Dynasty Warriors 9: Empires Producer Talks About the Domestics System

Dengeki conducted a lengthy interview with Dynasty Warriors series producer Akihiro Suzuki from Koei Tecmo to talk about the series’ 20th anniversary. The interview also covered the upcoming console game, Dynasty Warriors 9: Empires. Suzuki talked about the evolution of the Domestics system in the Empires series, the pros-and-cons of developing games on next-gen consoles and the decision to change the battle system. [Thanks, Dengeki Online!]

We have translated parts of the interview related to Dynasty Warriors 9: Empires as follows:

Dengeki: Domestics have also become a point in the Empires series, but will its content be the same as before?

Suzuki: In the first title—Dynasty Warriors 4: Empires—we felt like it would be difficult for newcomers to play if the gameplay had strong strategy elements like Romance of the Three Kingdoms. That’s why we simplified the domestics feature with a random factor and a shallow strategic system where they would choose from two types of cards.

However, as the series continued on, we found out that people who bought the Empires series have a strong tendency of liking strategy and domestic affairs. That’s why we gradually deepened the strategic factor of domestics. By Dynasty Warriors 7 and 8: Empires, we reached a system that is close to Romance of the Three Kingdoms. This time, we’re also putting about the same level of strength into domestics.

Dengeki: Dynasty Warriors 9: Empires will also be released on new generation consoles. What do you think the advantages and disadvantages of changing hardware are?

Suzuki: There are 2 advantages here: Being able to show a lot of enemy soldiers and improved visuals. Being able to stabilize the frame rate while leveling up everything is a big advantage.

As for disadvantages… I don’t think there’s any. Early developments on new hardware being hectic is already a usual thing. If I have to say any, it would be troubling if the hardware couldn’t be spread out. There were also cases where the prices of game software would go up with hardware changes. If they do go up, it will possibly become a disadvantage for users.

Suzuki also mentioned that the team tried to implement the usual supply line-based battle system on the large-scaled maps from Dynasty Warriors 9. However, they ended up getting a bad gameplay tempo that could not be established into a battle. On the other hand, they noted that the scale of castles has become much larger than any prior iterations. The team thought that it would be more interesting if they could probe into creating actual siege battles, which is why the battle system in Dynasty Warriors 9: Empires will focus on castle sieges.

In a prior Q&A session with Famitsu, Akihiro Suzuki confirmed that Empires‘ staple Marriage and Sworn Sibling systems, along with the popular Photo Mode from Dynasty Warriors 9, will return in this game. In another interview, Suzuki also noted that the new character creator system will be improved further from Nioh 2.

Dynasty Warriors 9: Empires will be released for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X, Nintendo Switch, and PC in early 2021.