gamingeek said:Who's the actual developer of this game?
I thought Nintendo was co-developing it with Mistwalker.
But most people are thinking it is Cavia.
gamingeek said:I thought it was Feelplus or AQ?
Maybe I'm was just saying that most of the people I saw on Gamespot speculating are saying Cavia because they were working with them on Cry-On for the 360 until that got cancelled. Others are also guessing Artoon (But some say it doesn't really look like Artoon.)
Edit* Well Cavia doesn't exist anymore they were absorbed into AQ.
gamingeek said:Who's the actual developer of this game?
Nintyfan17 said:I thought Nintendo was co-developing it with Mistwalker.
But most people are thinking it is Cavia.
Nope. IT IS Nintendo and Mistwalker.
Ya' know MISTWALKER... Hironobu Sakaguchi... The man who either came up with the concepts for, or was Executive Producer of THESE little-known games!!!
But I do think Nintendo & Mistwalker are developing it together. But which part of Nintendo is helping Mistwalker?
phantom_leo said:Nope. IT IS Nintendo and Mistwalker.
Ya' know MISTWALKER... Hironobu Sakaguchi... The man who either came up with the concepts for, or was Executive Producer of THESE little-known games!!!
Poor guy, maybe this game will get him some attention.
And Mistwalker handles much more than just story and music... they just don't make the actual content and programming, but the concepts, visual style, design, is all theirs afaik... And I don't think it was even hinted anywhere that Nintendo is co-developing on top of funding and publishing, it's still a complete mystery.
Nintyfan17 said:But Mistwalker usually has another developer handle the actual development Mistwalker usually just handles the Story and the Music. Everything else is from the other developer.
But I do think Nintendo & Mistwalker are developing it together. But which part of Nintendo is helping Mistwalker?
Read This. It seems like it's Mistwalker doing the development. Usually Nintendo takes on a Consulting kind of role in projects like this. I don't think I've ever read anyone else being involved other than Nintendo and Mistwalker.
phantom_leo said:Read This. It seems like it's Mistwalker doing the development. Usually Nintendo takes on a Consulting kind of role in projects like this. I don't think I've ever read anyone else being involved other than Nintendo and Mistwalker.
Nintyfan17 said:But Mistwalker usually has another developer handle the actual development Mistwalker usually just handles the Story and the Music. Everything else is from the other developer.
What he said Leo^
Mistwalker is doing the planning and conceptualisation but usually gets someone else to do the donkey work.
Some choice stuff (the website has basically everything from previous scans in direct feed).
Okay, there are some low-res stuff after all, Xenoblade style - they don't look so low-res when the camera isn't super-close to stuff though (why I chose most of these screens) - but as a whole it's more impressive, and works well. It's gonna be better in motion, the lighting seems great, and the jaggies are less noticable like that of course. Overall, I'm excited. I do hope the localisation doesn't take to the bitter end of the year 2011 or something though.
I'll just post a few of the pics you skipped.
Also there are larger versions of the pics Agnates posted here:
Agnates said:Shitty watermarks (lol IGN watermarks on Gamekyo, why didn't they just take them directly from the game's official website? they're all there, and I linked that btw). You should feel bad! They aren't bigger, I resized them with the html to hide the jaggies a bit, if you open the files you see them full. I think they're all badly compressed.
You hate watermarks so much.
Iwata Asks: The Last Story Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi details some of the uneasiness he had with his return to directing.
Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata usually asks his staff about their games just ahead of release. Not for The Last Story, though. The Mistwalker RPG doesn't even have a release date, but Nintendo has already posted the first in a series of Iwata Asks columns for the game.
Fittingly, the person in the hot seat is Mistwalker CEO Hironobu Sakaguchi. As detailed here earlier, the column reveals Sakaguchi to be The Last Story's director. This marks the Final Fantasy creator's first project as director since Final Fantasy V.
Typical for an Iwata Asks columns, this one began with some jokes between Iwata and Sakaguchi. Iwata joked that he was filled with deep emotion about meeting Sakaguchi for the interview. The reason for this is that he gets the feeling that many people throughout the world feel that Sakaguchi is distant from Nintendo. Sakaguchi responded that he gets the same feeling.
