Personally, I don’t think there are any spoilers in the quotes below, as nothing specific is revealed about certain characters or events, but read at your own risk…
This information comes from director Kuniomi Matsushita…
“When the development team was making a prototype for the game, they came up with Chibiterasu with the idea that, hey, let’s make Amaterasu’s child. Seeing the character made me reason that, although he’s cute and everything, it’d take more than a child to save the world. That’s why we gave him partners to work with — together, they’re one, so to speak. That expanded the potential gameplay available, and I think it made the characters more engaging to players. The basic storyline and gameplay system went from there. There was a lot of debate on what to do before then. At one point we had five Amaterasus forming a party; we tried all sorts of stuff.”
“And because encounters and separations are such a big part of the theme, that’s why we didn’t want you to be able to switch control between partners. If you could switch between them any time you wanted, then they wouldn’t be partners anymore — they’d be tools.”
“We thought about setting it more like ten years later, but with that kind of space, a lot of things change in that time. We wanted things to be just a little different from before, so that’s why we went with nine months.”
“I saw it (killing one of the main characters) as necessary for the story’s flow. Okami had several key people die during the story, but none of them were characters the player would get very emotional about. For this game, I wanted a more important character to die in order to reinforce that ‘separation’ theme. There were a lot of people against it, definitely, but I discussed it with Kitajima and he said that he could see it working.”
This information comes from producer Motohide Eshiro…
“Having the story being about kids working together was very easy to visualize, comparatively. It might be partly because I’m a fan of the movie Stand By Me. That’s another story of kids going on an adventure and growing a bit along the way. Everyone’s had an experience like that, I think, and that’s what makes the story resonate with us. For example, maybe you moved out of town and had to say goodbye to your friends — but then you made friends with new people where you moved. Encounters and separations are some of the most moving things we experience in our lives, and I wanted to depict that in the game.”
“I do think, though, that we’ve been successful in really integrating the story with Okami’s. We could have made them separate tales, but I think fans would prefer having the two worlds linked together.”
This information comes from Yukinori Kitajima, Japanese novelist and the screenwriter for Okamiden…
“You’ll find out how that (Kuni’s birth and his age) happened during gameplay. I think it worked out pretty well plotwise, although getting there was a major headache for me, to be sure. I’d come up with some humorous backstory, but it’d always lead to contradictions later. What’s more, the last bit of Okami had Issun restoring humans’ faith in the gods and so on, and apparently it’s now all been forgotten in the space of a few months!”
Unless I’m going crazy, Worms: Battle Islands was announced for WiiWare last year. Now, however, it looks like the game has made the jump from WiiWare to retail. THQ sent out this press release today…
AGOURA HILLS, Calif. – Delivering an arsenal full of laughs, explosions and over-the-top turn-based strategy gameplay this November, THQ Inc. (NASDAQ: THQI) today announced that Worms: Battle Islands is currently in development for Wii. The franchise that has sold more than 25 million units at retail over its lifetime and provided countless hours of strategy fun returns with classic Worms gameplay, all-new extensive online multiplayer support, customizable weapons and environments to blow to bits. Worms: Battle Islands is being published through the THQ Partners program.
About Worms: Battle Islands
Rally your worm troops, plot to defeat your enemies and battle your way through 30 single-player campaign mode missions, 30 brain teasing single-player Puzzle challenges and five different multiplayer game modes on or offline as you fight to take control of a secret island Worms™ base. Packed with more than 40 different in-game weapons and utilities, a deep customization tool set that allows users to personalize their Worms appearance and create their own weapons of mass destruction in the weapon factory, Worms: Battle Islands will quench all gamers thirst for ammo and destruction.
This information comes from Sonic Team’s Takashi Iizuka…
“The thought behind this game was also that the team wanted to capitalise on how far the Sonic franchise has expanded itself through the Mario and Sonic games. Obviously those were on the Nintendo platform and more family friendly. We wanted to take this opportunity to introduce 3D Sonic games to people who may not have played Sonic and provide a new Sonic game to those audiences.”
To be honest, I don’t care who this game is aimed at. More than anything, I just want Sonic Colors to be enjoyable! The most important aspect is for it to be fun, regardless of the audience SEGA is hoping to attract.
Kingdom Hearts Re:coded details
– 800 parts for your avatar
– If you equip an avatar with rare parts and take part in tag mode exchanges, the other players will get those parts as well
– Trophy system
– 30 trophies
– Need at least 20 to see the secret movie
– The secret movie is a short single event, but has important conversations according to Tetsuya Nomura
Tetsuya Nomura also had this to say about Kingdom Hearts 3D…
“Next is Kingdom Hearts 3D. The time frame for 3D is after Re:Coded. Development has already started in Osaka. As the Final Mix team finishes their work, they’re joining the staff in turn. We’d like to announce it as soon as possible.”
In just two days on the market, Pokemon Black/White has acquired some impressive sales numbers in Japan. According to Famitsu, the game moved 2.63 million units between Saturday and Sunday. Unlike most titles, Black/White’s debut week lasted only two days. Even so, it now holds the record for the biggest first week in Japanese sales history. Something tells me we’ll see additional records broken when the game arrives in other territories!
Dead Rising 2 (PS3/360) – 9/8/9/9
Okamiden: Chisaki Taiyou (DS) – 9/8/8/9
K-On! Houkago Live!! (PSP) – 8/8/8/8
Eiyuu Densetsu: Zero no Kiseki (PSP) – 8/8/8/7
Quantum Theory (PS3/360) – 8/8/8/7
