Famitsu interviewed the Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio head Nagoshi Toshihiro and chief producer Yokoyama Masayoshi at Tokyo Game Show. This interview was published on September 14, but I missed it in the flurry of new stuff everywhere, and only found it today. Enjoy!

Source: Famitsu Online

—— First of all, what kind of feedback have you been getting from people playing the demo version or watching the videos?

Nagoshi: It seems a bit different from the initial announcement, when there was a lot of scepticism. Now it seems a bit more accepting, like, “It is what it is.” So I think that’s a good response.

—— So the wind’s shifted then.

Nagoshi: Of course we expected people to have doubts in the beginning. It’s inevitable when you have so many people who’ve loved the Ryu ga Gotoku series for such a long time. And of course a lot of them are fans because they love the action battle system, and we’ve changed that this time. So it’s inevitable they’d start crying out, asking, “Why?” But I want them to know that we understand why they feel like that, and ask them to accept that we’re going to continue on this new path.

—— I think showing the gameplay, and the other announcements you made, will help with that.

Nagoshi: I hope if we can give people the chance to try it out for themselves after this, that will speed that process up a little bit too.

Yokoyama: I think it’s easy to understand the changes in Ryu 7, including the battle system, by watching the videos we released here. And if you can experience it for yourself, that’s even more persuasive, I think. So unlike our usual presentations, which tend to focus on story, this time at TGS we’ve been actively focusing on the gameplay.

—— Yes, while the Ryu ga Gotoku series hasn’t tended to keep things under wraps too much, this time we’re seeing gameplay all over the place.

Yokoyama: Yes. It’s noticeable that the more videos people get to see, the more positive opinions we hear. And I think more than anything the new gameplay trailer proves that it’s “the same Ryu ga Gotoku as always”. Lots of things to do, silly things to do in a serious way, and so we’re getting more feedback saying things like, “This is what we expect from Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio!”

—— I definitely want to ask you about the two trailers you revealed at the start of your first presentation. First of all, the so-called “Ijin Three” controlling Isezaki Ijincho were revealed in the story trailer. Can you give us a bit more detailed information about them?

[Note: The “ijin” part of Ijincho – 異人 – means foreigner, and these three organisations are called the 異人三 – so you could also translate it as “the three foreigners”. But that sounds a bit rude … so I’ll stick with the “The Ijin Three”. They’ll probably be called something completely different in the English version anyway.]

Yokoyama: After Kasuga Ichiban is shot by Arakawa Masumi, he wakes up in the Isezaki Ijincho area. And these three underworld organisations are in control of the town. They are known as “The Ijin Three”. As the story develops, as Ichiban rises up in the world from his homeless beginnings, he comes into direct contact with “The Ijin Three” due to various incidents.

—— I see.

Yokoyama: The Isezaki Ijincho underworld has been controlled by the yakuza organisation Seiryu Kai for a long time. Seiryu Kai gets protection money from lots of the businesses in Ijincho, everyone in Ijincho knows them. And the other two organisations each have areas in the town where their influence is concentrated. The area near Chinatown is dominated by the “Yokohama Refugees”, who are a group of Chinatown outcasts. And then right in the centre of Ijincho, there’s a windowless concrete building, like a fort, where the Korean mafia organisation known as the “Komijul” hang out. They’re all in conflict with each other, but they keep each other in check, so the Yokohama underworld remains in balance.

—— So Kasuga’s ended up in a pretty dangerous place.

Yokoyama: He has. And when he ends up coming into contact with them, that disturbs the balance a bit, and he gets involved in a crazy incident … basically, that’s how it goes.

—— But these three organisations only hold power in Yokohama, and looking at Japan overall, the biggest power is still Omi Rengo, is that right?

Yokoyama: It is. The Ijincho area of Yokohama even now is thought of as somewhere that’s too dangerous for Tojo Kai or Omi Rengo to intrude, as in the past. So it’s a place where neither Tojo Kai nor Omi Rengo hold any power.

