SRW/Virtual-On Roundtable Talk

SRW/Virtual-On Roundtable Talk, Featuring the Secret behind Temjin's Coloring and How SRW Original Mecha Came About
By: Shu
Original Dengeki Online article: http://dengekionline.com/elem/000/001/698/1698264/

Featured in this article is an interview between producers of the hit Sega Games series Virtual-On and the hit Bandai-Namco Entertainment series Super Robot Wars.

The interviewees are Juro Watari (Producer, Virtual-On series), Takanobu Terada (Producer, SRW series), and Hiroaki Oochi (in charge of SRW X-Ω).

We asked them about their impressions of each other's series, the things they're sensitive about when designing original robots, and the travails involved in a long-lasting and evolving series.

Juro Watari, Sega Games:
Serves as producer of the Cyber Troopers Virtual-On series, whose most recent release is a collab between Virtual-On and A Certain Magical Index (novel by Kamachi Kazuma), called A Certain Magical Virtual-On.

Takanobu Terada, B.B. Studio:
Game producer for B.B. Studio. Serves as producer and occasional scenario designer for the Super Robot Wars series, whose most recent release is Super Robot Wars X.

Hiroaki Oochi, Bandai-Namco Entertainment:
The producer at the helm of development for Super Robot Wars X-Ω (Cross Omega).

The Virtuaroid Temjin's image is a sporty boy!

--We discussed this at a recent roundtable, but I'd like to hear impressions from each of you about all of your respective properties. Let's start with Virtual-On.

Terada: Story time—I was working with Hajime Katoki, and I kept picking up hints that he was working on something other than Gundam. When Virtual-On came out, I remember thinking, "Ah-hah! That explains everything!" What stuck out to me was how colorful the Virtuaroids were. I asked Katoki about it later, and he described it as trying to create a sporty kind of image. I felt like the setting's distinctive aesthetic really evoked that sense.

Oochi: Virtual-On's coloring is very distinctive, it's true. I've had debates about how generally protagonist mechs are assumed to be red, so why is Temjin blue? But I remember remarking that Temjin looks like a protagonist purely from a design standpoint, regardless of its in-game role.

Terada: I knew that Katoki takes motifs very seriously when he designs robots. Like soldiers needing short hair... When I first asked him to design one of our original robots, the SRX, he said he wanted to put the Banpresto logo on its face to honor its place as a Banpresto mech. I was against it at first, but he stuck to his guns. I still remember the last thing he said about it, that he wanted to make a design that would last for ten years. (laughs)

Watari: Our series is purely original, so we don't have to be tied down by conventional ideas of what robots should look like. In fact, one of the things laid out at the outset was that we DIDN'T want to let existing conventions restrict us. We had intensive discussions right from the early stages about how we wanted the protagonist mechs to look. I wanted the look of a boyish, sporty character that runs hard across a field or throws a shot in basketball shoes from half court, then exclaims "This is so fun!" after eking out a win.

--Interesting.

Watari: As we put together the kinds of things that a sporty boy would wear, we gradually moved away from the stereotypical, tricolor look that protagonist robots have. As we worked it down to a form with a sufficiently distinctive silhouette, it came out as something that could work well as blue-on-white.

--There's definitely something refreshing about using blue as the main color.

Terada: Say, didn't the first Virtual-On carry a Sega Saturn on its back? I remember Katoki mentioning how he didn't want to give them backpacks (term for a distinctively shaped booster on a robot's back).

Watari: I was the one who proposed the idea of putting something on their backs. You have to see the back of your own unit most of the time when you play our game, so to me, it stood to reason that players wouldn't be as enthused if there was nothing interesting or distinctive about the unit's back. When I was looking into what we could put there, I found an image of a prototype Sega Saturn in a gaming mag. I liked the shiny, silver-plated look that the prototype had, so I decided to go with that. As an aside, when I saw the finalized Sega Saturn, my first thought was, "This is nothing like the design I had in mind." (laughs)

--What's your impression of Virtual-On, Oochi?

