Fantasian Neo Dimension - Interview

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An interview with Mistwalker CEO Hironobu Sakaguchi on the PlayStation Blog:

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A wide ranging interview with the Father of Final Fantasy to mark his latest title's launch on PS5.

Fantasian Neo Dimension launched December 5 on PS5 and PS4. This Mistwalker RPG features the creative work of two industry icons, both legends in the genre. First, there's composer Nobuo Uematsu, who has lent his talents to the game's score, the last full game soundtrack he'll produce solo, capping off an incredible 30-plus years of work. Last week, he walked us through just some of his favorite pieces.

Today, we talk to the second creative force involved, game producer and Mistwalker CEO Hironobu Sakaguchi. The creator joined us earlier this year on PS Blog to discuss the game's PS5 release. Our new chat, which you can hear in full on the Official PlayStation Podcast later today, casts the net wider to discuss his thoughts on the RPG genre, his long term working partnership with Uematsu-san, and marking both Mistwalker's 20th anniversary and PlayStation's 30th.

Playstation Blog: You're well regarded for your work in the RPG field, and RPGs are known for compelling team ups with disparate characters. For you, what makes a great character party?

Hironobu Sakaguchi: You want your cast of characters to have a wide range of both personality and diverse backgrounds, different character settings and stories. As they traverse this world and go on their adventure, I think seeing the shift and change in characters is one of the most attractive things you can experience as a player of an RPG.

On the game mechanics side, of course, which is equally important, specifically in Fantasian Neo Dimension, each character has their own rather unique set of attributes. Some characters might be more heavily skewed in defense, others might be more adept at magic, or some might do DPS, in the form of physical attacks. But that unique attribute or element that they bring to the table, in combat is going to become invaluable. So in Fantasian Neo Dimension, you can swap out your party and team members without consuming one of your turns, which makes your team composition and combat quite dynamic.

PSB: The game features wonderful, hand-crafted dioramas. Where did they end up? Did you adopt any for your own home?

Sakaguchi: The dioramas, rather unfortunately, over time, the paint will chip, and a lot of the clay will melt, and overall, they just simply will deteriorate over time. By the nature of how they're crafted, so very few have kind of survived as is, and it's impossible to store it. So the ones that have were either preserved and given to different players as a giveaway or presented to team members, core team members who worked on the game, and we did save a good portion of the props in each individual diorama, and those have been transformed into those gifts. But by and large, the so-called base, or a lot of the structural elements of these dioramas had to unfortunately be disposed of. So I would say most of the dioramas you see in Fantasian Neo Dimension are no longer in this world, and I understand that that might seem a little melancholy, and almost fleeting in a way, but there is some kind of poetic beauty in that as well.

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