N-Europe Interviews

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

thanks.

 

do you guys have a contact at Nintendo Benelux because my contact with Nintendo Benelux is quite good. of coarse i got loads more but i was just wondering.

[Hellfire]

Don't say these things out loud or you may be kidnapped by our competitors!

[M-PG71C]

UbiSoft would be a good pick, they are a French developer and they have a lot of influence as far as European publishers are concerned.

 

Although if you guys can get Rare to talk about the Nintendo DS (and certainly throw some VC questions there way) that would be great!

 

As for these guys, I honestly don't know too much about those kind of adventure titles since my experience with them begins and ends with Phoenix Wright, LOL!

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

i can offer stuff like this:

 

1974 Gaming: Interview With Torrel Torrel Video Game Clothing.

By: Maikel de Bakker

 

 

Today NiSuTe Europe is bringing you another exclusive interview with the guys behind Torrel Torrel. (Known for there incredible video game clothing!) Well who am I to keep you waiting? Here it is:

 

Maikel: Hello Torrel Harris Jr. Welcome here at NiSuTe.com

 

We spoke a bit today about your new business and it is a great and interesting business indeed. Can you tell us something about the company and the start of it all, before your idea of creating the Nintendo line?

 

Before creating the Nintendo line, my father Torrel Sr. had been in the apparel business for some time. His company was a licensee of the NBA and the NFL. It was working with him and helping him out that began designing licensed merchandise.

 

 

Now we all know Nintendo isn't the easiest of them all. And they are especially keen when it comes to lessening a product that so easily can vary in quality. How did you ever convince them?

 

Harris Jr: As a huge fan of video games particularly Nintendo products, I came up with the idea and was able to propose a licensing agreement to them. The strength of my father’s company in the licensed apparel industry played a large part in their willingness to enter a licensing agreement.

 

Maikel: And how did the idea pop in to your mind in the first place?

 

Harris Jr: I have always been a fan of Nintendo products and have personally owned every Nintendo video game system released. The idea came from seeing the potential to use these systems and games that I grew up playing as inspiration for stylish merchandise.

 

Maikel: Did you do all the designs yourself or do you have a team who help you with that? And is it hard to do?

 

Harris Jr: I have created each of the designs myself. Designing licensed merchandise is something that I have taught myself to do over the years working with my father. Drawing the actual images is only a small part of the process as my father has played a huge part in product development by hand picking materials, embroidery, cut and sew methods with our manufacturer. These steps are necessary to create items that separate themselves from everyday items currently in the marketplace. It was never an option for us to simply create screen printed shirts, but rather pay attention to the details and use different methods of production to create a more high end product.

 

Maikel: If Nintendo correct the designs what did they change?

 

Harris Jr: Nintendo's changes often have to do with making sure their graphics are properly represented. As a licensee it is important to create products that are up to their specifications.

 

Maikel: We know that "The King of Games" (a game T-shirt based company in Japan) have to send their T-shirts first to Nintendo and after Nintendo have looked them over they will get the seal of quality from Nintendo. Does this work the same for you guys? And why do you think Nintendo finds this so important?

 

Harris Jr: All products we create must be approved by Nintendo as well. The original drawing as well as the actual product must meet their approval. This is very important because we have chose to create a product that properly represents the Nintendo brand as an Official Licensee.

 

Maikel: Who are your main goal and why? Can you tell us something about the ages you're targeting at, and why?

 

Harris Jr: The target audience is the stylish gamer. A person who can appreciate the Nintendo brand as so many of us have grown up playing these games and products and continue to play Nintendo products. Our initial line is a bit nostalgic, but moving forward we look to expand into both retro items as well as the quality current products and games Nintendo currently markets. I don't like to limit our products to one particular age group or one particular audience and this can be seen across the initial product line. While the Koopa jacket may be for one person, the cartridge T-shirt may appeal to a different gamer.