Oochi: I remember that my classmates were big into Cyber Troopers Virtual-On: Oratorio Tangram, but they played at a level so far beyond mine, I just looked on while they played. (laughs) It was the kind of game that required more than just twitch reflexes—You had to have a solid handle on strategy and tactics to win.

Terada: There were tons of polygon-based games at the time, but speedy games that also placed an emphasis on a sense of bulk were few and far between. What struck me the most was Temjin's running animation. Normal robots boost around with verniers, but Temjin leans forward and runs on its feet. It fits perfectly with the image that Watari just went over—A sporty feel, like running around playing basketball in a pair of Airmaxes. It wasn't all clunky real-style robots, either. They had more liberally designed mechs like Fei Yen, too. I wasn't acquainted with Watari in those days, so it made me wonder what kind of people were making this game.

--And what about A Certain Magical Virtual-On?

Terada: The opening movie shows scenes of Virtuaroids and humans co-existing, which felt like a nice new take to me. I feel like it could make for a great anime, even. I haven't played that far into it, but it's fun. I'm not a very dedicated player, so I'm fine just mashing buttons on the controller. Seeing Temjin run was a nice throwback for me, too.

Oochi: Same, really. It's nice being able to play at my own pace without other people getting on my case. (laughs)

Watari: You're right about that! I know that different people prefer to enjoy games in their own way. I don't expect everybody to practice, nor would I want them to.

Oochi: I know it's important for head-to-head arcade games to emphasize the triumph of winning, but I always felt so dwarfed back in the day. There was no machine to practice on, so it was real play or nothing. You don't learn anything when you wait in line forever, only to go up and lose immediately. It gets frustrating, and that put me off a lot at the time.

Watari: Gosh, now I feel bad... (everyone laughs)

Oochi: I really like the matching in A Certain Magical Virtual-On, where characters are manifested as different Virtuaroids.

Terada: I find that some aspects of Virtual-On's setting are hard to convey in the arcade. Like, who's issuing the pre-launch instructions? Are they even human? (everyone laughs) Virtual-On is a prime example of an IP where the game world is expanded upon drastically outside of the games themselves, wouldn't you agree?

Watari: A lot of that has to do with the way the games were developed. For the arcade game, the intent wasn't to immerse players in the lore and setting. It was to get a lot of repeat head-to-head plays and generate a lot of income. It was an era where it was normal to hear directives from corporate like, "Nobody's going to watch the ending anyway, so keep it under a minute!"

Oochi: So it was a case where all they cared about was marketability.

Watari: We didn't have the leeway to feature any characters that served as pilots, so we opted for the "You're the pilot!" approach.

Terada: When I play A Certain Magical Virtual-On, I notice the people in it talking, which is a rarity for a Virtual-On game.

Watari: That's what sets this game apart. Kazuma Kamachi is writing the story, so I hope people enjoy it.

The original robots were always meant to be stand-alone?!

--Watari, what's your impression of SRW?

Watari: I've been exposed to SRW since the Game Boy games, but the first ones I played were the SNES games. I've got a lot of memories of that time, but what I especially got a kick out of was the freewheeling nature of the setting. Gameplay-wise, they were very straightforward SRPGs, but there were tactical elements like luring enemies in to wipe them all out en masse with a MAP weapon. You could craft your own battles that involve movement on the map. It was such an immersive experience, it had me hooked. The huge character roster is another big thing for me. Only in SRW would you find absurd scenes like a tiny Dunbine brawling with a Mechabeast. SRW gets away with it because of the nature of the games, and they make the most of those opportunities.

--I definitely get that.

Watari: If I could ask you a question of my own, Terada—The SRW games feature a lot of robots from different anime series, but the original robots in the games have come increasingly to the forefront. Could you talk about the intentions and ambitions that led to this current dynamic?

