YoRHa: Dark Apocalypse (Pre-5.1 Speculation)

[Anonymoose]

To prevent knee-jerk reactions, knee-jerk counterpoints, and new information from either clogging up or getting lost in other threads, now may be the right time to give it its own thread.

First things first, my knee-jerk reaction, and a new interview snip.

I'm just trusting in the system this time around. We had all these same doubts and debates with Ivalice and (yeah, Matsuno-san broke a few vases they're still sweeping up, but) everyone worked hard to fit it into the world and make it something new and it was totally worth it and I'm sure they can do that again.

What's Yoko Taro's mantra? "Tell Square Enix to give me money, and I will do it for you."

He seems perfectly capable of manifesting his insanity within the confines of, "Hydaelyn is isolated; your ideas will be manifested anew within this world to fit this world. Other than that, do whatever you want and don't bruise the world lore too badly." Hell, what if he just turns following those rules into part of the craziness?

I'm usually the strictest one in the room but...

Worst case scenario, one isolated raid questline is a mess and we still got to play an MMO raid randomly custom-designed by Yoko Taro and Yosuke Saito.

Strap me in.

Will the developer of the Nier series, Platinum Games, participate in developing the new alliance raid?
They'll be sharing assets with us, so in that sense, yes. But just like with Return to Ivalice, the FFXIV team will create the boss battles. Platinum Games won't be involved in actual development.

As a fellow creator, what do you think of Yoko Taro?

My first impression is that he's incredibly smart. His speech feels calculated, in a different way from myself. I never compared us, but if I had to say, it's like he tries to leave some kind of "scars" on you. He wants his creations to leave some kind of mark on the player or reader, any mark at all. I don't know if I can go as far to say as that's the purpose of his work, but at any rate, I strongly sense that power from him. Anyway, he's interesting. He's one of the few people that I can eat with and get excited over game talk with.

There are many different reactions to YoRHa, ranging from welcoming to rejecting. Did you foresee this response?

I think that as we reveal more information about Shadowbringers, YoRHa will begin to make more sense. At any rate, both Saito-san and Yoko-san are being careful to make sure it blends in with FFXIV. They don't want the FFXIV community to reject it, and of course they want to leave something with you. The FFXIV team feels the same way--we don't want to impose too much on the Nier community. Both sides of the collaboration want to make something that both communities will enjoy. We'll integrate that into the gameplay experience and create something unpredictable, so please look forward to it.

When did you start working with Saito-san?

Game development-wise, after Dragon Quest X.

Saito-san is a producer. What kind of involvement does he have with this project?

He's probably the top producer in Square Enix. Neither of us really think of each other as producers, and Saito-san probably doesn't think of himself as a producer either. He just wants to do fun things, and "producer" is simply his job classification. Saito-san can do game design too, so he has a lot to offer, and he excels at thinking about things. He's open-minded, and if the director (not limited to Yoko-san) wants to do something, he lets them do it. It was the same with Dragon Quest X. The producer should have 100% faith in the director and gather people to create what the director wants, while convincing the people who are against it. If both sides aren't happy, then they should separate. That's how much he puts stock in people. For this project too, we didn't talk about duties at all, and simply agreed that it'd be interesting to do something like this.

Would you say there's a special connection between you?

I don't know if it's "special", but we're both so busy that we only get 1-2 chances a year to drink together, and now we'll have to see each other for work, so I'm glad we'll have more opportunities to drink together.

During the video message, Yoko-san said that the story wasn't done at all, but what is the real development status?

At the very least, I hear that Yoko-san has a clear idea in his head of what he wants to do. Next is how we're going to introduce it into FFXIV's lore. It'll be a back and forth between us until we reach a conclusion.

What did you think when they brought up the idea?

"Oh, that makes sense." We could certainly make something really interesting. I don't want to say any more for now, since I want to tell the story when the three of us are together.

Matsuno-san tweeted that he was passing the baton to Yoko-san, but when I completed the Return to Ivalice series, it really didn't feel like it was over. Are you considering a continuation?

*laughs* The great thing about Matsuno-san's works is that they don't feel complete on their own. His game design is all about creating the presence of the history and characters. The story that he wrote for us encroaches on Eorzea's history and lore in a good way, and it's possible that it'll get involved again and something new will come out of it. I didn't request anything from him; he wrote the new text himself and it was implemented upon approval. I think it'd be interesting to collaborate again in a different way if we get the opportunity. After all, I'm a Matsuno believer *laughs* But Return to Ivalice really was great. I think there are people who didn't like it, but I'm glad that the people who played FFT were happy with the ending.