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Buffy - Wrath of the Darkhul King - Interview with developers Natsume
Beginning on Buffy
How did you come to produce this game?
Natsume have been worked on many THQ titles since 1999. While Power Rangers was in development, THQ asked us to develop Buffy.
The first software we developed in the US market was WWF for GameBoy Color five years ago. We have learnt many things over five years, and we have been improving our techniques. Through the different games we worked on, we have improved our construction of the game concept.
We think the techniques come after the story. We pay more attention to the concept of the game, how we can show Buffy's character to the player, etc. Once we work out how we want to express these thing on the GameBoy Advance screen, then we work on the technique.
Go west
What are the differences between Western and Japanese gamers?
The biggest differences are to how players see the games.
Western players prefer to experience the game world through the character's eye. On the other hand, Japanese players can enjoy the experience both as if they are the characters and through the character's eye.
Natsume are quite a family-oriented publisher. How does the Buffy game fit in to this?
Our focus is always kids. We hope they dream of becoming heroes through our games.
A beautiful young girl, Buffy, defeats enemies and by not giving up her fate of being a slayer she becomes a hero. It is a different pattern from the usual kids' action game. Buffy is a vampire slayer; yet she is a fighter to save people.
All about timing
How do you feel about producing a Buffy game just as the show itself ends?
We think that Buffy is well known amongst all. Even with the series ended, Buffy is so popular that we don't think that it should impact our game.
We thought it would be fun to put in a lot of heroes from the series, and we tried to keep all the characteristics of Buffy's friends.
The boss characters are the real ones from the show, so Buffy fans can get the entire atmosphere of the show. The script itself was written for the GameBoy Advance only.
How did you choose which bosses to have?
We could only have four bosses because of many rules for developing on the GameBoy Advance. The idea when choosing the boss is to get the one that gives the stronger impression, keeping in mind the specific features used for defeating bosses.
Thumb-bender
Tell us a little about the gameplay.
It is an action game but we tried not to be too action oriented. It not only feels good to defeat enemies, but also feel fun to solve puzzles, like putting together the same signs, buttons you have to hit by numbers and so on.
The puzzles are important for stages where it is hard to battle with no weapons. Then Buffy becomes much stronger for boss attacks.
There are some combination attacks that Buffy can do, like a rolling spin kick and back spinning punch. You can use these techniques by pushing buttons together, such as A+A+B. And you have Buffy's ability to use a broken piece of something to beat enemies with - a bench or barrel or something.
The story in itself is the most difficult part. Problems come from transporting real 3D life into a small side-scrolling 2D world. We needed to keep the balance between the background and the size of the characters.
We had to show the conversation scene every once in a while to help players get some idea of the story. However, you do not wish to show too many of that because it is a game, and you don't want to see a movie on the GameBoy Advance, you want to enjoy playing a game.