Terada: To start with, there were points where different series would clash or come into direct conflict with one another, and there was the question of what to do for an ultimate enemy to face. You can use an enemy from a given series as a final boss, but what works best in my view is crafting a powerful original enemy that can tie the different settings together. Something that serves as the glue meshing all the different established IP settings together. I had the idea of making a game where the SRW original robots could stand alone from the very beginning. I think that because we introduced the originals as a steady and continual trickle over time, they gradually became insinuated with the playerbase. Katoki and I were discussing the possibility of eventually letting these originals stand on their own right from the outset.

Oochi: That's something I've never heard before! I've always been more of a player of SRW games. The first SRW game I worked on was a title sold through iMode, and players would always ask me, "Where are the original robots?" I thought back to my own time playing SRWs and realized that the originals were important for the purpose of having someone safe to level and invest money into, someone that wouldn't leave your team during path splits. Considering that, of course it made sense for there to be a high demand for originals. I remember being newly impressed with the sense of stability they provided.

Watari: The original characters are always very versatile, yeah.

Terada: It wouldn't do for them to be too strong or too weak, so I'm careful to keep them balanced. I used to wrack my brain a lot figuring out how to tune them, but now I'm so experienced at it, I have a good frame of reference for what kind of range I want them to fit in.

--Virtual-On was featured in Super Robot Wars Alpha 3: To the Galaxy of the End. How did that come about?

Terada: It started out as me wanting a surprise entry. There's actually someone I've worked with at Sega, who isn't Watari, and they kept pushing me to put Virtual-On in SRW. But it was such an expansive property that I had no idea what I should even be drawing from, and it didn't have any pilots, so it was an iffy prospect. Cyber Troopers Virtual-On Marz covered the people inside the Virtuaroids, so I went with that one and threw them in as guest characters.

--It seemed like a very abrupt inclusion, but I was amazed at how much care went into their battle animations.

Terada: We had a die-hard Fei-Yen fan on our staff. He likes Virtual-On as a whole, of course, but Fei-Yen is a particular favorite! She has a different kind of body, and she comes from Cyber Troopers Virtual-On Oratorio Tangram, which adds to the roster list. He came up and asked me to let him do all of her animations, and the result was some very distinctive animations that incorporated elements like jump canceling.

Watari: That was when I first met Terada, by the way.

--Was it hard incorporating the characters' idiosyncrasies into the game?

Terada: Hatter had a very distinctive portrayal in the source material. When I saw his first appearance in Marz where he went "Thank yooouuu very much!", I just about died laughing. Fei-Yen was already given a character voice and voice actress in drama CDs, so we had no trouble with those two... Temjin was tricky, though. Ultimately, I asked Watari to give me something to work with, and Temjin became this dyed-in-the-wool military type called the Chief. But I'm still beating myself up for not shoehorning them into the plot proper. If they ever get featured again, I definitely want to work them into the story.

Watari: The source for Hatter was one of our development staff, actually. He would get like that when he was playing video games, shouting things like "Thank you!" or "Goddamn!" in English. (laughs) We took that dynamic and ran with it, and the result was the Hatter character.

Key moments in SRW X-Ω when player reception changed

--Could you talk to me about how the Super Robot Wars X-Ω/Virtual-On limited-time event came about?

Oochi: Actually, Sega's been wanting us to seriously consider working it into X-Ω since around the time they were hashing out the plot of A Certain Magical Virtual-On. We've been considering it for a while, but the timing never quite worked out... SRW is built from a lot of other people's IPs, and I feel that it's important for us to "give back", so to speak. That goes for both the home-release games and the mobile game. What we eventually settled on was putting it in coinciding with the software release.

Terada: Players wanted us to feature the Virtuaroids that THEY liked to use. I definitely see where they're coming from, but I wish they'd go a little easier on us. We can't put in every robot from every home-release title in the series.

--Could you talk about what's most striking to you due to the long-running nature of the game?

