Well, it's Amano Day. With very few exceptions, my mailbag today was stocked with thoughts about Yoshitaka Amano, maestro of the watercolor and the guy who designed the characters in G-Force. Oh, and some Final Fantasy games too, but who cares about them anyway? For anyone curious, he has an oh-so-humbly entitled homepage at http://www.thinklikeamano.com. Cool beans for fans of his, such as yours truly. I swear to god, I'm a hair's breadth away from buying a copy of Kartia just for the character portraits. The fact that I actually quite liked some of the characters didn't hurt either, though. Go Kun! I believe in you, man! But I digress. There's a lot of artistic commentary today, so pull out your berets and brushes, and let's get to it. | Thinking Like Amano | Allan, Can this be happening?! People turning on Yoshitaka Amano?!! I haveto say, these people must be stopped! Ignorance is killing them! Withoutknowing and seeing his works, how do they have a right to judge him?!!He's done more than just character designs and video games. Let's lookat Animation. Any one hear of a little anime/ novel series known asVampire Hunter D?!! How about Angel's Egg. G-Force anyone?! This man isbrilliant! But he doesn't stop that, not at all! I have a book of hisart which I got when his Manhatten Gallery first opened, infact Icovered it for Square.net. Seeing all he has done, much more than justgames, it was incredible -- beyond words. But that's just me. Perhaps others have a different opinion. Iremind you that while he has been doing some art for FFVIII and others,he is also doing other things as well. Upon arriving here, he beganworking on two new animations, plus 1001 Nights, the Filmharmonic. Healso has done several paintings based on New York. Has anyone seen hisNew York Nights paintings? I'm going on and on here, back to the point. I have noticed similarities between characters like Kaien(Cyan) andRimiuzan, although I've not seen the in-game works of Kartia. One reasonone may mistake his characters to be similar is that Amano does almostall of his work with a feminine feel. Basically, most of his characters,both in Video games, and in his other works look somewhat female. Finally, reguarding the quality of the artwork Amano has done, Iremind everyone that there is a reason that they are called charactersketches. Oh, and I agree that improving the translation style would benice. Aside from Xenogears, it has been hard to find a Square gamerecentally that has been very memorable. FF VII certainly hasn't, atleast not on the same level as Xenogears and FF VI. -Ben Helmer |
Every single compliment you gave Amano's work couldn't be more true! Everything about it is a bit of the fantastic, and it contains a level of detail that is my eternal envy (I've wanted to draw like him for a long time). Furthermore, everything is so exotic, especially the clothing that his characters wear. Who can forget Terra's paisley tights or Locke's snazzy bandanna? His artwork is surreal, reminding more imaginitive people of living in a dream world. All his characters look supernatural, but at the same time, they retain an incredible amount of humanity, such that they almost have souls of their own. To see his pictures is to hear the symphony of life, I say. He has successfully blended manga style, impressionism, surrealism, and a whole slew of other relevant genres. The man is a genius! And let's not forget G-Force! The classic anime series with guys in bird helmets! Who could forget that? -Chemical Demigod |
Dear double agent ?!?!?!? AMANO SUCKS?!?!?! Some people have something called imagination,amano is one of these folks. Tetsuya has a nice style but it looks just likeanyone elses (although it is better than MK) Tifa and Rinoa are practicallythe same person with the same personality description! I still think Sephirothwas the peak of his designs (AWESOME) but still never came near to thezaniness created by Golbez and the undisputed king of crazy kefka (he wascrazy and got crazier, little depth there but so what?). And what about Cid?Look at what Tetsuyas done to him! he's a bigger dork than FF6! Tetsuyas artis ok but not very original. Signed Me |
As I said, quite a load of letters. This is only half of what I received, so I had to pick and choose a bit. Suffice to say that there's some serious disagreement on Mr. Amano's style. Interestingly, one writer accused Amano's work of being repetetive, with characters looking exactly the same in each game. And they cited Akira Toriyama as a counter-example... | Writers for video game scripts? | I often see people complain about translations in video games, and the problemlies, often, not with the translator, but the English language. Why you ask?Because conversational English often defys all logical grammer, and can bequite repetative. In order to emphasize certain things we repeat them. "Ican't do it... I JUST CAN'T DO IT...." and the like. In Japaneseconversation, such repition is not reallynecessary. Now a translator reads a text in Japanese and translates it wordfor word. What you end with would be rather humdrum at best. So thetranslator does his best to "jazz it up" and the script usually goes throughthe hands of a natural English speaker. Unfortunatly, it is often true thatniether the translator's nor the natural English speaker are very talentedwriters, so the dialogue often comes out seeming very unrealistic... and thetranslators attempts at conversational English often end up with severalcompletly unneccesisary (sp?) grammatical errors. What needs to be done??Get writers of real value in translating posistions?? Why won't this be done?A truly talented writer would probably not want to work as a translator. Agree, or disagree or what not... just supplying my two cents.... -Will |
