Gundam Screenwriter Kazuho Hyodo Helped With Xenoblade Chronicles X’s Story

Xenoblade Chronicles X executive director Tetsuya Takahashi tweeted a few more tidbits of information via the game’s official Twitter account this past Friday.

“This time around, aside from Mr. Kunihiko Tanaka, I have also asked many other graphic artists to help with design,” Takahashi wrote. “As you all might have already realized, many different types of extraterrestrial beings appear in this game, and each has their own characteristic culture.”

“In order to convey the culture of each of these races through the game’s visuals, we’ve adopted the lavish approach of assigning different artists to each race.”

Switching gears, Takahashi then reveals that anime screenwriter Kazuho Hyodo worked on the script of Xenoblade Chronicles X alongside Yuichiro Takeda, who is writing the game’s story. Hyodo has served as screenwriter for various episodes of Gundam Seed Destiny, Gundam Age, The Pilot’s Love Song, Robot Girls Z, and Wagnaria. He also penned the s-CRY-ed After novels.

“To tell the truth, the script for [Xenoblade Chronicles X] is much larger than it was for the previous Xenoblade,” Takahashi explained. “As it would be very hard to handle everything by himself, Mr. Takeda introduced [Hyodo] to me. “As Mr. Hyodo is well-versed in sci-fi, I was able to leave things to him without worry.”

Takahashi also mentioned that he will introduce some of the artists working on the game, the next time he tweets.

Food for thought:

1.  It bears mentioning that Hyodo appears to be a writer-for-hire, just like many other writers (and directors) that work in the anime industry. He wasn’t necessarily in charge of the direction of the shows he has worked on. I thought it might be wise to point this out before anyone decides to sound the alarm at the mention of Gundam Age and Gundam Seed Destiny.

2. Bringing an external writer in to to assist your internal team isn’t uncommon either. You may recall that PlatinumGames did the same for Bayonetta 2.