WithThe Legend of Heroes: Trails Beyond the Horizoncoming west on January 15 through publisherNIS America, Hardcore Gamer had the opportunity to sit down withToshihiro Kondo,Nihon Falcom’s CEO and the game’s producer. In this interview, topics discussed included some of the elements of the game, but also a bit of the company’s RPG DNA and his personal feelings on the production.
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[Hardcore Gamer] Before going into Trails beyond the Horizon, I want to talk a little about Falcom. The company has an extensive history in game development and has been prolific in RPG development. Is there any specific reason for the team to focus so much on the genre?
[Toshihiro Kondo] So, this is kind of a historical thing. As you mentioned, Falcom is a company with a long history. Originally, the company mainly developed adventure games and, because in the 1980’s, RPGs became a very popular genre, Falcom dipped its toes into that genre and then there were more and more of those games, switching over from RPGs to action RPGs.
Because the people who would come to join the company were fans of the games, it meant all of the staff was very interested in these games. In a very natural way, we continued to make more and more games on this genre. It kind of became the “color” of Falcom games and the games were kind of “colored” by Falcom’s staff [interests].
And for me specifically, I joined the company because I liked Falcom’s RPGs and I wanted to work on them.
When it comes to the Trails series, it feels like the series has shown an absurdly impressive escalation of technology progress over time. The Trails in the Sky trilogy felt much closer to a medieval/queendom fantasy while Horizon’s bringing in the start of a space program into play. Was this rapid evolution a plan from the start or did it come for some other reason as you developed the series?
When we were making Sky, there was a big idea of what the technology level was and what it would become throughout the series. However, as each arc was created, that was when we decided on the details and to go deeply into what level of technology it would display.
Particularly, for Trails beyond the Horizon, the main idea was already in place from the beginning that the world would face this rapid increase in technology. But the details were decided in more detail per arc as we were developing the games, so it’s a little bit of both.
Along with the tech evolution, social elements that feel relevant in the current world have come into play. For instance, topics like immigration and racism have been a thread explored in the games, including the Calvard arc. What led you to explore these themes?
When it comes to the Trails series overall, you’d notice that the types of issues and problems that you see within the settings are relevant to where the games are. For example, if you look at two arcs ago, theCold Steelsetting, you could say it’s sort of a medieval setting, and as a matter of course, it has topics that deal with nobility, the relationship between nobility and the common people. It has a lot to do with tradition and history, and that’s because the setting kind of informs that.
Now, as the stage shifts from Erebonia to the Republic of Calvard, we started to think more deeply about what this setting was. Of course, the name Calvard had been talked about briefly ever since Sky, but now was the time to figure out what the issues were. When the team was thinking about the Republic of Calvard, they realized it was very similar to what was happening in the modern day. Accordingly, the types of issues the people there would be facing would probably be a lot more similar to what’s happening today.
Particularly, for Trails beyond the Horizon, the main idea was already in place from the beginning that the world would face this rapid increase in technology.
For example, and this is something that was mentioned in Sky, the issue of having so many people from different races gathered in one place. This was talked about in Sky, but it would only be further explored within the Calvard arc itself. When you look at all the other things within Calvard itself, it all flows from this setting.
Another thing we hadn’t explored in previous titles was the idea of a bad guy being straight-ahead bad. That isn’t to say that the other settings didn’t have a bad guy, but it’s just the idea that this is a clearly bad person doing bad things. This is something that was decided upon in more detail once we really began planning the Calvard Arc. It’s not that real human problems aren’t depicted in the previous arcs; it’s that these problems are geared towards the settings that they’re placed in, which makes them feel a certain way.
How was the Japanese fandom reception to such topics?
Well, we never really asked the fans directly about these topics specifically, but what I can tell you about the feedback in Japan was, firstly, that up until now, the villains in these games had been very orthodox JRPG villains. And by that, I mean that they are not necessarily bad. When you dig into the layers they have, you ask “wait, is this really a bad person?” in terms of their thoughts and motivations. So the Japanese fanbase was a bit surprised to see the villains in the Calvard arc being very straight-ahead evil people, doing what they want to do, surely evil, without having too much nuance that could make them seem like good people.
The second thing that we heard a lot from Japanese fans was about Van himself. Because Van is an older main character, compared to the previous main characters in the series, that means that the people he encounters and the way he does things is very different from the previous ones. The Japanese fanbase found him to be a very interesting main character.
To answer specifically your questions about immigration and racism, these are things that, honestly speaking, Japanese players don’t really think about. Japan as a place doesn’t have a lot of variety of people living in the country. That’s something they have probably never been confronted with, so it’s not at the forefront of their minds when they play the game.
Particularly, since the depiction of racism and the problems with immigration are very real, the people in the West probably took it a lot differently because their society is much more integrated and has people from many different places. But, the interesting thing about Japan is that, within the last two to three years, Japan has seen more and more people who aren’t Japanese coming to Japan and living in the country. Even right now, there are some people who are not from Japan who are kind of causing some issues, so Japan’s in a place where, if people are not really experiencing this right now, they will absolutely experience it in the next two to three years.
