Suikoden’s Spiritual Successor — Eiyuden Chronicle
Creator of the classic JRPG franchise Genso Suikoden, Yoshitaka Murayama dropped news that a new project is in the works. It’s title? Eiyuden Chronicle and it’s being seen as the spiritual successor to the long dormant Suikoden series.
The project comes in 18 years after Murayama worked on Suikoden III on the PlayStation 2 and 3 years since The Alliance Alive on the Nintendo 3DS. The internet was abuzz with questions over the weekend since the news came to light.
We sent some of our own questions to the newly formed Rabbit & Bear Studios and they’ve been gracious enough to clue us in on some aspects of the project as well as some concerns. We’ve listed the questions & answers down below as well as some commentary.
What are some challenges with planning a game that feels like the Suikoden successor many fans want but still be something unique?
Eiyuden Chronicle is a game that represents an evolution of my growth as a designer and scenario writer. The goal is to really increase the difficulty in specialty challenge modes while also including some form of asynchronous game play.
S9: I’m curious as to what kind of asynchronous gameplay Murayama is referring to. Asynchronous gameplay usually means some kind of multiplayer or social element. Would it incorporate something similar to what Bravely Default did with being able to bring in Streetpass friends? There are a lot of ways this can go and I’m looking forward to what they can pull off.
Many high profile Kickstarter games have been big hits or big misses. What is your strategy to avoid the problems that other projects encountered?
The reality is that whether a game is good or bad, or on time or delayed largely rests upon the team making it and the development process. In the end if you have the right team capable of pushing the game in the right direction both with internal teams and external partners then even a game that is crowdfunded can work.
We’ve made sure to have the right people, chose the right game elements, and plan things out the right way so I’m not worried about being unable to fulfill our Kickstarter promises to the backers.
S9: This gives some reassurance to me personally as I’ve followed my fair share of Kickstarter projects over the past few years. It looks like they’ve thought about this carefully and planned for what they can deliver. We’ll see just how well once the final goals are released with the Kickstarter.
What was the thought process behind going with sprite-based 2.5D graphics instead of 3D like many modern games?
We knew we wanted to use pixels to capture the detailed facial nuances and give depth to the emotions the characters show. However, we didn’t just want to make a retro game. We wanted to make something modern that stands out. So we looked into new lighting techniques, modern shaders, and reflections that can really add a new layer of depth to the backdrops. This also allowed us to add dynamic camerawork which is another element we really wanted to add from the beginning.
S9: If you’ve played Suikoden II back on the original PlayStation, then you’ll know that they had some of the best sprite work at the time. The Eiyuden Chronicle trailer showed the kind of dynamic camera work that they have in mind so I think we can expect some engaging visuals in the final product.
How many characters are planned to be available for combat? Will there be combination attacks?
We are still figuring out the right amount of characters that will participate in a battle. That means some may be active attackers while some are in the background giving you passive buffs. Depending [sic] what that final number becomes we’ll see how combo-attacks can work.
S9: It would appear that they’re looking to spice up traditional turn-based combat in the same avenue that Persona 5 did: via presentation. Also, just the idea of bringing back Unite Attacks probably brings joy to many Suikoden fans. Figuring out who has combinations with whom was almost a game unto itself.
Older RPGs are known for a lot of grinding for experience points. How does the team plan to address that to make it more engaging for modern audiences?
This is a game with a lot of different characters. That means that one of the constant problems is the characters you don’t use in your active team will fall behind quickly in level. We’ll be adding an XP boost for characters that are in your party fighting enemies that are a much higher level than them so that they can power level. Also, we are thinking of other ways to give characters not in your party and other ways to gain experience points.
S9: With Rabbit & Bear Studios looking to assemble it’s own sizable cast of characters, the aspect of having to level a good number of them looks like it’s been given thought. Other ways to gain experience points looks interesting, too. If it goes well, there may be less monotonous grinding in order to keep your different characters at a viable level.
Eiyuden Chronicle’s Kickstarter campaign is slated to launch July 27 12:00 EST.
