an action-based game style
would be less of an entry barrier and potentially
more inviting to new users than one centered
around strategy-RPG battles.
Maria: The older games made very light use
of 3D.
What was the biggest challenge to moving to
a fully 3D rendered game?
Alex: One of the biggest challenges we found
with the transition to full 3D was that it
brought many more details to the user's attention.
It was a particular challenge to maintain
that level of quality in the story event scenes,
because now that the characters were 3D models,
we had to make sure we were bringing them
to life with believable performances and facial
expressions.
Maria: What were some of the influences from
the previous games that you wanted to keep
for the newest iteration?
Alex: The Sakura Wars series traditionally
takes its structure from '90s anime TV shows,
so we wanted to preserve iconic elements like
the "next episode" previews, or the bumpers
you see in between commercial breaks.
We also wanted to keep mechanics like the
time-limited dialogue mechanic called LIPS,
a game system that's always been a major part
of the Sakura Wars franchise.
Maria: There’s been an unprecedented amount
of freedom in video games in the West that
allows players to have love interests of different
genders.
Since there are a good number of female Sakura
Wars fans out there, some of them were wondering
if there would ever be an opportunity to introduce
love interests of different genders in the
future?
Alex: Indeed, there's been a lot of discussion
in the industry about greater degrees of freedom.
In the Sakura Wars series, we don't consider
the romantic elements to be the main feature
of the games, but rather a means to express
the characters and the story.
That said, if we found compelling and convincing
reasons to expand the scope in future works,
I think it's certainly possible.
Maria: We’ve been getting a lot of really
good cosmetic DLC for the game, but I’m
curious if there was ever a conversation about
making story DLC?
Alex: For a variety of reasons, this hasn't
come to fruition, but there was a time when
we were considering additional story DLC.
Maria: What have you learned from the reception
of this game that you feel might help the
development and marketing of the next game?
Alex: We knew that the love of our player
base runs deep, but this experience reconfirmed
it.
All of us on the development team pledge to
strengthen our own love for Sakura Wars as
we move forward.
Maria: How did the idea of signing on guest
artists come about?
How did you choose which ones to sign on?
How was Tite Kubo selected as the main artist?
(I hope I pronounced that right by the way!)
Alex: For the old titles, character design
was entirely handled by Kosuke Fujishima,
but in today's Japanese video game scene,
it's becoming more common for a variety of
artists to collaborate on a game, so we planned
to bring in guest artists right from the start
of the project.
As for our artist selection process, we developed
our character groupings and backstories first,
then reached out to artists who matched the
direction of each grouping.
We chose Tite Kubo as our main character designer
because of his work on BLEACH serialized in
Weekly Shonen Jump, which was popular not
just in Japan but around the world.
He's very experienced in character design,
and the concept for the main heroine Sakura
Amamiya—"a swordswoman in traditional Japanese
garb"—fit very well with Kubo's style.
Maria: What was the most fun part about designing
the new characters in this new generation?
What were their inspirations?
Alex: The part I enjoyed the most was when
each of the artists sent in their character
design sketches.
Before we had them start working on the actual
designs, we sent them the detailed character
backgrounds and told each artist what we wanted
them to focus on in terms of personality,
life history, and appearance.
Some artists also came back to us with additional
character design suggestions.
It was a lot of fun figuring out how to incorporate
those suggestions into the official character
backgrounds while still maintaining consistency.
Maria: What inspired Peanut?
Alex: We wanted to create a mascot for the
Imperial Theater.
We came up with his Japanese name "Gekizo"
by combining the word for theater ("geki")
and elephant ("zo"), but after that we left
the design details entirely up to Mr. Sugimori.
He understood the two major motifs right away—"Imperial
Theater" plus "Elephant"—and so the very
first concept he submitted was almost the
exact same as what you see in the final game.
Maria: There’s a lot of long-time fans of
Kosuke Fujishima’s work on the previous
games who wanted me to ask this: Is it possible
to bring him back even if it’s only for
a guest artist role in the future?
