While many weren’t thrilled by all that was shown at the latest Nintendo Direct Partner Showcase, there were some surprises to be had, with arguably the biggest being the reveal of The Adventure of Elliot The Millennium Tales by Team Asano. This team from Square Enix is responsible for Bravely Default, Octopath Traveler, and Triangle Strategy, all of which feature the HD-2D visual style. In a special interview on the Square Enix website, the team broke down what led to them making the action-RPG that’ll span a thousand years.
When talking about said origins, the leader of the team, Tomoya Asano, noted that they had been going from genre to genre in each game, and this felt like a natural progression to keep things fresh:
“When we thought about where to go next, we felt that challenging ourselves to an action RPG would be a good direction. It goes without saying that we want to deliver this game to all the people who enjoyed the games that we have made previously, but I would be delighted if it could reach out to a new audience of gamers as well!”
If you’re curious about why Elliot looks the way he does, that was an intentional design choice, where the team wanted him to feel “grounded,” while also looking like a real adventurer. Arguably the bigger challenge, though, was stepping away from turn-based combat and focusing on intense, fast-paced action, and as Producer Naofumi Matsushita noted, it took a while to figure things out:
“In The Adventures of Elliot, the camera is generally fixed in a top-down view, and the development team did a lot of trial and error to work out how we could leverage the appeal of HD-2D within that view as much as possible.
The result of these experiments was a “rolling cylinder” effect that gives an undulating sense of depth to the backdrops. This has led to a different environment style and a different kind of appeal in comparison to previous HD-2D games.”
If you wish to try out The Adventure of Elliot The Millennium Tales right now, there’s a Nintendo Switch 2 demo that you can play!