 

Maikel: Now that you are on the verge of opening up your new site and getting ready to ship the first game related clothing are there still points of stress that need more attention? And what can we expect from the site?

 

Harris Jr: There are many points which I look to give more attention to. After this product offering I would like to make runs of product even more limited than 1000 pieces. I would like to do special things with video games like Zelda, which I have purposely chose not to create yet.

 

 

Maikel: How do you see the future of the video gaming lifestyle?

 

Harris Jr: I think the video game lifestyle will continue to grow, its a huge lifestyle that should be appreciated. I believe there are many types of people who fit into this lifestyle and with quality innovative and successful systems such as the Wii I see it continuing to grow.

 

Maikel: Will we see jeans, head ware and other attributes from you guys and what might that be?

 

Harris Jr: We have created fitted hats which have been created to match our jackets. I will see if I can get some pictures of those for you, as they have been quite impressive themselves.

 

Maikel: If you were to pick only one thing from your collection what would it be, and why?

 

Harris Jr: It would be the cartridge tee. It is an item that just says so much, yet is fairly simple. The quality of this item is also phenomenal and the embroidery and cut and sew methods used to make it look like a cartridge are unlike any shirt I have seen before.

 

Maikel: You sure must have a great passion for gaming. But what kind of gamer are you and what are your favorite consoles and games at this moment?

 

Harris Jr: Like I said I have always been a huge Nintendo fan, I have always felt confident in purchasing systems from Nintendo as they have consistently created quality products. As a kid growing up my money was spent on either video games or clothes. I'm a huge Mario and Zelda fan, I can spend hours just exploring the complex levels and finding new things in these games. I currently am loving my Wii and my DS lite. I play the DS to look for new things really. I am currently trying to beat Super Mario World (again) thats probably one of my favorites I like to beat every level.

 

Maikel: Does your gaming "hobby" infect your job a lot (does your dad pull you away from your gaming consoles a lot)?

 

Harris Jr: My gaming hobby is in esscence my job, I play video games and find inspiration. With this line no one can tell me to put the video games down, as they have in the past. When I'm playing im doing "research"

 

Maikel: Manny thanks Torrel Harris Jr. for letting us interview you! We hope you and your dad will bring us many years of gaming lifestyle and that your business will grow big and prosper.

 

Harris Jr: Thanks again for the interview, I really appreciate it and look forward to keeping you updated with our new products.

 

Torrel Jr.

 

Maikel: And thank you for giving us some of your precious time. And we hope to keep you all posted on the future products of Torrel Torrel. And do not forget to drop by at there site: torreltorrel.com

 

[The fish]

I'd suggest European developers. My personal picks would be Free Radical Design of Timesplitters fame, and Criterion, the makers of Burnout.

[Gizmo]

Dunno if it's been said but you could also try and get one with Retro. Try and squeeze out info about their new project, Metroid Dread, etc :p

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

interviews can be done with every company. that is no problem at all. but an interview is so mush better when you can do it face to face in the actual building that they work in. and that is what i will do as mush and as good as i can. altough i am a bit limited on traveling i can ride 600 km per day but not more. (the interview above is a mail interview and this is done almost by every gaming site. So actually interviewing someone face to face with some awesome pictures to go along with it will make so mush difference!)

 

ill show you what i meen this is a personal interview:

 

Written by Maikel de Bakker and Maurice van der Goor

 

 

“Hey, what’s this weird banner doing here?” you might think. “Haven’t I seen it before?” Yes you have, me and Maikel wrote the previous interview with the Ankama studios developers and we’re the ones doing it this time around as well.

 

We once more set off on Maikel’s motor bike leaving the office of NiSuTe Europe in Tilburg, crossing the Belgium border on our way to the next. And yet again, we lost our way in Belgium (why can’t they put the signs at the right place?) so after a small detour we arrived at the French border. Our travel from there on was without any problems, thus we finally arrived at Ankama Studios.

