This is a quick translation of the interview recently conducted with Falcom’s president, which can be found here. As I can’t read Chinese, I can’t vouch for all the nuances that might have been lost in the translation first into Chinese and then into English via machine translation, but I feel confident I’ve gotten all the key points correct. This was a really good interview and the questions make it clear that the interviewer is quite familiar with Falcom and their games. As this interview is primarily about Hajimari no Kiseki it contains inherent spoilers for Cold Steel 4. My commentary will be in italics.
– Kevin apparently doesn’t have a part in the game but Kondo says that the Septian Church will play an increasingly major role as the series progresses, including Kevin.
He seems to have been echoing something from floofy’s interview where he linked the Church and Ouroboros as two groups deeply connected with the nature of Zemuria and that we won’t fully understand any of them individually until we’ve seen the work as a whole. Kevin may not be playing a direct role here but his Merkabah is clearly visible so I doubt he’s quite as absent from the game as Kondo seems to be implying.
– Kondo confirms that Falcom is managing the 50+ characters by dividing them among the routes so we don’t get overwhelmed with them.
– When asked which route he likes the best, Kondo said that he thought players should pay the most attention to C’s, and that there’s a gap between the appearances of the characters in The Miserable Sinners and their real personalities. He also joked that of course everyone wants to know who C is…
– Kondo notes that gameplay balance has been an issue and the characters themselves are canonically strong and will be presented as such from the start, but weaker characters can be made competitive with the various means at the player’s disposal.
– Hajimari will not take us to any new parts of Zemuria but new characters introduced in the Episodes will tie into locations being set up for future games.
– Asked if the game will be more like The 3rd in its focus on existing characters rather than opening up a new story, Kondo replies that Hajimari has a driving plot and that’s the liberation of Crossbell and everything that goes into it, with The 3rd-like elements being restricted to the True Reverie Corridor which is secondary to the main plot.
– The interviewer asked if there would be anything like Sun Door 3 which was a favorite among Chinese fans. Kondo said that yes, and beating the fights will require you to set characters’ Orbments up for the particular battles. Apparently the context of the Episode is an informal competition that Olivier held, and all sorts of people attended… like Cassius. He said that we’ll be interested to see who teams up with who.
Estelle also gets mentioned as attending, so one assumes the rest of the Bright family is along for the ride.
– Kondo does not directly answer the question of whether there will be a point when all three plots intersect but repeats that there’s a central event driving the story and the groups will sometimes work with each other and sometimes be opposed at different points in the narrative.
– Asked who C is and what his goal is since he’s seen both fighting against Rean’s group and fighting against Rufus, Kondo replies that he wants everyone to see it for themselves in the game. Describing him in one sentence, he says that C is not affiliated with any organization. He has his own objective and gathers companions for the purpose of carrying it out. All he’ll say about C’s mission is that it’s closely related to his identity.
– In response to a question Kondo notes that the cast of Akatsuki is popular and while they aren’t appearing in Hajimari, he hasn’t ruled out introducing some version of them into the main chronology in the future.
This is interesting, as Akatsuki has been officially declared a parallel world, it seems Falcom is open to making some version of the protagonists canonical (as some version of Lif seemingly is).
– Asked about the meaning of the title, Kondo said that on the surface it’s because the game represents a new beginning as the series is going to be progressing to a new stage soon.
Kondo mentions a secondary meaning that I’m not quite sure how to interpret through the layers of translation. The impression I get is that the word has some meaning within Ouroboros and the trail they’re trying to point Zemuria towards.
– Asked if there will be a ‘retrospective’ feature to help players keep track of the game’s story Kondo said that the narrative flow is designed to assist players in understanding what’s going on and that it won’t be possible to play any of the Routes straight through to the end, instead you’ll have to stop at certain points and progress the other ones. Also, revisiting cleared content will not be possible because ‘it would cause too many variables’.
Kondo says something that I’m guessing is more nuance the software can’t process, about why the narrative flow is structured the way he describes. Something to do with meeting certain characters.
– Future games will use the new engine. Kondo mentioned that a remake of the Sky games using the new engine is a possibility.