Within the staff, we’ve been thinking “well, the timing for this was actually really good” because people are going to be thinking about this a lot more. On the flip side, there was more of an answer from western fans about these topics specifically, because these are things they face more frequently in the western society.
Ever since Daybreak, the series has introduced Field Battle, an action side to the gameplay, which had traditionally been turn-based, while keeping Command Battles as a central part of the experience as well. Horizon’s battle system is an evolution of Daybreak’s, but what novelties and polish adjustments does it bring compared to the previous two games?
As you mentioned, Field Battle was implemented in the first Daybreak game, and it received an evolution as we moved into the second Daybreak game. The idea was to continue to improve upon it, so you can expect both the Field and Command Battle systems. The idea was to look into how we could evolve these systems and keep them interesting.
Specifically, when we looked into the Field combat system, a lot of players had feedback about it becoming one-note, a little bit repetitive. So how could we make this more interesting? There were various ways: one of them was, for example, now being able to use arts in Field battles, not just Command battles; another really big one is the Awakening System.
This [Awakening] is something new to Trails beyond the Horizon and, essentially, what it is, without spoiling too much to you and your readers, is basically that characters can go into an awakened state when you are in Field Battles. This essentially allows them to have access to more moves, be more powerful, and things like that.
Specifically, when we looked into the Field combat system, a lot of players had feedback about it becoming one-note, a little bit repetitive.
This makes the action battles more fun and increases the tempo, but by the same token, it can give players a bit of a hint about how to make their parties. This game actually has quite a few playable characters, more so than Daybreak 2, for example, so if you’re ever in doubt about whom to put in your party, it’s probably a good idea to pick a few characters who can use Awakening skills.
These were some of the things we were discussing when revising the systems, and you’re able to expect new elements that have been added to the foundation of both Command Battles and Field Battles.
Unlike the Daybreak games, Horizon has a multiple protagonist scheme like Trails into Reverie. Besides Van Arkride from Daybreak, we also get to see the perspectives of Cold Steel protagonist Rean Schwarzer and Kevin Graham from Sky the 3rd. Why were those three characters picked?
There are mainly two reasons. The first reason is from the story’s perspective: the game would be huge if it had been a single route game, and we had Van meeting Rean or Kevin, talking to them and continuing the story, while still having to tell the whole story. It’d be even bigger than it is right now, so some of it is just the logistics of how to tell the story: because so much information and storytelling had to be put into this game, we needed a way to depict it all without it becoming gigantic.
As you pointed out in your question, there was a way to do it, which was what you saw in Trails into Reverie. It was this idea that you could have three stories going on at the same time and then occasionally crossing but still going forward to the “finish line” without taking up too much time. This was what we used as a reference when coming up with this game, and it allowed us to tell the story we wanted while hitting all the story beats we needed to hit.
The thing about this game in particular is that it’s pushing us towards the climax and the end of the Calvard arc itself and, as there are so many things to tell, we needed a way to do that, which was with three different protagonists.
When it comes to why these protagonists were chosen, if you look all the way back to Sky, there were a lot of flags that Kevin was going to be in Calvard. And when it comes to Rean, from the story perspective, without spoiling anything, a lot of what Rean went through in the course of the Cold Steel games and Reverie places him very close to the center of what’s happening in the continent of Zemuria itself. And if you look at specific scenes that happen, for example, at the end of the Cold Steel games and Trails into Reverie, you’ll notice that his future and the character itself seem to be connected with what’s going to happen to the continent.
Also, more on the planning side, the idea is that a lot of fans have been asking for years “where’s Kevin?” or “how come Kevin never comes up?”. And when it comes to Rean, he’s a very popular character and the staff internally have some affection for him and wanted an opportunity to bring Rean and show off how he’s grown over the past few years.
After over ten titles with interconnected storylines, the Trails series has amassed a huge cast that I’m sure many fans would like to see again and actively explore their perspectives. As such, are you interested in having more games in the series explore the multiple protagonist angle, and what are your personal thoughts on this system?
Personally, I prefer stories that focus on one main character, for example,Ys. On the other hand, I understand it may be necessary to tell stories in different ways. The circumstances of Calvard needed multiple main characters for this entry, and you may even see this in the next entry as well, who is to say?
The thing is that it really depends on the game and the story it’s telling. When you look at Trails in the Sky, for example, you have a young man and a young woman and the world is very new to them. Everything they’re experiencing and encountering are things they are seeing for the very first time, so there’s a sense of wonder that they feel, so it makes sense that that story will be told from the perspective of essentially one main character, to see things from her eyes and experience them as she would. That was the best manner of storytelling for that game.
On the flip side, the story in Trails has reached a level where we’re talking about a nation. For the size of the tale that needs to be told, it makes sense that there’d be three main characters and three stories. Personal preferences aside, I’m perfectly fine with approaching the game from whatever angle the story needs.