 

 

This time the interview was mainly hosted by 3 of Ankama’s Employees: Thomas Bahon, Cédric Gerard and Micheal Thant. After a quick tour through their new office we had a chat with them. Every now and then an employee of Ankama would come and have a seat with us so that we could ask them specific questions about the department they’re responsible of. The questioned departments were: Development, Artist/Animation and Music. The full interview took us 6 hours so be ready to read a lot of information in this article.

 

 

Well Ankama has moved. Previously they were cramped up in 4 tiny offices trying to do their work in a building they had to share with some other small companies. Nowadays though, they found a nice new location fully for themselves. This new location is situated in an old textile factory. The offices are located at the first half of the 1st floor and the employees are already working there in full glory at their new location. Even some desk decoration is already popping up here and there. The rest of the old factory is still being renovated. But if Ankama keeps growing at the pace they currently are, that space will soon be needed for new office usage. Currently, Ankama has 80 Employees working for them and if everything goes well they will reach 90 by the end of this month. And to give you a small idea of how fast they’re actually growing, when we did the last interview, their employee total was 40.

 

 

Between this interview and the previous one allot has changed for Ankama as well; as told in previous article they’re still working on projects for other companies and the demand for them is rising as well. Unfortunately Ankama is not allowed to tell us for whom they are working. They also have an animation section. This animation section is working for their current new project: Wakfu. But they are also trying to create a real TV animation series about the Dofus/Wakfu Universe.

 

Ever since Ankama started creating games they were passionate about gaming and that might be why the games at Ankama have this special feeling about them. “We’re talking about the special feeling gamers get with both gaming classics and innovative new games.” At Ankama they believe that the selection and hiring of passionate new personnel for their games contributes to this development – and so do we. We hope that Ankama won’t do what we have seen happen in so many other development teams and lose their passion to satisfy the majority of the players – but by the looks of it, they are trying their best not to.

 

Ankama is also working to increase its relations with other countries. They admit their current advertising was directed almost to France only. This is about to change. In a short period of time they will start big advertising projects in the UK, under the supervision of Michel. If those are a success they are planning to advertise in Germany, Spain, Netherlands and maybe even the US. They aren’t planning to do all of these advertising campaigns at the same time so their servers can keep up with the increase of the user base. And if the advertising is successful enough, every country that had advertising will get its own separate server. Specific servers will be progressively put in place for the various countries, regardless of any advertising campaign.

 

Anyway this was the information about Ankama studios’ current status and their near future; now it’s time to reveal to you some stuff about their games.

 

Let’s start with Dofus… Ah bummer, I reached my word limit for today’s article… Maybe I will write about that information next time. *evil smirk*

 

 

 

Ok, ok, OK! I will, I will! It seemed that a lot of you Ankama (read Dofus) fans actually hoped my previous article added some inside info about Ankama’s games. Well you’re finally getting what you’re waiting for the “good” stuff. (As if my previous article wasn’t good *grumble ungrateful*)

 

Let’s start with Dofus.

 

For our readers that don’t know the game let’s give Dofus a little description.

 

In short Dofus is a flash based MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) which has its unique artwork and humor, giving the game its own special feeling to play. You start with one of the 12 classes and explore its colorful world. In this world you can gain levels by killing monsters or doing quests. When you gained certain levels you learn new spells/powers so you can fight bigger and stronger monsters. You can also learn jobs to gather resources and/or process resources into helpful items like gear, potions and the like.