Even if it came down to us through a Chinese translation I can just hear his specific wording of that answer, it’s very Kondo.
– The new engine for future games has been in development for about two years and was planned for the PS4, but he hopes that games developed for it will be playable on the PS5, as Hajimari is planned to be with a later update.
– There will still be plot-based mecha battles but not so many as CS4 due to the Divine Knights being no more. There is also the minigame in the True Reverie Corridor where we have seen Rean piloting his new machine.
– It appears that there are no plans to reintroduce the exact same Orbment system from Sky/Crossbell (by implication, Kondo mentions that it would return if the older games were remade) but the next game will use a new system that will ‘use Sky, Zero and Ao as its base’. He acknowledges that a lot of players like the older system.
My take is that while the next arc’s Orbment system (presumably the RAMDA) won’t be quite the same as the Sky/Crossbell system but it sounds like it’ll be closer to it mechanically than the ARCUS.
– Adding a photography mode is something Kondo would be interested in and he likes the idea of it but nobody has proposed adding it to Kiseki yet. However, there has been an internal proposal to add it to Ys. He expects there will be demand for it in the future.
– Asked how he’d rate the project out of 100 given that it’s being developed by newer employees, Kondo rated it a 75 but added that even projects done entirely by the core staff would be around a 70-75 because in any project the team members grow over the course of development and when they look back afterwards they can always find room for improvement. In other words, he thinks the game’s on par with ones developed by the core staff, who in this case are providing advice and supervision but not doing the actual development work. He adds that rating the game a 75 doesn’t mean he thinks that’s what he’d score the game, just how he’d rate the development.
– Asked about plans for a Tokyo Xanadu sequel, Kondo said that they’ve been busy with their two big IPs recently but they really need to make a sequel if they have the time, and with the company slowly growing there’s more pressure to develop new IPs.
– Asked about derivative works like Nayuta and Alternative Saga and if there are plans for more, Kondo said not at this time because they’re in the process of developing the new engine and it’s not a good time for it, but he knows there’s player demand and if it continues then it’s something Falcom will consider once they’re comfortable with the new engine.
– Asked about Zwei and if there’s any interest in going back to that franchise, Kondo said there are no plans at this time but he didn’t discount that it might happen in the future if there’s significant demand.
– Most of the staff isn’t thinking about the 40th anniversary of the company next year but the executives are making plans. These are still under discussion due to the impact of the epidemic.
– The interviewer asked if Falcom has plans to expand to the Switch, since things like PC and handheld ports are a good way to expand the fanbase. Kondo said that it would be difficult with their resources and so they’re more inclined to work with third parties who can handle the porting process. A followup question about plans for PC/Switch ports of Hajimari was answered in the negative.
– Asked about the increasing complexity of the series and what plans Falcom has to help new players without overwhelming them, Kondo answered that over the series’ history the fanbase has been largely divided into groups based on when they each got into the series, and he expects this to continue going forward so each new arc will be written with the assumption it will gather a new fanbase and the game will be designed for all players.
– Asked what Falcom has done to overcome the hurdles and release Hajimari simultaneously in Japanese and Chinese, Kondo apologizes and says that Falcom spent a lot of time polishing the script and other elements up until the last minute before sending it on, so most of the credit should be given to Clouded Leopard Entertainment. He added afterwards that he’s been surprised how well-received Falcom’s games are around the world, having expected that JRPGs would be a harder sell in non-Japanese markets.
Clouded Leopard’s president Chen Yunyun interjects that Kondo was being too humble and Falcom shared relevant material earlier for Hajimari than with previous titles and quickly responded whenever CLE raised things they needed.
– In an earlier interview with A9VN Kondo had mentioned that Falcom was getting ready for PS5 development and hoped to release screens showing the new engine within a year. Asked if Falcom had any information to share on the game to follow Hajimari and/or the new engine, Kondo said that there is a scene in Hajimari made using the new engine. He invited players to find it.
– The last question was about the progress of the series as a whole and Kondo reiterated that the series hit the 60% mark with the end of CS4 and Hajimari is the first game that moves things towards the conclusion.