Anarchy Reigns Dev Comments

Originally published on the Platinum Games's Max Anarchy website. Written by Masaki Yamanaka, the game's lead character designer.
http://www.platinumgames.co.jp/max_anarchy/?page_id=15

Jack
Though Jack did come back from MADWORLD relatively unchanged, he now falls more into the "Power characters" camp of the game.
Though he is a basic, balanced character that you're used to, Jack is still a huge, two-meter tall man with log-like arms, and the rest of the cast was designed with him as the "Muscle-clad character" base.
As a character that never shows his back to his enemies and never ceases his brutal assault, he is the best match for the game's concept.

Leo
Leo, who has been designed as a second protagonist after Jack, is his exact opposite.
Black against white, a mountain of muscles against a model figure, an old seasoned man against a young pretty boy. It's not only about the design, but about personalities, too: while Jack has an atmosphere of an adult veteran, Leo is a troubled youth that often gets into trouble because of his own actions.
However, when you take into account his unparalleled combat capabilities, his elite status, even among his organization, becomes all the more apparent. The staff almost felt jealous of him: "A young, beautiful elite... Tsk".

Baron
Baron is another character that returned from MADWORLD. He hasn't changed at all, still being a strong, but vulgar and lecherous fool that you just can't hate.
Baron's main image concept is a phoenix that's been reborn from flames. His Killer Weapon is "Super Sexy Fists of Fire". The one who named it was JP from the localization team. He seemed to have almost abnormal affection for him. There was probably no bigger Baron fan on any team. We also finished his design much faster, too. We certainly managed to nail his image down. Everyone loves him for so many different reasons.

Mathilda
Her return from MADWORLD was decided right after bringing back Baron - can't have them without each other, right?
Always being around Baron, bringing down his stupid jokes (silently and violently), being a 100% genuine sadist - of course, none of those things changed.
Though she is a cyborg this time, we were really careful to keep her design as bewitching and sexy as before. We wanted her to feel like she exposes as much flesh and blood as possible. Hence the nipple spikes.

Sasha
I was responsible for the heroine design of the game. Since she originally had many princess-like qualities, she turned out to be an "Ice Queen" that doesn't like to leave anything to chance.
With sharp, cold eyes and slender, even glamorous figure, she is a perfect woman who is skillful, smart and beautiful.
The Killer Weapon on her back was designed back in her princess phase: the concept came from Snow-White and her seven dwarves, so it consists exactly of seven parts, including the base.
By the way, Sasha's long hair was made with the same technologies as Bayonetta's.

Nikolai
Since he is the leader of Leo's team, he is the elite among elites. He's a cold man who is dedicated to his mission, and rarely smiles, let alone laughs.
The idea for his weapon was as simple as "We want to make an electrocuting Killer Weapon already!". I think that emitting powerful electrical currents made his combat style quite flashy.
Instead of making his arms transform, we went for the "Transparency" gimmick, showing the whole internal structure beneath the outer shell.
As an aside, his name came from his electric weapons concept (二個雷, Ni Ko Rai (Two Personal Lightnings) -> Nikolai), though that doesn't say much.

Big Bull
The only character that was approved right after the character design phase. As soon as we got the "Cattle head + Jet Hammer + Robot" order, we instantly got exactly that.
He was planned to be bigger than Jack, so he was even bigger than he is now, but since the game is played in third-person view, you couldn't see your opponents sometimes, so we had to make him smaller. What a pity.
Designing his attacks that would fit his booming heavy tempo was tough, so we were glad to give him cool Bajiquan moves. Chinese martial arts sure are great.

Zero
It's a ninja. One of those NINJAS that everyone loves so much. Since developers love ninjas as much as you do, coming up with Zero was to be expected.
An interesting point is his Killer Weapon. Though most of the other characters have their weapons as a transformable parts of their own body, Zero is the only character with proper samurai swords.
It's difficult to spoil the untainted beauty of a sword, but we still wanted to give him something transformable, so why not the sheath? And that's how he got his sheaths with slight transformation features.