 

Dofus keeps expanding still. Total new updates pop up, giving access to new areas, dungeons or monsters. One of those future updates is the new Low Level Mountain. This Mountain will be the new spawning area for newly created characters of pay to play accounts (free to play accounts are restricted to Astrub still, thus will spawn at his class statue there). On this mountain the freshly born characters can go through various quests and dungeons to learn the basics of this game, making it a lot easier for total new players to understand how this game works. This Mountain will also be the first area with level restrictions. No one above level 20 will be able to access it so the “newborns” can first build up their strength before their left alone in the vicious game world. The new area has, like the many “new” areas, an upgrade in its looks. And for the first time they are using real backgrounds. If you take a good look at our pictures you can actually see Astrub as if you’re looking at it from a real mountain. This new area is perfectly timed with Ankama’s current Advertising plans so the new wave of foreign players can start this game without being scared away by the complexity the game used to have for beginning players.

 

 

There is also another new island on the drawing board. This island alone will contain at least 10 new dungeons divided over 3 layers (underground, ground level and treetop/sky level). Ankama also revealed a secret new ability that most likely will get available on this island. The new ability is still in discussion by the developers and still unsure so we can’t tell you more about it.

 

By various forums the players asked us a few questions about Ankama. We took the opportunity to ask a few of them and in this paragraph I’ll answer the ones about Dofus.

 

 

Dofus Q&A

 

Question: Will other classes get their unique spell like the Iop and Ecaflip have?

 

Answer Bill: Yes, they will. At the moment we’re still thinking of what abilities those other classes will gain. We want them to be truly unique and one of their kind. So they will enhance battle tactics and not just make the class more powerful. But eventually they will come it’s just a matter of time.

 

 

Question: Will there be more international servers?

 

Answer Bill: Maybe. But to start a new server Ankama has to be 100% sure the new server will have a big enough player base to start with. Dofus economy cannot work on a few accounts alone it needs a decent player base to start working.

 

Question: Will Dofus get better music?

 

Answer Guillaume: For the moment no. Flash has almost no music support. Forcing them to add music in the game as mp3 files, for example if the game would have better music you need file sizes of at least 1,5MB per music file. Though currently there is only 5 MB available for the entire music package. Thus currently the Music artist compressed all his Dofus artistic composition into a package of 5MB. And trust me I don’t like it one bit to hear my artistic compositions being compressed to the tunes they are right now. But improvement is on his way for the other games Ankama is working on.

 

 

Question: When will this endless class nerfing end?

 

Answer Bill: There are still discussions going on of abilities that are to powerful and abilities that need some boosts. The main intention of us is the higher your level is the more tactics, by usage of spells, you’ll need. Currently though the character with the biggest sword wins. So be prepared to see an upcoming nerf of all melee weapons.

 

Question: Will there be more events in Dofus run by a game master?

 

Answer Micheal: We are working on it. Every server will get its personal community manager that will be in charge of those events.

 

 

Question: Will Dofus vanish when Wakfu is released?

 

Answer Bill: That’s fully up to you. As long as Dofus has a large enough player base, the game will keep existing and will receive regular updates which will add new material to play with.

 

Question: What will be the bonus of getting a char up to level 200?

 

Answer Bill: It’s currently unknown but it’s worked on with great haste. This because on rushu there is almost a character that has reached that point. About one thing we are sure it will be a new move that will enhance tactics and not just make the char more powerful then he already is.

 

 

HMMMMMz word count is nearing 900 while I'm only allowed to make articles of about 600 words.(This is done so it is easy reading for every one) Oh well this time it isn’t my fault you won't be getting more information for the time being. You guys just asked too many questions about Dofus alone. I guess I have to tell you about arena and Wakfu in our next article about the interview.

 

Well let me first apolagize to all the fans out there wating anxiously for our 3rd and last article. Life caught up with me and i got unexpected obligations that kept me from finishing this article. Again sorry I'm only Osamodan so unless its summoning i can't do magic.

 

Anyway lets not waste to many words on my apolagies because I will end up needing a 4th. I might be cruel sometimes but I'm not THAT cruel. Tempting? Yes, but it also means making yet another article in my current situation so i rather not.