Oochi: Long-time players of the SRW series have had mixed opinions about the idea of running SRW as a mobile game. But back in 2016, we ran a 25th anniversary event, "Super Robot Wars: Super Steel Thanksgiving - Giving Our Gratitude for 25 Great Years". In that event, we emphasized the fact that SRW X-Ω was the longest-running game in the series, and we saw player reception gradually start to change. Terada mentioned the concept of "glue" earlier, but another big turning point in player reception was when we started including properties that had never seen the light of day in the home-release games. Some people were just happy to see them at all, and some were just idly curious about the game, but we patiently explained what we were going for and gradually got players on board with the idea. In general, it's hard to get change to go over well in a longstanding series, you know?

Watari: It's the same way with Virtual-On. The longer a series runs, the more often you get players who become convinced that they know better than anyone else the precise formula a game should follow.

Terada: Someone asked me to put Quantum Robo in SRW like 15 years ago, and I could never quite figure out how to make it work. Now that it's happened, and SRW X-Ω has broken new ground, it's become harder to put in surprises in the home-release games. (sheepish laugh)

--What inclusions have been the most striking to you, Terada?

Terada: Kyoryu Sentai Zyuranger and Mujin Gattai Kisaragi, just to name two. Oochi would front these ideas in meetings, and at first I'd be thrown for a loop, but when he explained his reasoning, it would make perfect sense. Zyuranger was initially my idea, but I was still surprised to see it make it in. (laughs) The other big one's gotta be Quantum Robo. Personally, I never thought it would never happen in SRW. It's a huge milestone in SRW history. Oochi's team succeeded where I never did.

--What inclusions have been generating a lot of buzz lately?

Oochi: Plenty, really. But a big one is Sakura Wars, which is also a Sega property. For some reason, a ton of fans were convinced that Sakura Wars would never make it into SRW, so that one made a lot of waves.

Terada: And in SRW X-Ω, we can time it to coincide with cherry blossom season.

Oochi: Some fans claim that once an IP shows up in SRW X-Ω, it'll never make it to a home-release game, but that's absolutely untrue. We can run limited-time events in SRW X-Ω because X-Ω is structured in a way that allows us to freely run with any setting and story. The roster in a home-release SRW game is built around other factors, such as what fits in the plot, the timing of a series release, and more.

Terada: In addition to that, the home-release games have long development periods, so part of our roster choices revolve around how much extra familiarization a given property requires.

Watari: The plots in SRW X-Ω are generally self-contained short stories, while the home-release game plots are like specially-tailored novels. They're both very much their own thing. In X-Ω's case, it has a lot to do with the kind of light footwork that's distinctive to mobile games.

--I see. What would you like to do with SRW X-Ω in the future?

Oochi: I've got an idea for a roster entry that's gonna knock the socks off of the X-Ω team!

Terada: Is this the thing you mentioned to me this morning? The one that made me go, "Are you nuts?" (laughs)

Oochi: That's the one! (laughs) Lately I've been getting more proposals with the reasoning that if we've broadened our horizons this much, surely such-and-such could fit too. If something controlled by a computer counts as a robot, the sky's the limit.

Terada: It's like Oochi mentioned earlier—SRW has always had a lot of intertwining, in that we rehash shows from years past. I want newer players to learn about a wide breadth of different mecha properties.

Watari: In that sense, I appreciated when SRW featured Daikumaryu Gaiking. SRW is great about pushing younger audiences to rediscover the classics.

Terada: I got a lot of the same reactions when we put Steel Jeeg into SRW. Apparently a lot of younger players became familiar with it through SRW.

The future of mecha games
--I believe Virtual-On started out life as an arcade game. It's still got a decent following in arcades, doesn't it?

Watari: We've shipped out arcade equipment that still runs, but a lot of the time, hardware reaches the end of its physical lifespan. For example, I've seen a case in real life where to run Oratorio Tangram, they use a Force cabinet with Oratorio paneling and a circuit board that they purchased separately, and somehow they get this slapdash setup to work. I felt both surprised and flattered.


