Fire Emblem: Three Houses directors shared stories about adding the sauna and animal interactions with cats & dogs in a recent interview with Famitsu.

Famitsu: The Expansion Pass delivered all kinds of additional content, but was its content decided from the start of development?

Toshiyuki Kusakihara, Director: “We actually planned on including the bathing room activities for the main game. However, we just couldn’t complete it so we ended up excluding it.”

Famitsu: So you’re saying…?

Toshiyuki Kusakihara: “Well, going into a bath as a female protagonist would mean you could only go inside a bathhouse for women, and vice-versa. I think that some people wouldn’t agree with that.”

Famitsu: Certainly.

Toshiyuki Kusakihara: “We also didn’t prepare the unclothed graphics, so there was a problem in presentation, too. That’s how it started. Then I thought ‘If it’s in a sauna that allows clothing, wouldn’t it solve various issues and make it amusing?’ Then from there, we felt that it would be great to do as additional content.”

Genki Yokota, Director: “The idea for the sauna popped up just before the release date.”

Toshiyuki Kusakihara: “Also, for the interactions with cats and dogs, we implemented them after the folks from Nintendo’s overseas office shared their strong wishes and asked us ‘to please put them in’.”

Genki Yokota: “Prior to that, I spoke with Kusakihara-san about ideas on ‘adding some way to interact with animals’.”

Toshiyuki Kusakihara: “That’s right. I gave up on the idea at first but decided to challenge it once again after getting that push.”

Famitsu: When I first played the main game, I do recall telling myself ‘This monastery sure has a lot of animals…’

Genki Yokota: “Didn’t it start out with Kusakihara-san saying ‘First, let’s place cats’ because he likes cats?”

Toshiyuki Kusakihara: “I don’t think I said that…”

Genki Yokota: “No, you did! Then after putting in the cats, I remember the dog-lovers of the staff rallying to say ‘Why aren’t there any dogs!?'”

Toshiyuki Kusakihara: “Is that so? By the way, there are 15 types of cats and three types of dogs.”

Famitsu: Now that’s an overwhelming ratio in favor of cats [laughs].

Fire Emblem: Three Houses is currently available for Nintendo Switch. Check out highlights from the interview in our previous report. You can also check here to see how much Intelligent Systems has grown lately.