 

Well as many of you know Ankama has also another game running: Dofus Arena. This battle mainly uses the battle concept of Dofus and made an entirely new game of it. Ankama did and is still doing allot of work on that game. In a near future it will get a major update. Battle system is revised, how exactly is still discused so we can't tell you about it yet. The engine in use is upgraded. Up untill now Dofus Arena only used flash to run the game. Now Ankama Studios is working on a new engine that is still based on flash, But has java rendered animations. Allowing to game to have background animation loops like waterfalls. And ofcourse these new animations are used for the spells so your eyes will be treated with nice works of art whenever you cast a spell. (Sorry fans there are no devices yet which can playback seen memories if so i would have galdly shown you what we saw) Anyway from waht we saw this game has gained mayor improvements and this game will also be a test for the new engine because Wakfu will be using a simular engine.

 

Ahh Finally!, you might think. Think again, I am their sorry to tell you but we didn't get to see allot of their new project Wakfu. Ofcourse we asked them some player questions about it but they didn't reveal very much. Do understand this game is far form finished and allot of concept are still in discussion. Even if Ankama showed us stuff chances would have been board changes mind and the thing we shown is left out or will be totally different. Ofcourse i can tell you already known facts like moving maps etc. But i think most of this article's readers already did. What we can tell you are a few answers we and some players asked about the game I hope those can please you enough for this long awaited article (hides in shame)

 

Question: Is there a beta of this game? If so when? and will it be French only?

Answer: Yes there will be a closed beta expected in july. Everyone can try sign up to a newsletter. As soon as its announced, from those signed up players a few fortunate will be chosen to play the beta. This beta will mainly test the current battle system of this game. There will be no difference in language spoken meaning english, french, german, spanish, dutch, etc etc can participate in this beta. Do understand that being able to speak more then one language will make it easier for Ankama to understand you and your findings of the test.

 

Question: When Wakfu gets released will Dofus cease to exist?

Answer: Thats fully up to you. If Dofus keeps having a decent player base the game will continue to exist and receive updates.

 

Question: When you are subscribed to Dofus will you have a sunscription to Wakfu as well?

Answer: We really don't know. It has been proposed once in a brainstorm session, but we start to think about it when the game is finished.

 

Question: Will we see some returning nostalgic dofus monsters?

Answer: Well you will see the tofu back ofcourse. It became one of our icons so we can't leave our most popular monster out of Wakfu. But we don't know yet about other monsters.

 

Question: Will you have like Dofus more then one character slots?

Answer: Yes but like Dofus you can't have more then one of those characters in the game at once.

 

Question: And multiclienting?

Answer: Ankama studios never liked multiclienting ofcourse we can't ban it because its fully legal. Although for Wakfu it will be allot harder to multiclient because some events happen differently then they did in Dofus.

 

Question: Will Wakfu have better music?

Answer: YES because dofus only uses flash as engine its close to impossible to make ingame translated music files. Which are needed for compressed music files witout losing quality. Like we told you in the article about Dofus, music only gets about 5 MB of space to fit their music in. Wakfu will partly/fully use java as engine which does allow music encryption making it easier to have improved music quality without needing way more space.

 

Question: Dofus has a lot of hidden humour (Astrub pub candles, wabbit island statues) will Wakfu have them as well?

Answer: Yes but we have to be more cautious we want to have a bigger public for Wakfu and the larger the public the larger the parent complaints get.

 

Pant pant finally i can say I'm done. I hope you all had fun reading my articles. Also let me use this last sentence to apolagize again for the lateness of this article, maybe I should stop subscribing to the MMORPG called real life

 

*wink*

 

[Tellyn]

Telltale Games are currently officially making Sam & Max for the Wii, so our impeccable interview timing will mean we get to ask questions about it. You know what to do.

[darksnowman]

I watched the Angry Videogame Nerds Zelda timeline thing on Gametrailers, so ask them if they are splittists or linearists.

 

Ask them what else they might have in the pipeline for the Wii, what their plans are for Sam and Max, etc. What about downloadable content and stuff via Wiiware?