While Iwata admits that there was a point in the past where Sakaguchi may have been distant from Nintendo (he managed to say this without mentioning Final Fantasy VII), he currently does not feel this distance in the least bit. He pointed out that Sakaguchi appeared beside him back in 2005 for the announcement of the Nintendo-published and Mistwalker-developed ASH.
Iwata asked Sakaguchi to describe his feeling when starting up work on The Last Story. Sakaguchi explained that after leaving Square in 2003, he took a break. He eventually started up work again, but while working on a number of projects, he felt that he was "riding on the wrong wave" -- that is, he felt that he was riding a wave different from the wave he should be riding. The Last Story project started right as he came to this realization.
Sakaguchi's feeling when starting The Last Story was one of gratitude. He was, first off, glad to be able to make something of such a large scale.
Additionally, The Last Story gave him a chance to take some new challenges. These challenges arose because of the different development formulas he's been taking with the game when compared to his past work. Much of the remainder of this first Iwata Asks column discussed this particular area.
Sakaguchi had some unease during the development of The Last Story. In addition to having to move away from the development formulas he'd gotten used to in his past projects, he felt that his role as director on The Last Story would bring him closer to the project and would thus reveal more of himself as a creator. He had great unease about whether or not gamers would accept him.
Despite the unease, Sakaguchi has also been enjoying himself. The reason for this is that he has the feeling that he's playing around and trying out new things. Iwata actually stepped in to explain this feeling, noting that if you do your work according to a formula, you won't feel uneasy, but at the same time, the work becomes routine, so you won't get excited. However, if you try out a new formula, although you can't help but feel uneasy, you'll also be excited.
Regarding Sakaguchi's return to a more hands-on role as director, Iwata noted that Shigeru Miyamoto will sometimes make a similar switch and will later express enjoyment with the process. Sakaguchi agrees with Miyamoto in this area, saying that sinking his teeth into development gives him the uniquely nice feeling of being able to get rid of unessentials and concentrate on work directly related to the game. Being directly involved in the development process also allows him to see things he normally might not see.
Sakaguchi also feels that another advantage of being directly involved in development is that his excitement may be transferred over to players. He believes that the reason he and his staff at Square were able to make the original Final Fantasy into what it became was because they were all excited as they made the game.
Towards the end of this first interview, Iwata at long last began getting into specifics about The Last Story's development process. The first things that Sakaguchi decided upon for The Last Story's development was its story and world view. The emphasis on story is unchanged from the past 25 years of development work, Sakaguchi said.
Iwata noted that over time, it's become possible to do more and more in terms of story and world view. Sakaguchi agreed that there were limitations in visuals and audio back at the time of the original Famicom. However, because of these restrictions, he was forced to begin the game by thinking how he would tell the story. With all the technological advancements now, he can tell the stories without trouble, but he feels that things may have gone too far -- you end up showing too much.
Because of this, Sakaguchi felt that the time was right to do an about-face, or a "reset." He took a look back at the origins of games and considered what what it means to tell a story in a game. The first thing he did for The Last Story was to think at length about this area.
Sakaguchi's considerations about the origins of games concerned not just The Last Story's story parts, but its gameplay systems as well. He spent a lot of time working on fundamental problems, conducting a large number of gameplay tests during the game's R&D phase. He feels that the solutions he came up with are not extensions of current methods.
Wanting to express the world and story with a new style, he ended up devoting his full strength to the project. This is the origin of the name "The Last Story."
Explained Sakaguchi, "It was the same during the time of Final Fantasy, but I always give my all and develop with the feeling that 'it would be fine if this were the end.' However, this time, that feeling is particularly strong."
Responded Iwata, "It's like you're putting in so much that even if it were your last project, you would have no regrets."
"Yes," said Sakguchi, laughing. "Because if I were to fail, I'd be told to retire."
Sakaguchi Shares More Last Story Details in Latest Iwata Asks
Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata has an unexpected duo of developers seated opposite him for the latest Iwata Asks column.