Durga
Back in the beta, we got an order to come up with a cool villain, someone like "A mercenary feared by the whole battlefield" with "evil charisma".
Since his Killer Weapon, a magnum revolver, combines agility and unfair range, he's a perfect fit for the "Hit & Run" playstyle. Though there was also the risk that everyone would hate playing against him. Actually, he really is kinda cowardly. So everyone does hate him a whole lot.
Since he was supposed to be a cyborg who lost the whole right side of his body in battle, the designers gave him a tail so he could keep the different weights of his halves balanced.

Garuda
Durga's robot sidekick. In the past, he was as vicious on the battlefield as the other half of the duo.
We were fine with making him a complete robot for the contrast with Durga, who only lost his limbs.
When we came up with the ways of implementing the Human Form - Hover Form - Flight Form idea into the game, many designers got very excited. Using your teammate's flight mode is just one of the features of this.

Oinkie
Though we have lots of equipment-like Killer Weapons, we still wanted to make a transforming martial artist, no matter what it takes.
Though we came up with lots of different designs, the most popular among the staff were the ones that didn't actually look like martial artists. In the end, nothing could beat the fatty's popularity.
By the way, since transformed Oinkie is the largest member of the cast, we were able to make his fighting style more detailed, and you can actually see and enjoy it. And since Platinum Games is currently based in Osaka, we were itching to pack him with various Osakan traits.

Rin Rin
Since we have lots of cool female characters, we also wanted to have some cute ones, too, and so Rin Rin became another MADWORLD veteran to come back. Moreover, as a middle sister of the three.
The order was "Do whatever you want, but keep her hairstyle the same", so you may say that our character designers' tastes are reflected in her more than in other characters.
She also got colored from black and white, which makes her even more cute.
I'm sure some of you have already seen it, but here is a picture that one of our character designers have uploaded to his Twitter, depicting her pant... If there is a character who would look good in a swimsuit, it's Rin Rin.
http://www.platinumgames.co.jp/max_anarchy/wp-content/themes/ma_2_6_07/images/conceptRINRIN2.jpg

Fei Rin
Fei Rin is the eldest of the three Rin Rin assassin sisters. She boasts the most bewitching and glamorous body out of the three.
Since her weapon is a trident that allows her to attack from a safe distance, I think that, among the sisters, she’s the most beginner-friendly one.
However, I think both Rin Rin and Ai Rin were more popular on our teams. I guess it’s because she doesn’t wear a skirt.
Since she is the token boob character of Max Anarchy, it was natural for the developers to carefully model every millimeter of them.
http://www.platinumgames.co.jp/max_anarchy/wp-content/themes/ma_2_6_14/images/conceptFEIRIN2.jpg

Ai Rin
Based on Rin Rin, but younger, an innocent, but spoiled child – these are the traits that she was derived from.
For the Killer Weapon, we went for a reference to Bruce Lee-sensei's nunchaku that he favored, with a few adjustments to make her fighting style the most aggressive one among the three sisters.
It seems that she was the most popular character of the debugging team I worked with.
Is it because, despite her personality, she's so cute and innocent that you can't help but forgive her? Is it simply because she's strong and easy to use? Or is it because she's the youngest girl in the game? I wonder what exactly is the reason of her popularity...

Douglas
An old man who fights alone to exterminate the mutant monsters. Since he turned himself into a cyborg and managed to survive for so long, he is the oldest Max Anarchy character, being appropriately 180 years old.
Thanks to the power of two pilebunkers installed into his arms, this gramps can easily wrestle huge monsters simply by pushing them hard enough. That’s way too cool.
Even though he’s a grandpa, I recommend trying him out at least once simply because the sound of a pilebunker hitting its target is so pleasant. My personal favorite is his dashing strong attack, when he jumps and hits the enemy with his whole body.

Max
He’s the former commander of Leo, Nikolai and Sasha, so we tried to make him into a character who mastered the techniques of the three.
He’s a big character with good defense, speed that is higher than average, and bigger combos, but I think that it’s still possible to have an advantage against him.
He’s also the key person of the story mode, so he plays a great role there. Please look forward to revealing his personal story, too.