Level-5 CEO on The Snack World, Lady Layton, Megaton Musashi, Inazuma Eleven Ares

Inazuma Eleven Ares

With Inazuma Eleven Ares, Level-5 is bringing back its classic soccer RPG franchise. Famitsu begins by asking how the story will be expanding.

Hino explains that Level-5 is taking on a story that sprouts friendship between three people, like how far Asuto Inamori can influence the other two who have different backstories. He said friendship here, but it’s still unknown if ultimately the friendship will really grow or not. Even if they do become friends, they will become so while fiercely opposing each other. Each of the three protagonists have their own different problems. Hino would like to depict a youth drama from the different points-of-view of those three.

Inazuma Eleven is indeed a youth story with a focus on Asuto. Haizaki, as you can see from his looks, is distorted. Nosaka may look normal at first, but there is no light on his eyes. In the story, Asuto will be the one who brings back the light in both of their eyes.

Asuto is a hotblooded character just like Endou of the first game. As shown in the anime video that debuted during Level-5 Vision 2016, fans can see that they will also mingle in various places outside of matches.

Eleven Band is a key item for Inazuma Eleven Ares. In the game, the setting is that the band is equipped by all of the athletes. But for the actual real-life product, it will be more like a pedometer that counts walking and running steps, and that will be a gimmick that affects characters in the game. Which means, if you’re training yourself, you can actually strengthen the characters accordingly.

Famitsu asks if there are any other gimmicks in the Eleven Band, which Hino confirms. There’s a feature that shows the same schedule as the in-game characters, for example. Also, for the design, Level-5 plans to release with different school designs. Even this kind of toy expansion should be considered as a new cross-media expansion.

Inazuma Eleven Ares takes place in an alternative timeline following the first game, in a scenario where aliens / Aliea Gakuen never attacked. Asuto’s soccer club is abolished due to the team running out of money. In this world, if a school doesn’t have a sponsor, they can’t be managed. This is what causes for the team to be disbanded. But suddenly, a potential sponsor appears and promises to back them up if they go to Raimon Junior High School and take on the Football Frontier. They think this is their last chance, and they’re challenging themselves to see if they can win the Football Frontier just once.

Going back to the topic of the parallel world, Hino mentions that the idea of a what-if story “was greatly admired within the company”. It seems to have come about because he’s been worrying about what kind of shape he should make for a new Inazuma Eleven title. It’s by no means something that he thought of in an instant, but he’s gone through a very long, harsh trial and error process, and created a number of plans… while thinking they weren’t good, and continued to discard them. According to Hino, the process took about three years. He wanted not only series fans, but also new players to enjoy it. After all, if Level-5 announced something small to the public after Yo-kai Watch, there would be no interest in that.

The story won’t have an invasion by the Alia Academy, as previously mentioned. As far as how much time will have passed from the first game, it will be a bit after after the Football Frontier ended with Endou and the rest becoming champions. It’s almost the same as Inazuma Eleven 2.

Fubuki’s younger brother will still be alive in Inazuma Eleven Ares. The main characters will take the focus, but ultimately there will be what-if developments to watch. Basically, the personalities of characters are being drawn the same way as the past entries, and it’s just developing in a parallel world.

Lastly, Famitsu asks about the “Ares” part of the title. When thinking of Ares, some people may relate to the Zeus-like thing which was the final opponent in the first game. However, this thing called Scales of Ares is the name of a certain being that will influence the main characters once they reach the latter part of the story. For now, Hino was only willing to share this and nothing more.