To the left of Iwata (center) is Metroid co-creator Yoshio Sakamoto. To the right is Final Fantasy father Hironobu Sakaguchi.
Both creators have major Nintendo-published titles in the works. Sakamoto is working on Metroid: Other M, which hits here on September 2. Sakaguchi is directing The Last Story, which is scheduled for release later this year.
The two don't seem to have any actual ties as far as their current work is concerned. But they did in the past. Their connection involves this fine piece of classic Famicom box art:
The above Famicom Disc game is a 1987 adventure game called Miho Nakayama's Tokimeki High School. The game, which features idol Miho Nakayama, was developed by Square and published by Nintendo.
Sakamoto describes Tokimeki High School as a text adventure game in which you make use of the phone. Yes, the real phone. Midway through the game, you're given a phone number which you can actually call to hear hints on how to progress along with messages from the real Miho Nakayama. (In later versions, Nintendo swapped out the telephone component with in-game messages relaying the same info.)
As detailed by Sakamoto, some 20 years back Square approached Nintendo about making an adventure game that made use of the phone. There was no talk at the time about the game featuring Nakayama. Sakamoto was called in to attend the meeting with Square.
At the time, then a five year employee at Nintendo, Sakamoto was growing tired of the same old adventure games, so he pushed his superiors to go with the idea. However, rather than using an original character, he suggested that they use an idol. Iwata jokingly asked if Sakamoto was a big idol fan at the time, but Sakamoto replied that he just figured the added flash would draw attention to the game.
Sakaguchi comes into the picture because he was actually on the Tokimeki High School development team. Not originally, though. Following development on the original Final Fantasy, Sakaguchi joined the Tokimeki High School team towards the end of its development.
The Tokimeki team went down to Kyoto for a two week period, and that's where Sakaguchi and Sakamoto met for the first time. Sakaguchi initially couldn't believe that Sakamoto was a Nintendo employee. Apparently, Sakamoto's hair was the same back then as it is now.
Much of the column consists of Sakaguchi, Sakamoto and Iwata reminiscing about the the old days of development. But Sakaguchi did manage to comment a bit about some of his design decisions for The Last Story.
Gameplay systems took priority in The Last Story's development, said Sakaguchi. He suggested thinking abou the game as "a game that has a story in it." While the game has a solid story with strong cinematic components, gameplay is the strongest point.
This is only the third time that Sakaguchi has placed emphasis on gameplay first. The last time was Final Fantasy VII, whose development began with considerations about how to use 3D in the game. Prior to that, you have to go back to the original Final Fantasy, as Sakaguchi began development with a trial and error phase where he attempted to see how the PC role playing games of the time could be brought to the Famicom.
"In these 23 years, there have been only three instances where I considered gameplay systems first," said Sakaguchi.
To help test out those gameplay systems, Sakaguchi drafted Nintendo's testing subsidiary, Mario Club. In fact, Sakaguchi was visiting Mario Club for a four day period when Iwata conducted this latest Iwata Asks column.
The reason Sakaguchi wanted to use Mario Club was because he wanted to see how beginner players react to the game. Watching players actually play allows him to see where they're enjoying themselves. Of course, they also had the test players write their opinion, although Sakaguchi warns against trusting this form of feedback as players will sometimes write just the good points, or their feedback listing what they enjoyed will differ from how they react when actually playing the game.
Closing off the interview, Sakaguchi provided some hints about how the game's conversation system will work. Previous posts at the game's official blog suggested that there might be a system similar to the Tales series' skit system, where the characters will stop and engage in character-building dialogue bits that may not necessarily be related to the story. With The Last Story, it seems that the characters will actually converse as you run about the fields. Sakaguchi believes this system will allow players to get a better feel for their relationship with their ally characters, which is one area he wanted to convey with the game's story.
This is the second Iwata Asks column for The Last Story. For a summary of the first, see this story.
Jackal & Manamia artwork
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZxXkRh9xb0#t=1m58s
7 seconds of new footage from the Nintendo Wii Software Lineup Video