Atlus released Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker last month in Japan, and to commemorate the occasion, they held a little interview on the game’s official blog with key developers, director Shinjiro Takada and art director Akiko Kotoh, about the making of the enhanced 3DS port.
During the interview, they’re asked to share the meaning behind the game’s subtitle , Record Breaker (or rather, Break Record in Japan).
“I can’t give you the deeper meaning behind it today,” says Kotoh after explaining a translation of the English phrase of ‘break the record’. “As for subtitles, during the development of part 1, we named it Overclocked when we released it for the 3DS, which I believe gave it a strong sense and a feeling of ‘surpassing its predecessor’.”
“The [Record Breaker] subtitle has some deep roots in the story, so it’s kind of difficult to comment on that…” adds Takada. “There are actually several meanings behind it, so please check it out for yourselves once you get to play it.”
The next question asks them to touch a little more on the new character called Miyako.
“Miyako was actually a character that was decided on during the development of the original version of the game for Nintendo DS, but we decided that she was unnecessary while working out details on the scenario, and decided to omit the character” explains Takada.
“For that reason, she doesn’t exist during the Septentriones part of the game,” he continues. “However, she’s a character we contemplated, so [her inclusion] began after consulting with the writer on whether she could appear in the Triangulum part.”
Next, they’re both asked if they’d like to share any aspects of the game they were particularly focused on, or struggled during the development of Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker.
Takada says that he felt that they had most trouble on the Triangulum part, the reason being that the characters had all matured while surviving the seven days during the Septentriones part, and he didn’t want that to go to waste. However, he had trouble figuring out what kind of new drama would take place and how to depict how much they’d grown.
As for Kotoh, she says that her main focus was on the opening movie for the game. She even went as far as telling the producer who worked on Devil Survivor 2: The Animation, that she’d “like to make something like Akira” for the opening. Unfortunately, there were many parts that got cut out from the final version, but she hopes that someday there will be a way to show it all to the fans, one way or another.
As we all know by now, Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker features guest characters from Durarara!!. The interviewer asks how that came to be.
“One day, I was there wondering what would it be like if characters from one of my favorite works in Durarara!! were to appear in the world of Devil Survivor,” responds Takada. “They’re both modern dramas, and both illustrated by [Suzuhito] Yasuda , so the opportunity came from the thought of how they would appear as guests.”
Devil Survivor 2: Record Breaker will release in North America sometime in early 2015 for Nintendo 3DS.
Published: Feb 11, 2015 12:33 pm