Oochi: That shows the kind of dedicated fans you've got. It could also be that the owner's a hardcore fan... which amazes me, really.

--The name Virtual-On comes from a real word. How do you see VR as it relates to the word "virtual", and how much of that applies to Virtual-On?

Watari: VR as it currently stands involves minimal movement, with a lot of waiting in ambush and shooting, but it's perfectly fine for things with a sense of realism.

Terada: Faster movements always give me motion sickness. It could just be that humans need better semicircular canals.

Oochi: I get motion sick easily too, but I'm really excited with how close it's getting to mecha. VR Zone Shinjuku has VR activities like Argyle Shift, and when you're there trying it out for yourself, it's so immersive that it feels like you're really in a mech.

Watari: It feels like it's still a bit out of reach. If you don't mind me moving on, I'd like to learn more about how SRW's original mechs came about. Could you go over that some?

Terada: Well, we've got tons of original mechs... I'll go over the most emblematic of them, the SRX. The R-Series came about from the concept of real-type robots combining into a super robot. Combiners have tended to be super robots, right? I pitched the idea of real-types that looked totally stand-alone but actually combined into super robots, and Katoki found it interesting.

Oochi: How many combining robots do you go for?

Terada: In keeping with older combining super robots, I wanted maybe 3 or 5. To make my whole concept of a super robot made out of real robots that don't look like combiners at all work, we gave unit 2 and unit 3 power-up parts and had those transform and serve as the hands and feet when in super robot form. As an aside, the SRX's successor, the Banpreios, has power-up parts for unit 1 as well. We've never publicized the particulars of that, though.

--That's interesting to hear.

Terada: Anyway, the pre-combined R-Series had different motifs. Unit 1, the R-1, was the hero. Unit 2, the R-2, was supposed to be the SRX's torso, so it was a bulky machine. Unit 3, the R-3, was designed to have an effeminate shape since it had a female pilot. I guess in retrospect, it's pretty much Temjin, Raiden, and Fei-Yen. (laughs) I feel a special attachment to those three robots.

Watari: I can't believe you managed to segue that back into Virtual-On. (laughs)

--To wrap things up, let's hear some closing remarks about each of your latest releases!

Watari: Well, the game's made it out the door now, thanks for that. I'm sure there will be all kinds of reactions to how much the game's changed over a 15 year interval, from surprise, to bewilderment, to just plain enjoyment. Virtual-On has never been a title that lets itself be tied down by preconceived notions. Part of it is figuring out how to break down what I previously built, and this time this is how that manifested. I hope people can both enjoy and stick with it, including the aspects made by someone like me.

Terada: Say, I saw recently in the news that Tanita was coming out with a Virtual-On twin stick. That surprised me! (laughs)

Watari: Yeah, that's a thing. (laughs)

Terada: It's supposed to measure body fat, right?

Oochi: And blood pressure and calories burned, too. (everyone laughs)

Watari: Personally, I think that if we're putting out something by Tanita, people won't be motivated to go out and buy it unless it's got Tanita's signature technology integrated into it. Of course, it's one thing to write up an outline, and another to make everything fit inside. I have to say, I'm incredibly grateful for the spirit that Tanita's shown.

Terada: Super Robot Wars X is going on sale March 29. It's got a very new and different sort of series roster, and I think it's going to be a rather eccentric SRW title. Especially the opening. I hope people enjoy it!

Oochi: We're working hard to reach SRW X-Ω's three-year anniversary. We received positive player feedback for the A Certain Magical Virtual-On limited-time event. We're going to keep at it, and I hope that everybody will enjoy A Certain Magical Virtual-On, now on sale! Play SRW X, on sale March 29! And by all means, play SRW X-Ω in your break time! Since it's a mobile game, you can make a habit out of picking it up in your free time. Play SRW X-Ω five minutes a day!