PSOW Takao Miyoshi Interview at E3

[Ryna]

As the title said, PSO-World is going to be at E3 next week and will have the chance to interview Takao Miyoshi! In case you don't know who Takao Miyoshi is, he is the director for Phantasy Star Universe and Phantasy Star Online. Tomeeboy will have the opportunity to sit down with Miyoshi-san and ask him questions about PSU and PSO. To celebrate this rare opportunity, PSO-World would like to include some user-submitted questions. So if you could post your questions in this thread, we'll pick out the best ones to include in the interview session. The questions can be about PSU or PSO, but we'd like to focus on PSU.

[Sinue_v2]

This is real early, since PSU itself isn't even out yet - but I'd like to hear what he has to say about what he thinks the future holds for Phantasy Star as a franchise. Do they plan on making episodic future updates to the same base PSU game like they did with PSO? Will they be full sequels with completely new 40-hour RPG offline modes? Will PSU be a one-off stepping stone to the next Phantasy Star game?

Where does he see Phantasy Star going in the next generation? Will there be any room for Reiko Kodama or Tohru Yoshida in any future Phantasy Star/Phantasy Star Universe projects provided they're not too busy with Skies of Arcadia 2.

[Parn]

My only question is one of curiousity... when did development of Phantasy Star Universe officially take off? I have speculations as to when, but those are speculations based on rumors.

Also Sinue, check your PMs. It's psuedo important.

[voxie]

The clothing and character styles in PSU and PSO have always stood out against other games, being sort of psuedo fantasy, flowery science fiction, as well as modern "Harajuku" style.

I'd like to know what kind of things inspired the costume design behind the games, especially with PSU?

[Reystradamus]

i wanna know 1.release date confirmed
2.is the xbox 360 servers really gonna be separated
3.will north america be able to play with the japanese and europe players.
4.to keep up the good work and to have a good day

[Neith]

I'd love to know the ideas behind the beast race, since it's sounding like a great choice.

Nanoblasts seem quite extreme for what us PSO players were used to- was there any particular inspiration behind the idea of Nanoblasts?



<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: UrikoBB3 on 2006-05-03 17:32 ]</font>

[kyori]

My current question(s) so far.. :

What will the japanese release date be? Considering that there's a estimated US time window for the X360 version, the japanese release should be very soon.

Will content between both regions be released the same time or will the japanese version always be one step ahead?

Why is it that SegaLink does not accept foreign credit cards? Will they start to accept foreign credit cards?

Will online voices be dubbed in english? Are they going to offer dual language tracks?

Will closed beta participants will able to keep their characters?


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: kyori on 2006-05-03 17:45 ]</font>


<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: kyori on 2006-05-03 17:55 ]</font>

[Velocity_7]

1. Will Paypal be accepted as a payment option? Maybe internet banking? (e.g., CIBC, Royal Bank of Canada, etc. support internet banking)
2. Will Japanese and North American servers be linked?
3. Will auto-frameskipping be implemented? (at the moment the frameskip system is the same as PSO Blue Burst, involving constant frameskipping)
4. How much of a challenge was it to fine tune things like the physics engine for more realistic character and monster movements?
5. If we make characters in Extra mode, and decide to make new characters in Online mode, is there a way to copy the designs exactly from Extra mode? And can this be done in reverse as well?
6. You've said that the PC and PS2 versions of Phantasy Star Universe will be linked. Will this mean that, if I had a single account, I could use it on both the PC and PS2 versions of the game?
7. Will there be something like a 90-second power suit transformation for humans? Not as strong as Nanoblast but it'd at least give humans something! (stupid question, if you don't want to add this ignore it )

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Velocity_7 on 2006-05-05 19:00 ]</font>

[DeathMachine]

What was the inspiration for the new battle system? Did he look at PSO, and say, "Hmmm...something just isn't right. What can we do to make this more fun?"

[Sinue_v2]

I'd love to know the ideas behind the beast race, since it's sounding like a great choice.

This one can actually be answered now, since Miyoshi has commented about it in the EGM debut of the game. The Beast race was inspired by the Motavians of the original series.



Miyoshi felt that since there were multiple planets, there should be multiple alien races inhabiting them. As the game structure evolved - so did the concept of Motavians, and we eventually ended up with the BeastMen - who look vaugely Motavian when in beast-form.