#yasumi matsuno

[acquired-stardust]

Vagrant Story Playstation 2000

[omercifulheaves]

Vagrant Story (2000)

[mendelpalace]

Development images for Final Fantasy Tactics, circa early 1996.

According to Yasumi Matsuno, the original plan was to create a real-time strategy game akin to Ogre Battle: The March of the Black Queen, but this concept was eventually scrapped.

[geekysteven]

[fostersffff]

The director of Ogre Battle and Final Fantasy Tactics telling everyone to shut the fuck up about Ogre Battle and Final Fantasy Tactics and play Unicorn Overlord is incredibly funny, and at least the second time I can think of a Japanese developer going “stop fucking talking about my games and go play a Vanillaware game, you philistines”.

[wind-caller2]

Hallo,followers!

A kind person transcribed a conversation between four game legends, including Mr. Matsuno, which was broadcast on the radio program.

enjoy😆😆😆

[actionkazimer]

I don’t have a lot of time, but I can’t just do nothing for Vagrant Story’s 25th birthday. Top of the list of games that showed me they can be more than the sum of their parts, and still some of the best art direction out there.

[genkinahito]

Vagrant Story ベイグラントストーリー (2000) Director: Yasumi Matsuno

[andnowrotfront]

i need to actually start bozja so i can experience more actually well written ffxiv politics again

[sprintingowl]

Writing A Wargame When The World's A Bastard

I think most people looking at an rpg blog are probably familiar with the "Wow! Cool Robot!" meme.

And I think to an extent all play consists of "Situations I Don't Actually Want To Be In But It's Fun To Imagine The Scenario." Even tag and hide and seek simulate escaping from a predator.

However, when I say Over War is both a wargame and a tabletop roleplaying game, I want to be a little more precise about which inspirations I'm drawing on.

Yasumi Matsuno is a name that Final Fantasy XIV players might recognize, but he has a much broader body of work with incredibly consistent themes.

Matsuno also directed and wrote Final Fantasy Tactics, designed directed and wrote Tactics Ogre, designed directed produced and wrote Vagrant Story, and created Ogre Battle, which lit a fire in my head as a child and eventually led to the creation of this game.

In a Yasumi Matsuno story, you can generally expect gothic vibes, a baroque aesthetic, and messy, multi-sided political choices that orbit around resentment, societal disenfranchisement, and a struggle for a better world.

Those themes and elements are what I'm trying to channel in Over War.

There's more than a few splashes of the usual Sprinting Owl ridiculousness (you can build a unit out of just chupacabras and goats in the uneasiest alliance any fantasy world has ever seen,) but the game centers around questions like "Should anyone ever deserve to rule a land?" and "What compromises on integrity and vengeance are you personally willing to make to achieve your goals?"

There's a sidebar at the beginning of the book making it clear that I am not trying to draw real-world parallels---I'm not smart enough to do that without messing it up---but I do want the players to think when the game hands them a thorny issue, and to reach a decision that they are ultimately comfortable with.

This is tricky to do in a game which ultimately also needs to be fun, it won't sell if it's not fun, but those are the compromises I'm making in the hopes that this game will bring enjoyment and disquiet to folks.

[acquired-stardust]

Final Fantasy Tactics Playstation 1997

[falciesystemessays]

i think a lot about Farewell To A Legend.

for those of you fake fans who haven't played Final Fantasy XII, that's the name of the last hunt quest, where you fight against the superboss Yiazmat. this name is important, but i'll get back to that. this boss is memorable for having hp in the millions. it took me hours to beat this monster, and i had to cheese it using Wither. beating this boss is not just a show of skill, but of dedication. you have to commit to beat Yiazmat, and that honestly gives it a special place in my heart.

but let's talk about the name now. Yiazmat (or Yazmat in Japanese) is named after the original lead for FF12, Yasumi Matsuno. Matsuno is an important figure for a particular kind of fantasy RPG. He directed Ogre Battle, Vagrant Story, and was the creator of the Ivalice setting used in FF12 and the Tactics games. He was very familiar with these games, and it showed for FF12, where he was both director and producer. This meant that he was both the creative lead with the vision, and the project lead making sure everything goes smoothly. An in-house interview with localization lead Alexander O Smith shows him talking particularly kindly about Matsuno's work, the level of information and worldbuilding he had ready for them.

