This week's interview is with Picorinne Soft, a development team that consists of two brothers. They have released a few games over the years, with the most notable being the arcade style Infinos series. In Part 1 of the interview, we talk about their latest demo, Infinos Gaiden.
An Interview with Picorinne Soft, Part 1
Interview by: Douglas Schules; Translation by: Douglas Schules Daedalus Machine At Comiket 91, I picked up the trial version of Infinos Gaiden. Can you tell us a bit about the game?
Picorinne Soft My team had previously made a shooting game series called Infinos. The trial version of Infinos Gaiden distributed at C91 is the 4th game in the series. We came up with the plot while making Infinos 2. DM Based on where your booth was in Comiket, I first thought that Infinos Gaiden might be a danmaku style game, but the gameplay and graphics remind me more of classics in the genre of Gradius. What genre do you see this game and why? PS In designing the original Infinos series, I wanted to reproduce the feeling of shooting games from the 80s and 90s. For that reason, the gameplay and graphics should also be reminiscent of the games at arcades of that period. If you want to get picky about classifying game genres, the game is a side-scroller, but because recently there is also the distinction between danmaku and non-danmaku, it might be considered a "non-bullet hell side-scrolling shooter". But in my own personal opinion as developer, I think it's simply a "shooting game" or "side scrolling shooter". That's because the genre can be readily understood through a quick look at the images or animation, even if we don't talk about the many subdivisions in a genre.
DM Earlier I mentioned that the game reminds me of Gradius. In what ways did this game or similar ones, like R-Type, influence Infinos Gaiden? PS There's a huge influence. I also happen to prefer those style of games myself. DM The game I played was obviously a demo, so what ideas do you plan to implement for the finished version of the game? PS I think that the latest version will be more finely tuned, but in terms of the overall engine and gameplay it's pretty much complete. DM How long did it take you to develop the demo of Infinos Gaiden? PS I think it took about half a year. Because it's necessary in the first stages of production to also design non-content aspects of the game, like the game system and opening demo, it takes a bit longer than simply designing stages. DM What elements do you think are necessary for a good game? PS I think that depends on the person but, for me, overall balance is important. What I mean by game balance is that none of the elements that comprise a game -- the gameplay, graphics, background music, and sound effects -- are inferior to the others, or that when gathered together none of them stick out. Games aren't pictures or music. A "game" is the collective sum of all of these elements. DM Where did you apply these to Infinos Gaiden? PS In the case of graphics, I think it's more important that the assets match the overall game rather than drawing them beautifully. For that reason, when I'm drawing the assets I focus on how they move on screen, and redraw them to fit the stage when making additional adjustments to the game. I repeat this with graphic and sound effects so that the overall game coherent.
DM I’m interested in hearing about the music for the game. A lot of times developers focus on graphics or gameplay, but a good soundtrack is really essential to the success of a small demo like this one. How important do you think music is to games? PS As I said before, a game needs balance between gameplay, graphics, background music, and sound effects. Music is one of the compositional pillars of a game. If this game didn't have background music, for example, I don't think I could release it. DM Can you tell us anything about the role the BGM plays in this game? PS I didn't put any letters or demo in the middle of the stages. Because of this, it is necessary to convey the feeling of the story and the world to the players through its graphics and music. So, the music in this game has become the element that produces both realism and tension in the game. DM Can you tell me a little about your circle? For example, how long have you existed, where are you located, how many members, their roles, what games you've made? PS This Circle began with the release of Infinos, which was free, in 2013. So, we've been around for about 4 years. As for the number of members, there's two of us: me and my older brother. I'm making the shooting games, and my brother is making RPGs. Up until now, the games we have released have been the Infinos series, the vertical scroller Battle Crust, and the training RPG Disc Creatures. While we have never made a game together yet, we ask each other’s opinion, and when something we're working on is nearing completion the two of us play test the game and make any final adjustments. DM How does your circle decide the games it designs? PS We don't really have any specific process. I guess I could say that we are shaping our favorite games that we imagine. Around that lies the strength of doujin games, and even in the future we plan to move forward designing things we thought we'd want to make. DM What plans does the circle have for the future? PS Because we're still in a trial and error phase, our goal for the time being is simply to continue to make games and release them in the future. DM The opening credits of Infinos Gaiden is entirely in English – there’s no Japanese. Given that the majority of people who would buy the game at Comiket cannot read English, this is an interesting choice. Why did you decide to do this? PS That's because we wanted to make an arcade style game. And English is pretty common in the introduction demo and ending credits, not just for shooting games, but arcade games too. So when the player starts the game and sees the scrolling English text, the purpose is to get them to think, "This is like an arcade game". And because none of the game contents need to be in Japanese specifically, having it in English lets people outside of Japan play too. DM While many games at Comiket now have both English and Japanese language options, most companies use a service, like Playism, to translate the game. Did you use something like this or produce it in house? PS We didn't use any service like that for this game. However, the story of Infinos Gaiden recycles the story of Infinos 2, and Playism did do the English translation for that.
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