 

[ShadowV7]

Will the Wii version have an episodic format the like PC games?

 

What way is TellTale games using the Wii to take the most advantage of the console.

 

This is if it is an episodic format:

Can we see future downloads for further episodes via WiiWare?

[Hero-of-Time]

I would like to know the following.

 

What was it like working for LucasArts and was is difficult for them to split off and form their own company?

 

What are their thoughts on the point and click genre and does it still have a place in todays market?

 

To those who worked on the Monkey Island games how do they feel about the series and who came up with the brilliant scripting? Was it a single person or did everyone have some input?

[triforcemario]

Will the game be basically a port of the PC episode games, or will it be an entirely new game? (please, tell me if they've alreadu confirmed this or not)

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

i have 2 exclusive interviews coming for N-Europe. (ps my name supposed to be green)

[Goron_3]

Here's a nice question to ask em:

 

-If the port goes down with the Wii's audience and sells well, is there a chance we could see a new, exclusive Wii episode, instead of just a port?

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

well is that the only question? come on guys i need more! loads more. other wise they will not take N-Europe seriously.

[Guest Maase]

"Is there any plan about other old franchise like Monkey Island or Grim Fandango coming to Wii?"

 

it could happen :P

[Tellyn]

The interview's been postponed for now, but I need questions for several more interviews:

 

- Pixel Magick (Developing Wordsnake for WiiWare and DS)

- Bplus (Developing PLATTCHEN for WiiWare)

- Zoonami (Developing unknown projects. Past history includes Funkydilla!!, Game Zero, Zendoku, and the head directed GoldenEye)

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

i have a list of standard (but very good) questions but they only work in face to face interviews.

 

i have written a report. i hope you all will enjoy it.

 

its called: Have A Wii Break

[Hellfire]

i have a list of standard (but very good) questions but they only work in face to face interviews.

 

i have written a report. i hope you all will enjoy it.

 

its called: Have A Wii Break

 

Read this people, it's very interesting.

Good job Maiky.

http://n-europe.com/news.php?nid=11488

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

Thanks for the support Hellfire. Mine next article is finished.

[Tellyn]

Guys I'm planning on sending off questions for the following interviews tonight:

 

XGen Studios - Developing Defend Your Castle for WiiWare

2D Boy - Developing World of Goo for the Wii or WiiWare

Steel Penny Games - Developing Bruiser and Scratch for WiiWare

Rising Star Games - Responsible for Harvest Moon and No More Heroes in Europe

Zoonami - Dedicated Nintendo developer, with Zendoku and cancelled projects Funkydilla and Game Zero to their name

Pixel Magick - Developing Wordsnake for the DS and WiiWare

[darksnowman]

Would it be possible to ask them what they think about the hard drive situation on the Wii? Seeing as most of them are developing Wiiware material then I'm sure they will have an opinion on the issue- I mean, are they worried that their games will be overlooked because people will have no room to download them?

 

As for Zoonami, whats their favourite DKC game - they are ex-Rare staff, so its relevant enough. Also, Game Zero, any word on it? And any word on any of their games? They've been beavering away for a long time but nothing has seen release, has it? I'm sure Zoonami have a GoldenEye type game in them, all the prowess couldn't have gone to Free Radical, lol.

 

And Pixel Magick, making both a DS and Wiiware game so does that mean the stylus will be directly translated to be the Wii remote?

[Fandango]

Some general questions you can ask anyone: What do they think of the Wii hardware in comparison to X-box 360 and PS3? Underpowered or are Developer's just not talking advantage of it?

 

For XGen Studios, what extra features will be in the Defend Your Castle game as opposed to the Flash version?

[Maiky-NiSuTe]

i am still in contact with

 

Ruud van de Moosdijk

VP of Development

Engine Software BV

 

and

 

Ingrit Muller

Ankama studio's

 

for the exclusive look behind the screens there!