The difficulty with translations is that, for most companies, there's a balance between speed of release and quality trying to be made. In the gaming industry, delays can be very, very costly to companies, and getting games out in a timely fashion is crucial. As a result, time spent localizing the game may not be all that was hoped for. What's the old horror story about Ted Woolsey's experience translating Secret of Mana? Six weeks or something? If companies could, economically, justify delays in the release of games so they could get the translations absolutely perfect and conversational and wonderful, which their staff could probably do given time, they would do so. But it's a tough business world and a tougher market, so corners get cut, and nobody refuses to buy a game because the translation is lousy. (Obvious counter-example to the above: Working Designs. Like, duh.) | Super Dodgeball Fans Unite! | Allan, you have the best taste in videogames...EVER! Super Dodgeball isstill one of my favorite games too. I also liked Super Spike V-Ball, avery Super Dodgeball-like volleyball game. -Brud |
Strange but true story: prior to the development of GIA, AK and I were semi-seriously batting around the idea of making a page devoted to Tecmos, developers of such classics as Super Dodgeball, River City Ransom, and Crash 'n the Boys Street Challenge. It remains the coolest project I never quite got around to. | Fighting crime in a future time | Since the success of FF7 a lot of RPGs have copied the enviroment ofthis game. We are seeing a trend to locate the games in ahalf-futuristic, half-fantasy/medieval worlds(Thousand Arms,ShadowMadness,Lufia III,(Xenogears,not so obvious),Star Ocean and so on.I am not saying that we have to stick to the tipical medieval worlds,but I fear that developers are more concerned about the quality of thegraphics than trying to develop original designs.About other things, I disagree with hte opinion of Andrew Kauffmann: Ithink DQ7 will be released in the US, If a game not so charismatic(StarOcean) is going to be released, why not the flagship of Enix?I would like to say that suikoden has got the best written and developedstory, whta makes the game much shorter. AndrÚs Macâas |
Mixing of technology and fantasy elements for RPG worlds really isn't anything new. It's been going on since WarMech popped up in FF1, and aside from the pretty much all sword 'n sorcery Dragon Quest series, most RPGs dabble in this area to some degree. Some have guns, many have ancient technological treasures of the Ancient, Advanced Civilization du jour, and so on. And, for designers, freely drawing what they like from both the magical and the technological worlds is quite a handy and liberating tool. I mean, a guy with a sword is cool. A guy with a gun is cool. But a guy with a sword that's also a gun? That's ginchy, baby. As for Dragon Quest VII, there are a few things hampering its release. For one thing, while DQ remains a mighty series in Japan, it hasn't seen American shores for years. Name recognition is highly likely to have degraded since then, making its sure-fire hit status less than assured. Furthermore, it's likely to be a massive undertaking (DQ games are very, very text-heavy), and the licensing fee from Enix would be huge. | Last word on Suikoden | Ok, lets get this started: First off, it's nice to see all you guys back up on the net after thestaff turnover at RPGamer (I still have no idea what all that's about),congratualations for patching things up with Emma (as is myunderstanding, since the last I heard you were on the verge of breakingup, and, as stated before, I'm pretty much out of the loop). It's alsowonderful to here letters with actual adult content (re: communism jokes(I go to a very socialist school as a matter of fact (UVic (the lastissue of the campus newspaper had no ads to support International BuyNothing Day and on it's back hada very communist poster which actuallysaid, "Buy nothing and stop the bloody cogs of capitalism))(are all ofthese brackets getting annoying yet? I'm having trouble keeping trackof them myself)), cocaine jokes, other things that tend to be censored),and well worded and occasionally witty responses. Anyway, to the questions: Did you like Earthbound? I know that it's a very acquired taste, andthe graphics look like they were for the Nintendo, but the translationis incredible, the plot is good, and the game itself is huge. What was the Promised Land in Final Fantasy VII? It seemed that after apoint in the game that people stopped mentioning it. Was it supposed tobe returning to the Lifestream after death? I've been looking back at Final Fantasy VI, and that game isincredible. It lead the way for the reading-between-the-lines of FF7,had a great plot, characters that were distinct in game play (whereas inFF7 the only differences were in the Limit moves), and was all-in-all amaster piece. Just to make this a question, do you agree? Yours Truly,Thaeus |
In order, I really truly hated Earthbound with a passion when I first played it. Then I rented it again, and was mildly annoyed by it. Ten rentals later, I've yet to actually finish it, but I'm quite fond of it now. Strange how things change, isn't it? The Promised Land was, I think, the ideal state of the world. Namely, a world that has been engulfed and purified by the Lifestream, with only perfect and nature left in its wake. I was never quite clear on that point, though, and your theory makes sense as well. And yes, I love FF6. Always have, always will. | The Lowdown | Word on the street is... happy Thanksgiving! |
Well, that'll do for today. Have a happy turkey day (what's left of it by now) for all my American friends out there. As for me, I've still got work to do, so I'll see you all tomorrow. - Allan Milligan, Avenging Forever | | | |