Then he got sick and had to step down from the project. taking his place were Hiroyuki Ito at the director's seat, best known as a battle system guy and the director of FF6 and 9, and Akitoshi Kawazu in the producer's role, best known for the SaGa series. We can only speculate on how different things could've gone, but ultimately FF12 is a good-ass game, where you can feel the love in every aspect of its development. It's well-worth playing if you haven't, and in my opinion makes the perfect bridge between eras of Final Fantasy.

So let's get back to Yiazmat. After seeing Matsuno step down, the rest of the team wanted to honor him in the best way they could: By naming the biggest baddest boss fight after him, and calling the quest "Farewell To A Legend." Gonna be honest, that quest name is probably about 75% of the reason why this boss sticks out in my head so much. I plan to use that exact sentence a few decades from now on the off-chance Matsuno proves to be mortal. And like, sending a message as a game developer, that's something I want to do!

I wonder, sometimes, when I get far enough in this gamedev shit, will I get that farewell to a legend? Will my presence be missed if I leave a project? Will I be remembered as someone who mattered? All the crunch culture and layoffs and harassment in the game industry paint us as expendable, as things to be used and discarded, and I don't want to be part of that. I want to rise above that, and being a bit less selfish, I want us as a collective to rise above that. But going back to selfishness, I know somebody has to be The Guy who gets the credit. And I hope that for my work at least, I earn that. I'm only just getting started, I need a hello before a farewell. So I guess I'll start by sending my own message. Look forward to that.

[autopotion]

I've included games that he was at least either a director, writer, or producer on

[catiuapavel]

It’s always been surreal to me that people created this rumour that Vaan was inserted late into the development of FFXII and that Yasumi Matsuno’s was forced to add him in to justify their dislike of the character... All because of an early piece of concept art that was stylistically and aesthetically SO different from the character design of FF12 anyway and a piece of interview where it’s mentioned that, in an early draft of the game, they contemplated having an adult knight protagonist.

Early drafts and concepts being discarded is nothing unusual in game development (or in any kind of writing tbh). You see it on the regular, and yet this led to a 17 years myth about how Basch (who was never the knight in question) was somehow always intended to be the protagonist but, at the last minute they inserted Vaan into the game. This is taking your dislike of a character to an extreme level honestly.

And now 17 years later the former director says this rumour is baseless and you’ve still got people saying they don’t believe him because they can’t let go of their bizarre theory. At this point you have got to be normal and just accept there is no insider story explaining why you’re justified in hating Vaan. Your opinions dont need some official explanation.

[itsmissing]

Play any video games? If so any notable favs?

me and video games go way back! ask them about me, they'll totally tell you they know me. i promise.

it's funny, i was thinking about how to answer this and it turns out a lot of my favorite video games were by Yasumi Matsuno! i'd consider Final Fantasy XII one of my favorite video games of all time, and i grew up with Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen and Final Fantasy Tactics. later on, when i got a PSP, i pretty much inhaled Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together and i dropped a lotta hours on the fairly recent remaster of that title.

some non-YasMat faves include the Megaman Legends series, Pillars of Eternity 2, Okami, Risk of Rain 2, XCOM 2, the Disgaea series (up until 5), Fallout: New Vegas, and TF2 (which i've recently started playing again with some friends). there's probably a couple more that i could name but those were the ones that stood out in my noggin.

thanks for the question!

[5yn]

Yasumi Matsuno really went "I want to make a HEROINE who's NOT LIKE ALL THE OTHER GIRLS" and then wrote a character whose story arc ends with the big whopee of "Hey did you know Birthright Monarchy is Uncritically Cool and Good as long as it's a woman?"