Resonance of Fate Interview

We recently sat down with Resonance of Fate's director, Takayuki Suguro, and its producer Mitsuhiro Shimano, to find out more on this intriguing tri-Ace title.

IGN AU: Tell us a little about the world that Resonance of Fate is set in.

Takayuki Suguro: It takes place in the Earth's distant future, where the air has become so polluted that people can't really live in the outside environment, so the humans have come up with machine tower called Bazel, which cleans the air and the water, and produces the things you need for your everyday life. Everything outside of this machine is so polluted that almost all the humans are living in this tower. In the tower, the higher you go, the more power and wealth the people have. The guys at the very top are the strongest people, and in this game they're called Cardinals. They're basically the governors or rulers of this world…

There are three main characters in the game, and they're kind of in the middle class of this world. Usually, if you're not living on the upper levels, you'll never have a connection with the Cardinals, however, these three protagonists somehow find a way to talk to them, and [as a result] are given missions to accomplish…

What's also interesting in the story is that the tower of Bazel, which people believe is just controlling the environment, also has the ability to control the peoples' fate. How they live and how they die is also being controlled… [in this world] every character has their own fate, but the Cardinals' fates and everybody else's fates start to blend in and be mixed up, and there's going to be a lot of conflicts between the lower, upper and middle class, and that's where… the story gets much more interesting... and becomes a bit more fast-paced.

IGN AU: So are the main characters mercenaries taking missions from the Cardinals, or are they trying to affect social change, or are they simply trying to work out what's going on?

Takayuki Suguro: Originally, the three main characters were 'Hunters', which is like [being a] mercenary. They used their experience from formerly belonging to a military [organisation] and having a combat/martial arts background, and it was just their job to begin with, they didn't really have any motivation to do with the guys at the top; they didn't have any goals to live up on those higher levels. It was just their job, but somehow their fate started turning around as a result of the machine and everything else.

IGN AU: Is the entire game set in the tower?

Takayuki Suguro: Yes, the game takes place entirely within Bazel.

IGN AU: This is a long way from a typical fantasy RPG. Is it refreshing to make something that's a bit more real world and gritty?

Takayuki Suguro: Actually, deciding [to go with] the more realistic setting actually comes out of the battle system, the reason being we wanted to use guns as the primary weapons, so it had to be more realistic, not cyberpunk or fantasy.

IGN AU: Could you tell us a little about how the battle system works? What are its main hooks? Is it real-time or turn-based?

Takayuki Suguro: At the very basis, in terms of the programming, it's based on a real-time action kind of game. At the very beginning of development, we actually tried to do it completely in real-time, where – of your three characters – you're controlling just one of them, and the other two are run by the AI. So in the beginning you controlled one of them, with the other two attacking at the same time… but we realised we weren't trying to create an action game, we were trying to make an RPG, and we also realised that the AI characters were quite frustrating, because 1) they might not move as you would want them to, and 2) they might die off-screen; they might die unintentionally. With that in mind, we deleted the parts that didn't make sense, and that's when a turn-based element came into play, so it's like a mixture of real-time and turn-based.

IGN AU: With the focus on guns, how much scope is there to upgrade them?

Takayuki Suguro: In terms of the weapons you're able to customise them. What you have to do is earn these parts from the enemies, and you take these parts into the junk shop and you develop them into an enhancing item, like a scope or an additional magazine, or extra firepower.

IGN AU: Given that focus, how do you ensure that the combat stays compelling? In a traditional fantasy RPG, for instance, you might summon some huge monster to do battle for you, so how do you ramp things up here without magic and more over-the-top elements?

Takayuki Suguro: Obviously since we're using the guns, like you mentioned, there won't be many visibly changing abilities or skills, but the battle system lands quite heavily on the strategy side. It's not completely strategy, but it has a strong sense of strategy, so what's going to happen is that in the beginning of the game you have quite a limited amount of skills, and you might find some of the enemies to be relatively difficult, but as you unlock skills, you'll have more [strategic options] to work on. Even if you take the same enemy, you might find some other ways to defeat it; you might find it easier just because of these unlocked skills.

Out of the skills we've revealed so far, there's one which is a blast up and smack down. When you blast up an enemy, the enemy stays in the air, and you're able to jump over it and shoot it downward, which comes with added damage when it hits the ground. Now in the beginning, the blast up doesn't really lift as high as you want [it] to, but as you get stronger you can lift enemies higher, you can lift the heavier guys a little bit higher, and it adds a little bit more time and a little bit more damage as you progress.

IGN AU: The team has mentioned that it's interested in more complex characters; in characters with shades of grey. How does that influence your path through the game? Is it linear, or is there more to it?

Takayuki Suguro: In terms of whether the player can alter the story – they can't. It's a straight story.

IGN AU: tri-Ace has been a big supporter of the Xbox 360. What appeals to the studio about the system? And is its support a reflection of a growing importance in making games for a global audience?

Takayuki Suguro: Actually, not really, is the honest answer. The major reason is, if you look at the current gen, or the so-called next gen – the PS3, the 360 and the Wii - the 360 was the first one to come out, and... the 360 is relatively easy to develop a game on. They're the two reasons... it came really naturally for us to develop a game on 360.

IGN AU: Do you think that the Xbox 360 is gaining momentum in Japan?

Takayuki Suguro: Umm... not really.

Mitsuhiro Shimano: I would like to add, however, that the tri-Ace developed games for 360 have been quite successful, even in the Japanese market, so I'm confident that this title will do quite well on both 360 and PS3.

Takayuki Suguro: It would be great to make a title that's successful worldwide, but that doesn't mean that we'd make a game specifically for the Western market. We believe that whatever is fun is fun throughout the world.

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