"Letter from the Producer #17: Rallying (Part 3) & How it Started (Part 15)
Hello there. I'm Masaru Saito, the producer of Brigandine Abyss.
Today I'd like to continue talking about the Rally mechanic I touched on in previous letters.
When a leader unit and a monster unit group up, this is called Rallying, and it allows the leader unit to gain the Rally Trait of the chosen monster. This time, I'd like to talk about the trait of a particular monster, the Ash Wolf.
As a Wolf-type monster, the Ash Wolf is agile and excels at direct attacks. When a leader uses Rally on an Ash Wolf, they will gain the ""Continued Movement"" trait.
With this trait, a unit can use any remaining movement points to move again after using a skill, such as an attack.
As you can see in this video (at around 00:15), one of the most obvious uses for this trait is attacking, then immediately retreating to a safe position.
I've talked about enough unrelated stuff the last couple days, so let's get back to ""Brigandine Abyss: How it Started"".
After having a number of meetings with Adglobe Inc. regarding the development of Brigandine Abyss, they mentioned that Makoto Yamamoto (the director of the Sengoku Basara games) was going to be the lead director of the project.
I ended up meeting Mr. Yamamoto for the first time in an online meeting, and I remember being very nervous ahead of it.
I mean, this is the man responsible for famous games like the Sengoku Basara series!
What if I said something weird and made him uncomfortable? Would I be able to clearly explain my ideas for Brigandine?
You might not believe it, but I'm actually pretty timid.
But he turned out to be really friendly, and I relaxed as soon as I started talking with him.
Mr. Yamamoto ended up being a tremendous help all throughout the development of the game, but I'll save those stories for another time.
I'm participating in Bitsummit in Kyoto today as well. Tomorrow's stage event starts at 10:40 (JST).
Despite being timid, I tend to get carried away when I get on stage. I'll do my best to stick to the script this time!
(To be continued in the next letter.)"
"Letter from the Producer #18: Alysbelle & How it Started (Part 16)
Hello there. I'm Masaru Saito, the producer of Brigandine Abyss.
Today, I'll be talking about Alysbelle, one of the main characters of the game.
She's the protagonist of Purifanoe's story mode.
A young girl living in the faerie country of Purifanoe, Alysbelle gets drawn into the war breaking out across the continent.
As she fights against the Novus Imperium, certain secrets about Alysbelle herself begin to come to light.
People's preferences are subjective when it comes to the types of characters and stories they like, so I can't speak with total certainty,
but I think out of the six scenarios in the main story mode, Purifanoe's may end up being the most popular.
Either way, I certainly hope you enjoy it.
Now, let's continue from where we left off with ""Brigandine Abyss: How it Started"".
When it came time to plan out the strategic combat system, Adglobe Inc. was able to procure help from Mr. Masayuki Horikawa.
Mr. Horikawa has been involved with games like ""Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance"" and ""Redemption Reapers"".
I first met with Mr. Horikawa in an online meeting, but eventually I was able to meet with him in person, and we ended up talking at length about all sorts of stuff.
Similar to the situation with Mr. Yamamoto, I was very nervous at first, but, again, I relaxed as soon as I realized how friendly Mr. Horikawa was.
He even talked to me about the job experiences he had before ending up in the video game industry.
I've come to realize there's a surprising number of people who enter the game industry after working in completely different fields.
Several of my acquaintances have similar stories.
I've job-hopped a lot myself, but that's a story for another time.
(To be continued in the next letter.)"
"Letter from the Producer #19: ZOC & Our Steam Demo!
Hello there. I'm Masaru Saito, the producer of Brigandine Abyss.
Today I'd like to talk about a concept used in many strategy games: ZOC.
ZOC stands for zone of control, and it's one of the mechanics in Brigandine Abyss' combat system.
(In Japanese we pronounce the term like ""zoh-ku"", but I'm not sure how you say it in English...)
ZOC refers to the six adjacent tiles surrounding any single unit and the limitations imposed on enemy units' movement when moving through these six tiles.
By positioning your units in a way that makes good use of ZOC, you can impede the movement of advancing enemies.
In Brigandine Abyss, certain units can ignore an opponent's ZOC, so be careful.
If someone is talking about a strategy game and you say, ""Oh yeah? Does this game even have ZOC?"" you'll come across like a true strategy game buff, so give it a try.
Some of you might already be aware, but we released a demo on Steam yesterday (May 25th).
You can experience the prologue for the Gran Dragnica and Scarlet Will stories, so if you've got the time, please give it a try.
The demo contains battles, so you can experience zones of control for yourself.
Tell your friends about it, and use the opportunity to impress them with your newfound knowledge of zones of control!
""Did you try the Brigandine Abyss demo? Yeah, I beat that one battle by using ZOC to block the enemy's units. Huh? You don't even know what ZOC is? Zone of control, baby, zone of control, sheesh!""
(To be continued in the next letter.)"
"Letter from the Producer #20: Zeilzarde & How it Started (Part 17)
Hello there. I'm Masaru Saito, the producer of Brigandine Abyss.
I'll be talking a little about Zeilzarde today.
He's the protagonist of Mysteine's story mode.
Zeilzarde leads the queen's knights and is the Chief Commander of Mysteine's forces. He's a true man's man. Even after being cursed when he blocks a magical attack meant for Queen Mysfaene, he refuses to give up and keeps fighting!
He's awkward but kind-hearted, and very caring towards his subordinates. He's especially awkward around women! But he's cool! And he's 46 years old!
This character stems from my desire to have a middle-aged man as a protagonist!
During the scenario writing process I pleaded with the writers... ""Please, make one of the protagonists a middle-aged man, just one...""
What can I can say, I wanted a main character who was close to my own age.
Now, let's continue from where we left off with ""Brigandine Abyss: How it Started"".
The lead character designers for the game are Junko Kawano and Niji Hayashi.
I'll explain how I came to work with Ms. Kawano.
Ms. Kawano's illustrations are very lively and dynamic, with this overall vivacious quality to them, and I had her in mind as a character designer from the outset of this Brigandine project.
Contacting her about this was surprisingly simple.
A game that Ms. Kawano had worked on as a character designer happened to be among the library of games that Happinet has distributed.
Using our company's internal network, I reached out to the company that had created that game and got in contact with Ms. Kawano.
There are so many different ways to contact creators, but this time I was able to rely on a Happinet-exclusive method.
(To be continued in the next letter.)"