Alex: Kosuke Fujimori holds a very special
position in the history of the Sakura Wars
series.
We as the development team feel nothing but
respect for him.
I’m going to break character for a moment
here and mention that Maria’s going to be
asking me the question with spoilers.
If you haven’t finished the game yet, please
mute the audio/turn off subtitles and then unmute/turn on subtitles when the spoiler
label disappears onscreen!
Back to you, Maria!
Maria: How did the decision to send the original
cast to the Shadow Realm come about?
When writing the story, do you get inspired
by events in real life?
Alex: One of the core concepts of the new
Sakura Wars game was that the story would
be centered around Seijuro Kamiyama and the
other new characters.
But even so, we couldn't forget about Ichiro
Ogami and all the other characters from the
past games.
We pondered for a bit on what could have happened
during the 10-year gap in the story between
the last game and the new one, especially
since it would require Kamiyama and the other
new characters to be the ones fighting for
Tokyo.
Eventually, we came up with the idea that
Ogami and the other characters had their own
important battles to fight, leading us to
the present we see in the new game.
Maria: Would you consider a potential sequel
or spin off based on where the anime left
off?
Alex: We can't confirm anything right now
one way or another, but if there is enough
fan demand, anything is possible!
Maria: Some fans would like to know your feelings
about Kohei Tanaka’s importance to the series
as a music composer.
It’s a rare thing for a single composer
to have composed 100% of the music of an entire
series!
Also, bonus question: Are you a One Piece
fan?
Alex: We can't imagine anyone else but Kohei
Tanaka handling the music of Sakura Wars,
which is why we consider him an invaluable
contributor to the series.
He's written a whole new soundtrack for the
new game, too, with loads of irresistible
melodies glowing with Kohei-san's love for
Sakura Wars, so we hope you listen closely
and enjoy.
And as for One Piece, you bet!
We're huge fans.
"WE ARE!"
Maria: Why did the soundtrack feel nostalgic?
Alex: That's the magic of Kohei Tanaka.
The soundtrack has many themes with a nostalgic
quality, and we suggest you listen to the
past titles' music to compare if you're able
to.
Maria: Would you consider spinning off Sakura
Wars into different genres, like perhaps revisiting
the original strategy gameplay or maybe developing
a musou style game?
Alex: Sakura Wars as a series is known for
branching off into various spinoffs, so there
are indeed many possibilities we can contemplate.
Maria: I’ve spoken with hundreds of fans
who have played the new Sakura Wars for the
first time and are just now discovering that
it’s got a long legacy of games that never
made it to the West.
I’m sure I know the answer to this question
already, but they, along with other fans,
would really like to know if we’ll be seeing
the original games localized and, if not,
they want you to know that they’d buy it!
Alex: Speaking personally, I would love for
the past titles to reach as many fans as possible.
Just like how the recent PS4 title was made
possible due to an outpouring of fan support,
with enough demand there could be an option
for presenting the old titles in some form.
We definitely want to hear your thoughts!
Maria: A huge number of fans wanted to ask
this question: What’s the likelihood of
this game or future Sakura Wars games coming
to other platforms?
PC and Switch were on the top of the list!
Alex: We are aware that there is demand, and
the development team is giving it a lot of
thought.
Maria: Do you have anything you’d like to
say to the fans of the game, old and new?
Alex: First of all, we're overjoyed that the
game has reached the West.
We'd like the legend of Sakura Wars to spread
further and further, so it would be an honor
if you could spread the word about what makes
the game special to you!
And that’s the interview!
I hope the developers answered as many of
the questions you all asked as possible!
I want to thank Zack Reese from SEGA for all
his work to turn this interview into a reality,
as well as Tetsuya Ohtsubo and Tetsu Katano
for a glimpse into the series that we all
love so much!
And, of course, I want to thank eurothug4000
for helping me with this interview!
Links to everything we talked about today
are available down in the description of this
video!
Thanks for watching everyone, and see you
online!
