Game Developer in the World of Anime

Chapter 631 631: Half-Month Sales of _Tales of Berseria

Leaving Utaha alone in the office, Ichin headed over to the Bloodborne development team.

Most of the team members were the same ones who had previously worked on Tales of Berseria. Many of them had also participated in the development of Dark Souls, so aside from the change in art style, developing Bloodborne was largely second nature to them.

Arriving at the art department, Ichin tapped Rin Toyama on the shoulder and asked with a smile, "Rin, how does the design work feel so far?"

"Hmm, it's a bit complicated," Rin tilted her head slightly and picked up a stack of reference materials beside her drawing tablet. "Victorian-era clothing is something I wasn't very familiar with before. Even though I've gone through the materials now, it's still quite difficult to design equipment and outfits that truly match the style in a short time. But for Hifumi, this is actually quite easy. She's studied this kind of clothing before, so I've already spoken to Kou and adjusted her workload so she can take on more of this type of outfit design."

Ichin nodded. He was well aware of Hifumi's strengths, especially in clothing design. He had asked her about it before, and she indeed had extensive knowledge of various styles.

After finishing his conversation with Aoba, Ichin headed over to Hifumi's side.

Hifumi had just completed a set of hunter attire. When she saw Ichin approach, she immediately showed it to him.

"Ichin-kun, take a look. How is this design?"

Ichin examined it carefully, then said with satisfaction, "Yes, this is definitely your forte, Hifumi. It perfectly matches what I had in mind. Rin will probably assign you more clothing design tasks next, so I'll be counting on you."

Hifumi didn't resist at all and simply smiled as she nodded. "No problem. Leave it to me."

After finishing with the art team, Ichin went to the programming department.

Over there, the programmers were working together with the animation team to develop the game's action modules.

Although Bloodborne was, like Dark Souls, a Souls-like game, its combat system had undergone major changes.

First of all, shields were gone. In their place, the off-hand weapon was now a hunter's pistol.

Without shields, hunters would need to rely on agile movement, dodging, and maneuvering around enemies during combat.

However, the pistol introduced a mechanic similar to parrying with shields in Dark Souls. A successful gun parry allowed players to execute a high-damage visceral attack.

In addition to that, the weapons themselves had changed. All primary weapons were trick weapons that could switch between two forms, enabling various combo attacks. This was completely different from Dark Souls.

Beyond weapons, the biggest change lay in the dodge system.

In Dark Souls, dodging mainly relied on rolling. In Bloodborne, aside from the traditional roll, there was also a new evasive maneuver called a quickstep.

Compared to rolling, the quickstep was faster but covered a shorter distance. It looked stylish, but required a certain level of skill to master.

In short, combat in Bloodborne was far more dangerous than in Dark Souls. Trying to fight using the same approach as Dark Souls would easily lead to failure.

These differences from Dark Souls were precisely what the programming and animation teams needed to implement. Ichin himself would also be involved to speed up development, especially since Bloodborne was planned to be announced at the year-end TGA.

After arriving at the programming department, Ichin sat down and directly joined the game's development.

As for Salt and Sanctuary, Hazuki was overseeing it, so there were no concerns about its development progress.

His main focus now was to complete the core systems of Bloodborne, which had a higher level of difficulty.

September gradually passed in this busy rhythm.

Ichin reduced the time he spent at campus. After work each day, he also cut down on relaxation time and studied all the courses for the semester on his own. All that remained was to wait for the final presentations.

Meanwhile, over the course of half a month, Tales of Berseria's sales steadily climbed. In the last few days of September, it surpassed seven million copies and began pushing toward eight million.

This was an astonishing figure, especially considering that a large portion of those sales came from players in Japan.

After learning this, Ichin quickly understood why. In recent years, the Japanese gaming industry had seen fewer and fewer ARPGs like Tales of Berseria, or more specifically, Japanese-style ARPGs.

For example, there had been no news about a new Dragon Quest installment for the past couple of years. Even its most loyal fans had grown impatient, including Ichin himself.

As for Tales of Berseria, its characters were beautifully designed, the art style was excellent, and the story was highly engaging, packed with numerous exciting highlights that kept players hooked.

On top of that, the combat system was something many game companies could only dream of achieving. After all, it had been developed in collaboration with Capcom, the masters of action games, ensuring its quality.

With all these elements combined, Tales of Berseria achieved outstanding results and became immensely popular among Japanese players.

After announcing the game's latest sales figures, Ichin also posted an update on the official account. In addition to giving players a free cosmetic update, he made a promise.

A new installment in the Tales series would definitely be released, so players should look forward to it.

Naturally, players were delighted to hear that a new game was coming. But soon, concerns began to surface.

"If it's a new installment, please don't make it a tragedy again!"

"Exactly! Wouldn't a happy ending be great?"

There were many such comments, and Ichin saw them all.

However, he had no intention of revealing anything about the next game's ending so soon. Saying it now would ruin the sense of mystery.

Utaha, who was beside him, noticed that he had read the comments but made no response. She said helplessly, "You really have a twisted sense of humor, Ichin. You're making the players anxious about the next game."

"The next Tales game doesn't even have a shadow yet. How could I possibly give them an answer?"

Ichin closed the webpage and spread his hands. "Besides, it'll be at least a year or more before we even announce the next installment. It's still far off, so let them wait. By the way, Utaha, what about your side? When will Akane's new game be announced?"

Utaha had already finished writing the script for Akane's new game. The development team had long since entered closed development, and as long as no revisions were needed, she didn't have to be involved for the time being.

At this, Utaha smiled mysteriously. "I can't say the exact time, but it should be soon. It's a pretty good game."

Hearing that, Ichin couldn't help but look forward to it.

...

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