—— Fascinating. And the rest of the video showed us we’ll still get the strong story and the silliness we expect from Ryu ga Gotoku.

Nagoshi: Ijincho’s historic scenery gives it a very realistic feel. So you could say the drama feels realistic too. Also, the town was vital to the telling of Kasuga’s story.

—— In what way?

Nagoshi: Kasuga is someone who made “for the sake of Arakawa” his reason for living. When he loses that small happiness after Arakawa tries to kill him … he ends up feeling he has nothing to live for, and nothing to care about. His reason for living ends up being to find the answer to the question, “Why did he try to kill me?” Unlike wanting money, or wanting to have his own gang, it’s really an appropriately small desire for him. But that desire of Kasuga’s will end up getting him involved in a far bigger story than he expected, and get him involved with the people controlling Isezaki Ijincho, so it’s a story with some dynamic developments to look forward to.

—— I see! I can’t wait till we get to hear more details! So next I’d like to ask about the game system trailer. It looked like there’ll be plenty of playspots to enjoy, but can you tell us how many there will be?

Yokoyama: Actually too many to count. The thing is, though they might not be called playspots, there’s a lot of things in there that are great fun to play. There was a scene in the trailer from the Business Management game where you’re at a shareholders’ meeting, and this Business Management is a big piece of side content in the game. It has a story, there’s the shareholders’ meeting game, and there’s some simulation-style parts too. And you also play to add staff to the company … it’s a combination of things. So it’s hard to count the number of ways to play there. But if you consider it as one composite minigame, then it’s definitely the biggest in the series’ history.

—— Wow! When I played the demo, I noticed that if you went to certain places there’d be conversations between the party members. Is that something else we can think of as being another way to play?

Yokoyama: In Adventure Mode, you can push a button and the characters will have a discussion about their situation, yes. Rather than considering it play though, I’d say it’s more about backstory. Finding out what your friends’ favourite food is, for example (laughing). It’s trivial stuff, but you can get to know them and understand their lives.

—— So maybe more like short stories, as opposed to substory-level contents?

Yokoyama: Right. When you add members to your party, that adds to the conversation subjects too. And if you know what your friends like, that can give you a hint when you’re trying to improve your bond with them. In Ryu 7, “kizuna” [bond] is the parameter that displays Kasuga’s level of friendship with his party members.

—— Right, I see.

Yokoyama: For example, if you know “Adachi-san loves cabaret clubs”, if you take him to one it will improve his motivation and deepen your bond (laughing).

—— Sounds fun! (laughing)

Yokoyama: When you deepen your bonds, it strengthens Kasuga’s “cooperation skill”, so you should use those conversations in Adventure Mode to find useful hints to help you do that.

—— It’s great to have fun stuff like that that’s useful too! Well, so the next thing I want to ask about is the theme tune you announced on the first day of TGS. Nakata Yasutaka-san and Shonan no Kaze is a unique combination. Can you tell us how you came to arrive at that combination?

Nagoshi: Everything about this game, and the scenario, was still coming together at the very last moment … and the final piece of the puzzle was deciding on what we wanted it to be called. And ever since that was decided I’ve wanted to find an artist we haven’t used before. For Ryu 7, having this protagonist who loves Dragon Quest, I thought it might be fun to have 8-bit music in there. So I was thinking about who has such a diverse approach to music, and decided to ask Nakata-san, who I’d been interested in for a while.

—— I see.

Nagoshi: But Nakata-san’s a composer, he doesn’t sing. So I had to find someone to sing, and there aren’t that many musicians who really get what Ryu ga Gotoku’s about. So that’s why I decided on Shonan no Kaze, who’ve done music for the series before. Though I had no idea whether they would work together as a combination.

—— Yes, I feel like their styles are very different.

Nagoshi: That’s why I felt it would be really interesting if we could make it work. I reached out to each of them, and in the end it went well, and they agreed.

—— I’m really looking forward to hearing what they came up with. Whether one side will dominate in the tune, or whether they’ll get on well together … I can’t predict it.