For many years now, fans in the west have felt like they’ve been behind Japan with a huge gap that seemed hard to deal with. Now, we’re just one step behind with Horizon. How does it feel to have the series so close to being internationally available without a gap?
I’m very sorry that we have made you guys wait for so long to get the games. Sometimes we even had to make the Japanese fans wait up to three years between releases, but it was obviously a lot different for the western fanbase.
Twenty years ago, the market was very different. It wasn’t so easy for JRPGs to sell well in the west and there wasn’t a lot of feedback about the games that were coming out. It was difficult to really gauge what level of a fanbase there was in the west, what kind of expectations there were or to hold any kind of dialogue. The market for JRPGs was just very different.
However, about ten years ago, things really began to change. As the games grow in terms of a fanbase, that means more opportunities for feedback and to understand what the western fanbase is thinking. We’re now in a position where we can see that more than we could before. We can see and understand what the fans think about these games in the west more.
In terms of a timeline, obviously the best would be to have games come out in the west day and day with Japan. But the thing is, because there’s a story focus and the story takes a long time to make, there are a lot of things to localize, but even beyond that, the writing staff is very dedicated to making sure the stories they tell are the best they can be. Even though we may have to send the game for final approval, the writers are still there making small manual changes and polishing the text. That kind of necessitates a timeline, but by the same token, we do want to continue to decrease the timeline…
[Alan Costa, NIS America representative] And we as well.
[Kondo] …and to ensure that the games come out at the very least as quickly as reasonable for the localization, from the release in Japan to the release in the west.
We’re now in a position where we can see that more than we could before. We can see and understand what the fans think about these games in the west more.
Do you feel like this has somehow affected the perception from the western public and Japanese public?
Yeah, the perception of the western public and the Japanese public are greatly changed because of this. In terms of the western players, because they’re caught up now, they know the whole story, and they can look at the whole story as it is right now, and it seems to impact them differently because they’re more familiar with it specifically on the subject of themes.
So, because there are themes like immigration, racism, wealth disparity between rich and poor, these are things the western fanbase has a lot of opinions about. They have a lot of feedback on it and a lot of it is clearer and easier to understand now for the developers, so it’s positive. On the other hand, the Japanese people aren’t as aware of the things we have talked about.
It’s an unfortunate truth that in Japan right now the number of companies working on JRPGs is decreasing. The popularity of JRPGs still exists; the companies that make them are decreasing, and this puts us in a very special spot. Hopefully, these themes that the game touches upon because it’s more current and modern, I hope the Japanese player base will also have a different perception and be more interested and want to play and offer their feedback on these things which haven’t been touched upon in JRPGs before.
In the case of Trails beyond the Horizon, it’s going to be coming out in the west, and I’m really curious to see what the western fanbase has to say about this game. Given Falcom’s place now as one of the few remaining JRPG developers, we put a lot of elements into this game, so, while it’s not exactly experimental, it does challenge a lot of the conventions in JRPGs and the conventions of what has come before overall in terms of gameplay, story and things like that. The staff and I, we’re curious to see what the fanbase has to say about this game.
A lot of the feedback we receive from the western fans is really instructive too. As Japanese developers, we don’t know the western mindset, so hearing the feedback and to see “oh, this is a sensitive topic in the west” or “this is what they’re thinking about these things” is something very interesting and instructive for the developers to then feed back into the development of the games.
The popularity of JRPGs is still existent, the companies that make them are decreasing, and this puts us in a very special spot.
On the flip side, there are also things that can frustrate us as Japanese developers, the biggest being turn-based combat. There’s a perspective that a lot of western fans have about turn-based combat… and it frustrates us because we want people to play and enjoy it because we love turn-based combat. So we need to turn it into a positive and think “what can we do to make the system interesting?” so that players in the west want to play and enjoy it too. It’s very stimulating to receive feedback from the west because it’s so different from the mindset we have as Japanese developers.
Thank you very much for taking your time and for the opportunity. Is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers about Trails beyond the Horizon and Falcom’s future plans for the series?
To talk about Trails beyond the Horizon specifically, this is obviously the latter half of the Calvard arc. you may expect a lot of the threads that started in the beginning part of Calvard to be tied up here or at least begin to be tied up. You can expect a lot of shocking things with the story, but even beyond that, this is also moving the series overall into its conclusion.
As you play the game, you’ll see things that are not only directly related to Calvard, but also the story of the continent of Zemuria itself. You’re going to see a lot of things that are going to be revealed for the very first time. A lot of the secrets that this world holds are starting to be revealed in this game. I hope players look forward to that and enjoy what they play because it’s been a long time coming.
In terms of future plans for the series, obviously there’ll be more games that come out not only in the Trails series, but also the Ys series as well. Beyond that, we even have some ideas for some new series. One of them is something I’d like to show all of the fans in the west very soon, so please look forward to what we have in our pipeline. Hopefully we can bring you more information about that along with our partners at NIS America. More than anything, we hope you continue to play and support our titles.
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