<
Recently, Cubed3’s Adam Riley was asked to go hands-on with Tecmo’s first ever Nintendo DS adventure game, ‘Kyotaro Nishimura Suspense Series: Deadly Intent’, to see just how accessible it would be for the Western market. The response from readers was definitely positive and sales in Japan have been extremely strong so far. In an attempt to show just how interested Western gamers are in Masahiro Shidara-san’s creation, an interview about the game was conducted recently (prior to the recent Tecmo show, in which its sequel was unveiled). Read on for an closer look at Shidara-san’s title, views on gaming in Japan in general, the chances of expanding onto Wii and much more…
Cubed3’s Adam Riley: First of all, where did the idea come from to make a game with Kyotaro Nishimura-san? And why did you think it would be more suited to the Nintendo DS rather than other formats?
Masahiro Shidara-san: In Japan, many people in the middle-age bracket have become game users, thanks to “Brain Training” on DS. However, I realised that there is no product for them that this audience can enjoy as a ‘pure game’, although there are lots of practical types of game like “Brain Training”. Therefore, I began to think about developing an entry-level game for this generation. It was quite natural that we came to an idea of combining the “adventure game system” that a light user can enjoy and the theme of a “Suspense Drama on TV” that has been supported by the middle aged people, especially in Japan. Finally, we wanted to have support to strengthen our game concept by working with Mr. Kyotaro Nishimura, a famous writer well known for his novels and being an author of TV drama programmes. This has resulted in greatly improving the appeal of this product.
The Game Business Department I belong to was established for the purpose of capturing the newly formed groups of game users (such as middle-aged and female) that have been attracted by by the DS and Wii, whilst maintaining our company’s strategy. That’s why our product planning has started based on the concept of doing something new with the Nintendo DS since the system has primarily encouraged the growth of ‘new game users’.
AR: How closely did the Tecmo team and Nishimura-san work on this project? And were there any particular problems during development?
MS: In this project, Mr. Nishimura provided us with the basic plot of the story, such as locations and characters (including names/occupations). He also created a theme of a hero attempting to find out the truth behind his father’s death. We, TECMO, focused on making these elements acceptable for middle-aged people in the most ideal way. We thought of “users who play a game for the first time” and took a ‘scrap-and-re-build’ approach, going through this process again and again, using trial and error all the way through development. Obviously you can imagine it was really hard work for us! We even had a lot of arguments break out amongst the team! *Laughs*
AR: Public data from Famitsu has the game selling over 130,000 copies, which many believe is a great success for such a niche title. But has the game’s sales actually met or exceeded your company’s expectations so far?
MS: Sales of the game have already exceeded 200,000 units and are still going strong. We expected this figure would be achievable because we were able to complete the game development almost perfectly based upon our original concept. However, the goal I set up for myself was to achieve 300,000 units life-to-date. So, I hope the game will continue to sell well over time. Fortunately, I have heard that the weekly sell-through during January and February has remained healthy.
AR: Could you please briefly explain to our readers about the storyline of the game? Is it based on one of Nishimura-san’s novels or is it a completely original piece of work?
MS: The story is completely original. Mr. Nishimura is famous for his “police story” style. The point of this game is that player can enjoy Mr. Nishimura’s “detective story” instead of “police story”, though. The outline of the story is as follows: The main character, Isshin Arata, had a father who was a great detective. After his death, Isshin went abroad in order to escape from that sad reality. He spent three years abroad and finally made a decision to become a detective, taking over his father’s will. This game starts off when he comes back to Japan.
As a novice detective, Isshin visits Kyoto looking for a woman who used to once be an assistant to his father. However, Isshin happens to get involved in a murder of the landlady of the Hotel where he stays. He and his assistant, Asuka Kyo, try to solve this mystery together. This is the introduction part of Chapter One. The game consists of three chapters. The final goal is to find out the truth of Isshin’s father’s death.
AR: How does it make use of the DS system’s various features, like the touch-screen or stylus? And what makes your game better than other DS adventure/mystery games?
MS: This game has two different modes: “The Long Piece (Story Mode)” and “The Short Piece”. We adopted a new interface for the Story Mode whereby players touch “Cut Panels” shown at the top of the touch screen when player investigate the details of each case. The short piece of the game consists of fifty smaller mysteries. They can be solved in approximately ten different ways that are unique to DS, such as pointing out the inconsistent part in the testimonies, tracing the route of a criminal’s movements and encircling the questionable part in an evidence photo with the stylus.
