Found this cool little article that escaped my radar last month. Gives some amusing background info about one of the unsung heroes of Square/Squenix, namely the awesome localization and translation work by Alexander Smith.
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Found this cool little article that escaped my radar last month. Gives some amusing background info about one of the unsung heroes of Square/Squenix, namely the awesome localization and translation work by Alexander Smith.
I didn't even know this guy worked for Square. I just knew about his contribution to Ace Attorney!
It is kind of sad that this needed to be settled xDQuote:
RPGSite: Whilst we are discussing the world of Spira, perhaps you can settle a debate fans have been having since release. The scene where Tidus and Yuna are laughing – was it deliberately that awkward? Some believe it is while others think it is just bad.
Alex: Yeah. According to Kazushige Nojima, it was based on an exercise he did in acting class...other than that, I don’t know what to say, other than I think that James Arnold Taylor and Hedy Burress did an amazing job making it as un-painful as possible.
Ahahaha I love this guy.Quote:
RPGSite: Before we move on, you also worked on the music of Final Fantasy X - you wrote the English lyrics for ‘Otherworld’, another brave but successful departure for Square Enix. Can you tell us about the genesis of that particular song and whether you had a hand in translating any songs for X-2?
Alex: The song came to me almost fully formed from Nobuo Uematsu, with a guide track to indicate where the lyrics were to go. The lyrics were loosely based on The Song of Wandering Aengus by W. B. Yeats, and the singer, Bill Muir, was the frontman of a death metal band active in Tokyo at the time. Interestingly enough, the spoken section in the middle of the song was originally just going to be a guitar solo, but the temporary base track Uematsu had inserted sounded just like the guide track used elsewhere to indicate lyrics, albeit more staccato, so I assumed it was one of those Limp Bizkit-style breakdowns and wrote in words. Uematsu was gracious enough to include the unintended results!
Quote:
RPGSite:
No wonder that I lost interest in XII's story part way through the game. The main whose focus was on that part had left halfway through.Quote:
I mentioned the Ivalice Alliance earlier on, which boasts Final Fantasy XII among its number. The game had a troubled development, so do you have any knowledge of what happened when Yasumi Matsuno suddenly left the development team?
Alex: I believe the company line is that Matsuno had to leave for health reasons, and that rings true enough to me. I think the team did a remarkable and commendable job of filling in the void left when he departed, while keeping that essential Matsuno-character of the game intact.
RPGSite: Despite their efforts, would you agree that losing the ‘father’ of the game midway through development led to the second half of XII’s story being weaker than the beginning?
Alex: There are so many factors that can influence a game’s story, it’s really impossible to know what parts of the game were affected in what way by Matsuno’s departure.
They don't exactly make the story up as they go along, just because someone left chronologically half way through the development process doesn't mean that they primarily worked on the first half of the story.
I haven't played the game since it came out, but my only real problem with the story ended up being the twist with the (SPOILER)Occuria. I actually really preferred the human political-ish story. I don't really chalk any of that up to Matsuno's absence though. That part of the plot probably would have went down no matter what.
Yeah, I think the whole point of Smith's response is that you can't tell what parts or how much of Matsuno's vision was missed, I'm sure like movies, a lot of game developers finish later parts of the game/story as they're dealing with earlier parts, or even beforehand.
Really fascinating read, and I'm actually kinda glad him and Joe (also a cool dude) are moving on to the development side of things. That said, I hope they don't fail on that end and get disappointed. Some things I thought were interesting:
- even developers on FFX-2 had a "WTF" moment with the light-hearted departure from the first game's more serious tone. Very sad that Smith admitted that he had to justify it in his own mind...
- mentioning Erik Wolpaw at Valve as someone he respects... I don't know much about who he is or what else he's done, but I interviewed him about Portal 2 and the guy is a huge asshole.
- I definitely think he and other contributors to the FFXII project are under non-disclosure agreements about what really happened with Matsuno's departure. The fact that after all these years he has to put forth the self-described "company line" means there's probably some kind of legal obligation here. Either an NDA about the situation, something that he can never reveal unsettling info about SE, or just a general wish to continue doing business and creatively collaborating with the company.
- "The Laughing Scene." I always assumed this was intentional, and I was surprised to see people on the internet who honestly believe it wasn't, although Smith's comments here gave it some credence...
- just how big FFX's "I love you" is as a first for the series and a monumental decision at the time. Nojima also scores points for being excited about the idea, "giving them something to talk about."
- creating the Al-Bhed language.
Personally I wished they spent more time on his most recent collaboration with Matsuno, Tactics Ogre, but I guess there's really not much to say, as Smith said in the article it's always just consistently solid stuff.