Iwata Asks - Xenoblade Chronicles X

An Abundant Game

Iwata

Finally, I would like to have Takahashi-san talk about what he would like players to see.

Takahashi

This being the very first HD¹⁷ game from Monolith Soft, we started by forming a team, and delving into experimental development. We first decided that the key pillar would be making it an open world. We continued on development deciding that we wanted to make the robots (Skells) another key pillar. But along the way, we adopted the notion of having the game loosely connected online, and that became our mantra. We changed the main protagonist to an avatar, and had to abandon many of the things we had built up to that point. 17. HD: High Definition. This is used to describe a visual resolution that has many pixels, over 720 scanning lines, and an aspect ratio of 16:9.

Kojima

(With a deep sigh) Yeah, we threw it all away.

Takahashi

We reignited the project from there, and worked on shaping the game so it could fit into a mold that we were envisioning. Everyone was extremely passionate, and I feel the game is an end product that is essentially a crystallization of all the blood that was shed and tears that were wept during development.

Iwata

You made your last game burning bridges, and now you made a game that's a crystallization of your blood and tears.

Takahashi

Yeah. I talked about the last game with you in the Iwata Asks interview we had the other day. With the last game, even though we balanced out the y-axis (story) and the x-axis (game system), it was still quite a linear role-playing game.

Iwata

It was by no means a single-path game, but the direction of the game was mostly predetermined.

Takahashi

But not this time. We took everything we had at Monolith Soft to make a non-linear game with a strong focus on the x-axis.

Iwata

By making it an online game, it became non-linear, and as a result of that you now have a lot more freedom.

Takahashi

Right. I also think we were able to express a game with a great sense of abundance. For example, the main story itself is actually shorter than Xenoblade Chronicles. But when you combine all the story elements including the side quests, the amount of text in the new game far surpasses that of the previous game.

Iwata

The two writers were able to help you with that.

Takahashi

Right, and on top of that, each of the characters became really unique. All the adventure, exploration and leveling aspects add to that, and because of that the gameplay experience will be different for each player. Even the memories that are going to be created as you play will be different, so I hope people play the game exploring those aspects.

Kojima

That's also something I want to really say, too...this is a game that you can play very proactively.

Iwata

I feel that a lot, too. The gameplay is very proactive, not reactive.

Kojima

There's a lot you can do in this game, and I want the players to decide what they want to do and where they want to go depending on their own preferences. So as Takahashi-san said, the experience and memories that are going to be made should be vastly different depending on the player. It's not a game where you can get the same exact result regardless of who plays it.

Iwata

It's become quite an abundant game in a sense that the experience can be so different depending on who plays it.

Kojima

That's right. I think that's the best part about this game.

Takahashi

We're pretty confident about that.

Kojima

Yeah, we're actually quite confident about it.

Iwata

Thank you. The reason why Xenoblade Chronicles X became such an abundant game was probably in part due to the sheer volume of ideas that were brought up between the developers during development. Of course, Takahashi-san, there's no doubt you spent a tremendous amount of energy laying the groundwork and created the overarching flow, but all the ideas didn't just come from you.

Takahashi

You're absolutely right.

Iwata

Different ideas from all sorts of people that went into the game were built upon the groundwork that Takahashi-san laid, and with certain criteria, what would work in the game and what wouldn't had been determined. I assume that Kojima-san has made a number of these decisions.

Kojima

That's right.

Iwata

So the reason this became such an abundant game was because you were able to pick only what suited the game the best out of the large amount of ideas that everyone came up with.

Kojima

I really think so. Not everything in the game has Takahashi-san's colors in it. A lot of staff members' different tastes can be seen throughout the game. But that's not saying everything is bundled in without order. Takahashi-san positioned everything in place, making sure it all fit in harmoniously. At Monolith Soft, we believe our strength is that we can make games that don't just have a single tone. We're able to make games that are quite multifaceted.

Iwata

I'm sure our customers pick up on things like that.

Kojima

Yeah, if people play the game they will understand things like what kind of a person a writer is who wrote a specific part of the game. Every once in a while there are games that let you see through them and get a glimpse of the developers, which are games I like quite a lot. I hope Xenoblade Chronicles X becomes one of those games.

Iwata

All right, thank you all very much. Now, there's one more thing I'd like to tell you about.

Takahashi

Sure.

Iwata

Yokota

Sure.

Iwata

So, a poll was held by a game publication's website²¹ where they asked what games the readers were excited for now that The Legend of Zelda for Wii U isn't coming out in 2015. I'm talking about a website in America. 21. Game publication's website = Game Informer: A monthly video game publication based in Minnesota. After publishing their first volume in 1991, they currently have over 7 million paid subscribers. This poll was conducted on their website.

Takahashi

Right.

Iwata

Xenoblade Chronicles X was number 1!

Everyone

Oh wow!

Iwata

I think it's amazing that people mentioned Xenoblade Chronicles X.

Kojima

I feel so grateful.

Iwata

Since the game is first coming out in Japan, it will be released in America well after everything about the game has been revealed to the public. That raises the hurdle, but on the flipside, if everyone who plays the game in Japan talks about how much they enjoyed the game world, and how their experiences were different from one another, that would be something great for the western audience to hear. If people outside of Japan hear a lot of positive news about the game, I feel like we can throw an answer to the question of what the future holds for JRPGs. It would be this game, this is the answer to that question, in the form of a video game.

Takahashi

That's right.

Iwata

As of this interview, the game is yet to be released in Japan and we're still trickling out promotional videos, but we already have people overseas talking positively about the title. This is because, as Takahashi-san described earlier, you all put in so much energy that the game virtually became a crystallization of everyone's blood and tears, and people overseas noticed. I think they'll all be excited for the day when they will be able to roam the vast field to their hearts' content and fly a Skell high in the sky to see the world from above.

Takahashi

Right.

Iwata

You've all finally come this far, overcoming many obstacles. I'm sure, like me, that you all can't wait to see the customers' reactions once they start playing.

Takahashi

Yeah, we're really excited.

Iwata

Everyone, thank you for such hard work over a long period of time.

Everyone

Thank you!