This game has two points that make it superior to other adventure games. One is that the game has two different modes, the “Long Piece” and “Short Piece”. This unique feature provides two different ways to play; the former allows the player to enjoy playing the game thoroughly, whilst the latter allows them to enjoy the game within a limited time (the games can be completed in about ten minutes in this mode). The other point is that everyone can complete this game. Even a novice player can enjoy playing the game at ease and reach its ending since this game is designed to be so user-friendly.
If I say everyone can complete the game, some people may say “Is it fun at all to play such an easy game?” However, we could easily elaborate on the story alone, eliminating the irrational flow of the game and the “Game Over” parts completely, and we could still gain a very high level of customer satisfaction with the results.
AR: What are you most proud of about the project? And is there anything you were unable to put into the final game (due to time constraints or other reasons)?
MS: Although we see a commercial phrase like “The game that everybody can enjoy” quite often, I’m confident that we could make such a game with this title. In fact, there were many elements we had to give up on due to various reasons. But, we’ll keep them in our minds for our assignments in the future.
AR: There are many Western gamers that enjoyed games such as Hotel Dusk, Another Code and the Gyakuten Saiban series. Are there any similar aspects between those games and this one?
MS: Since this game belongs to a genre called “Text-based adventure game”, the structure (incident – investigation – resolution) should be more or less similar to others in the same category. Somebody has to die in order to make a game come into existence. That’s what I’m feeling very uneasy about *laughs*
AR: There are many people interested in seeing this game released in the West. Considering how popular traditional text-based adventure games have been on the DS over here in general, will you be considering translating the game to take full advantage of the wide demographic of the system?
MS: This game is designed based on the fact that it is specifically observed in Japan that 30% of DS users are middle-aged people. Considering that fact, the story of our game is based on traditional Japanese culture. I think it’s quite difficult to release this game in Western markets because the game is designed for people who are familiar with Japanese culture and people who don’t have any knowledge of Japanese culture can’t enjoy at all.
For example, the incident in Chapter One takes place in a “Tea Ceremony Room”. Are you guys (‘the reader’) interested in this kind of thing? I’d appreciate if you give me your feedback. But, it’s good to know there are many people interested in the game like ours. I hope I’ll be able to develop a game that can be enjoyed by people all over the world someday.
AR: Being a ‘Suspense Series’ implies that this is merely ‘Chapter One’. Would it be correct to assume there will be more Kyotaro Nishimura games coming to DS?
MS: Yes. The title is representing my will and I’m hoping to expand the series as much as possible. It might be the time to consider the next title for the series since the sell-through has been pretty good so far. But I’m afraid somebody has to die in the story again! *Laughs* (Since this interview was conducted, Tecmo has indeed revealed a sequel, featuring a different author this time, ‘Misa Yamamura’ instead of ‘Kyotaro Nishimura’)
AR: Text-based adventure games are starting to come to Wii on a more regular basis due to the control system being similar to that of a PC. Therefore, considering this new trend from developers, has any consideration gone into Tecmo expanding the suspense world by creating a similar game on Wii or even WiiWare?
MS: We need to establish the base of the series on DS first. As we are receiving the request for the sequel from many people who played our first game, it will be very important for us to create a game that satisfies people’s expectations. We haven’t thought about how we will develop the series in the next step just yet. But we’ve been trying to pay attention to the movement of the market since there always are a lot of options. Not to mention I’m really hoping to “expand the suspense category” as much as possible with our titles!
AR: What are your thoughts on the approach taken by Level 5 with ‘Layton Kyojou no Fushigi na Machi’ and ‘Layton Kyoujo to Akuma no Hako’, mixing the detective/adventure theme with logic puzzles?
MS: The theme, the content and the system of those two games (Curious Village and Pandora’s Box) are both really impressive. Especially since many female users are supporting those games. It is because female users have been a core user of puzzle games for a long time and therefore, it seems to me the success of those games is a quite natural consequence.
AR: And what are your views on the current state of the Japanese market following the success of the Nintendo DS and Wii?
MS: I believe that the history of the home-use console market in Japan is the most advanced one. We have reached a certain limit for games on the PS2 in terms of the complexity and the volume of games, so the market had to be reset. (I think people in the Industry will face a similar situation in Western markets sooner or later)
It was Nintendo who could give the right solution to such stagnation in the market and the success of Wii and DS has proven that the result of their solution has indeed worked splendidly. We, as developers, were inspired and encouraged again by the new hardware. I’m sure more and more fun games will now continue to be developed in Japan. Keep an eye out for the games coming from Japan!
