Ahead of the launch of Fire Emblem Engage this week, Nintendo has published a brand new "Ask the Developer" interview with some of the talent who worked on the game.
In the second part of the interview, a number of concept art has been shared. Perhaps most interestingly, is how the game's main character could have potentially had different hairstyles and colours. Here's what Intelligent Systems' director Tsutomu Tei had to say about this, along with a look:
"The first characters were Alear and Céline. We thought it was best to start off with the base male character and female characters. These are some of the rough designs from the first draft.
"Based on the game's settings, she proposed many variations with different hairstyles and color schemes and such. Then we had back and forth discussions with our internal staff to decide the character's image."
Other segments of the same interview share even more concepts, here's a look:
There was also a brief mention of eye detail in the game, and how much effort character designer Mika Pikazo put into this:
"Also, we put quite a lot of effort in the expression of the eyes. We already mentioned that the way she uses the bold colors is amazing, but the eyes are also expressed in a delicate balance. The irises of the eyes were particularly difficult. When you look at how she drew the eyes, you'll notice the irises are intricate and never simple."
What do you think of these concepts? How about the new character designs in Fire Emblem Engage? Tell us below, and make sure to grab a pre-order if you haven't already.
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[source nintendo.com]
Comments (12)
Alear may or may not be my single favorite design in all of Fire Emblem, but in general Engage’s designs have grown on me. I’m sure that some people will complain vociferously and tell this game to get off their lawn; that seems to be many FE fans’ favorite activity. But it’s good to switch things up a bit, and I think they’ve done that fairly well here. At the end of the day it’s really not that serious.
I actually really like Alear's design and have said so since we first saw them.
I honestly don't really like the MC's haircolor. But it does fit the character. So, yeah.. I'm okay with it. Would've loved to see a character designer in the game like Awakening had.
Initially, I was wrong about FE Awakening and Three Houses, so I'm doing my best not to judge. Still Day 1. I have heard great things about this game so far, but my biggest fear is that it ultimately ends up being too streamlined.
Right now, I realize that there is only so much that they will show, but I am beginning to think that the roster might be kind of slim for this entry. This is actually my main concern, that FE Engage is just another starter entry like Path of Radiance.
Please do not get me wrong, I still like Path of Radiance, it was my first FE game. Although, once I got a taste of the GBA titles, I felt so cheated. I learned that actual game mechanics (and Classes) were sacrificed, in the hopes of: making PoR more streamlined, user friendly, and easier to pick up and play.
I sincerely hope that I'm wrong about this game, since I have already committed to buying. I just really hope that FE Engage will still be another great expansion for the series, and not another water-down for western audiences.
He may look a bit edgy but I'd definitely have prefered that black/white-haired protagonist over toothpaste
It's great Nintendo is sharing these in an "Ask a developer" series, but man, did they butcher the artwork here. The size and resolution are so low, it's really hard to appreciate Pikazo-san's work. I am glad he also has a Twitter account.
P.S. Here's a link: https://twitter.com/mikapikazo
@DOM_31 Oh wow, thanks for the correction. I feel stupid for not knowing that.
There is so much more about Alear's design that needs fixing along with the hair colour
To each their own, but I personally can't stand they way the main character looks. The renderings have shown so many other characters in the game that look better. Three Houses characters were phenomenal. I just can't be some goofy weirdo for a whole game. If I am able to play the main quest as a decent looking player than I may look into it further. As for now, Engage is just not for me.
Nah would have took toothpaste over the generic edgy white/black that has been done a million times before.
Definitely prefer "toothpaste", not only because the black and white one is kind of generic, but also because of the reference to the colors of enemy and player units in Fire Emblem (bonus points since it's also the standard Joy-Con colors, too)!
This was also in the interview:
"Since she usually draws young characters, she was concerned about her confidence level in some of the character design. It’s true that the designer’s skills should not be limited to drawing cool nobles and young girls."
Looks like a Red Flag to me, yikes!
I worked for an anime/manga distributor for a year. I had never immersed myself in that world before.
We had 22,000 SKUs for DVDs. Only 8,000 of them were non-pornographic.
After a while, it seemed like at the end if the day, most roads in the anime realm led to "cranking down to drawings of sexualized children".
This interview tidbit isn't doing the genre any favors.
I'm still excited for the awesome game gameplay mechanics, but it really is too bad about the character design.
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