Nagoshi: You won’t know until you hear it, eh? In a way, that applies to Ryu 7 as a game as well as to the music, there’s a lot of things about it that are like, “You won’t understand until you see it for yourself.” But then, the sense people have that “Ryu ga Gotoku is this kind of game” cuts both ways, it can also be taken to mean we’ve become formulaic. I think the fact that we can say, “You have to see it to understand it” about this one proves that we took the challenge to break free from those formulas, and I think that’s a good thing.

—— I know there’s a lot of people who want to try it out for themselves, so your demo area has been very busy. And I’ve also heard people saying, “I wanted to try it, but the queue was too long, and I didn’t get to play.” So will there be more chances for people to try it after this?

Yokoyama: We do want to do that, yes. We’ll have events of course, and maybe we’ll release a demo version. But I don’t think it will be the same version people got to play here at TGS. There’s still something we’re working on that hasn’t been implemented yet, as well.

—— I can’t wait. By the way, is development going well on that other thing?

Yokoyama: … Eh? (laughing)

—— “Eh?” (laughing)

Nagoshi: Well, we always want more time, you know (laughing).

Yokoyama: If there’s enough time, it’ll be a great thing. But the Ryu ga Gotoku team will get as much in as we possibly can right up to the deadline, just as we’ve done for the past 15 years. We pride ourselves on our abilities there, so it’ll be fine. Even now we’re working like crazy and throwing all our energies into development.

—— This may be a silly question, but you’ve changed so much in Ryu 7, from the battle system and the setting on down. How has that affected the development staff’s motivation?

Yokoyama: Motivation is high, of course. Coming to Tokyo Game Show is a big boost for motivation too. And today, seeing the customers in the venue and the presentation respond to the things we’ve made has boosted our excitement a lot. Because this title especially feels like something we’re making from scratch, the excitement is higher than I’ve seen it in years.

Nagoshi: Looking at it from the staff side, Ryu 7 has been a great project. You could say that our staff, whether they’re new in the team or they’ve been with the series for a long time, none of them have really experienced making a game from scratch like this before. It’s part of the numbered series, but it’s still very much a new thing. There was a lot more trial and error than ever before in the series, it was a process of finding exactly the right way to do it. And now all we can do is send our answers out into the world. Of course, we’ve had our moments of terror, of “If this doesn’t work, we’ll have wasted all this time,” but if we’re going to be able to do it, we have to be able to get over that and focus on what we’re doing. And I’m glad the newer staff have been able to benefit from that experience too.

Yokoyama: With a series, half the work is prediction, you know. Like, “If we focus on a new setting this time, will it be a hit?” With this one we really can’t answer those questions because it is such a new thing, and that stings. But because this is a new challenge, it means we can really break free of our old formulas and stereotypes.

Nagoshi: We’ve always done action up till now, but we just couldn’t pile on any more toppings. It’s like making pasta with pollack roe and cream, but then adding sea urchin and salmon roe too … some chefs might be able to pull that off, but it’s damn difficult.

—— It has to be different ingredients.

Nagoshi: Right. And that’s why we made such a huge change of direction this time, in search of new possibilities … and I really want Ryu 7 to be a success, for the sake of the future of the Ryu ga Gotoku IP.

—— I see. So then, finally, do you have a message for anyone who’s thinking of trying out the game here at Tokyo Game Show?

Yokoyama: I think you’ll see some things you’ll like. People who are curious about the battle system can play part of the story, see how the battle system plays, and I think they’ll leave with the sense that, “Oh, it’s more Ryu ga Gotoku than I expected,” as well as, “But you can do a lot of new things.”

Nagoshi: Tokyo Game Show is a chance for us to hear people’s opinions first-hand. The head developers who worked on each part of the game can get to see how the customers respond to what they made. Even if the game’s scoring 100 points, we’re still looking to squeeze even 0.1 extra point of improvement into it, so after TGS there’ll be more events, more chances for people to try it out, and we’ll be happily taking opinions on board right up until the very last minute.

—— Thank you. I guess you’re into the final push in development now, so good luck!