A The famous release from Final Fantasy Tactics: Ivalice Chronicle It is the main victory for the defenders of the history of video games and developers who seek to learn lessons from the craft of classics. Not only did the Square Enix supply in two “versions” of the game – one with updated visual effects and voice acting, and one that correctly recreates the original PlayStation title – but this did this with several veterans at the helm: director Casutao Maehiro, art director of Hiroshi Minagawa and former scriptrans -writer.
These people worked on the original Final Fantasy TacticsThe field makes them a rare breed of a game developer who is instructed to return to his old work and reflect on ten -year development decisions. They were frank in relation to problems, including Restoration of the lost source code And re -creating systems only “feel”. Meanwhile, the former screenwriter Yasumi Matsuno wrote a fresh dialogue and scripts, The light shines on Tactics“The greatest heritage: its electrical history of the class war, corruption in the church and state oppression.
This was an early example of how strategic games can be platforms for a strong story of stories. The successors like it Fire emblem awakeningIN Warcraft 3And Marvel's Midnight Suns Everyone won praise for investing in a strong letter, as well as in a close strategic battle.
Excellent games, spelling, lives everywhere in games, but revival Final Fantasy Tactics They forced us to ask, what applies to the strategy genre, whether it is a turning point or in real time, what makes it such a reliable canvas for writers?
We asked the question of Mayhiro and Minagava in a recent call, discussing their work on A IVALICE ChroniclesTheir field is the answer: this is all about the grounds of the genre.
The number of the characters with whom you control can form the story of the game
Mayhiro and Minagawa returned to the repeating topic during our conversation about the problems of remastation and updating Final Fantasy Tactics: Fundamentals of the design of the game, from its square combat system to its composition of the characters. Many of the characters controlled by the players are unique soldiers, Bowmen and magicians with sprites to order, who play a role in the history of the game. Others are common fighters with custom spells, who can either take on the role of cannon fodder, or be pointed in units, as strong as the main cast.
This is this mosaic that Maehiro said separates Tactics Of the militants where you play for one character. Although Ramza Beulwe is the main character, he treats the battlefield as his allies equally, when it comes to control and gameplay. “In the game based on actions, you have a character you control and your [goal] This is to defeat the enemy, ”said Maehiro. – I feel that this kind puts you on rails for a certain type of stories telling. It is difficult to weave in these external elements. ”
“But when we think about the RPG strategy, there are many different characters that you can control.” He hinted at wide types of enemies that introduce various types of antagonists who can fill history. Extrapopopy his thinking, and you can see how other gaming processes need the same needs as resource management, control over the terrain, as well as recruiting or loss of characters can integrate writing and gameplay.
“Given that this is the general format of the RPG strategy genre, he draws a good canvas to have a more detailed story of stories,” he said. Although Maehiro was specifically about the RPG strategy genre, its thinking applies to other types of strategic games.
Image through Square Enix.
Tactics“The great story is not the only element associated with the main gameplay. Minagawa explained that when reconstructing the Pixel Art style of the original – and in updating it in the “improved” games in the mode – he and his colleagues were connected by those very tiles of the players. “When it comes to such things as the proportions of the character, the sizes of pixels, even how far from each other, on the face, all these solutions are connected with the most actual design of the game,” he said. “If we tried to change the character proportions in order to be able to portray the character in the other way, then how it reads on the screen will differ.”
“The size of the cards, as well as the sizes of each of the panels and cubes, will also affect this.”
Deeper forces are moving Final Fantasy Tactics'Design
If you think about how the principles of the design of the game can form its storytelling and art, you should also consider how equipment and tools can form design.
Minagawa explained that one infamous restriction of the PlayStation designation of the internal “Z-Bufer” is revolved to pursue it as an art director for Ivals ChronicleThe Square Enix field created its own Z-Boer on the original version of the PlayStation game, and all original art assets were connected around this system.
Art director, came to the project with Final Fantasy XVIHe admitted that he was taken by surprise by the use of Remaster, thinking that it would be easier than a massive role-playing game filled with unique 3D assets. “I seemed to suggest that if I took the basic information and tried to re-release it in order to be much cleaner than it should just be a very simple and simple process,” he admitted. “But, doing this, I realized that in fact it leads to so many different technical external problems that I did not expect.”
Image through Square Enix.
Another restriction for updating the game was in the need to clarify the animation of the characters in order to appear on large screens. The greatest PlayStation resolution was 640p. Today minimum The resolution can be 720p. But the tool used to create original animation was available only in the PlayStation hardware environment. “It seems to be in this environment,” Maehiro said. “Looking back, it seemed to make me think about how we probably should not have something like that in this really unique, specific environment.”
Another regret expressed by Maerio: Restoring the original Final Fantasy Tactics The source code after the transition to release international versions of the game. Since then, Square Enix has updated its methods of saving software, but this is the main reason why the team spent so much time to watch the mobile and PSP versions of the game, as well as studying the archive data of the players.
It is easy to look at these restrictions and admire how Square Enix told such an ambitious story – and updated it for the modern era – with such specific restrictions. But, as always, these are restrictions that formed a story over them.
This exciting archival exercise seems to have paid off for Final Fantasy Tactics– The team when -liba made these efforts for Final Fantasy Tactics AdvanceGame Boy's game exclusive continuation with an equally ambitious (if underestimated) narrative? “The RPG strategy genre is a little more than a niche,” Maerio said with some caution. “This is said, I think if Ivals Chronicle Really good … It also shows the viability of the genre business. “
“This can potentially open doors for things such as Final Fantasy Advanced Obtaining the same treatment, or continuations or new names, ”he said.
