Tactics Ogre: Reborn Interview - How Square Enix approached revisiting a beloved classic RPG
Of the slew of RPGs that were released late last year, only one can be described as one of the most well-regarded RPGs ever made. Tactics Ogre: Reborn is not the first time that the seminal tactical RPG has been re-released, but it now stands in a spot where years of praise, critique, and feedback can be taken into consideration as Square Enix looked to repackage the best version of its "crown jewel" in what will easily be the most available version of the game for new audiences for the foreseeable future.
After its launch, RPG Site had a chance to ask some questions to the development team of Tactics Ogre: Reborn, including producer Hiroaki Kato, director Takashi Katano, and lead game designer Naoyuki Takahashi.
RPG Site (to Hiroaki Kato): What is your history with Tactics Ogre before working on Tactics Ogre Reborn, and how did the project come about initially?
Hiroaki Kato (Producer): My history with Tactics Ogre goes back 28 years to when I did some debugging work on the original SNES game. I can remember looking at all the elements that made up the game -- the system, the story, the visuals, the music -- and being amazed at the quality of it all. I thought to myself, "this game is going to go down in history". I can still remember it like it was yesterday.
I also worked on the PSP version as Project Manager, so this is now the third time that I've been involved in the development of this game. I'd really wanted to revisit the development of Tactics Ogre at some point, paying attention to the feedback from people who had played the PSP version around the time of its launch. The real turning point came during development for 2017's Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age, which I oversaw. We made a lot of enhancements over the original Final Fantasy XII, including boosting the game's visual performance, recording new audio to improve the sound design, revising the battle design, and just generally improving the overall playability.
At that time, I thought to myself, "I think we now know everything we need to know to be able to make a new Tactics Ogre game", and that prompted us to start development.
RPG Site: With Tactics Ogre being such a well-regarded genre classic, how did you approach developing a new version with so many adjustments? What was the prevailing philosophy in the development?
Takashi Katano (Director): Tactics Ogre: Reborn uses the PSP version, Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together, as its base. We reviewed the feedback from players, and at the start of the project, all the developers involved played the PSP game and shared their thoughts on things that could be improved. We also had discussions with Yasumi Matsuno, who designed the original game, about what kind of improvements we could make.
There were some decisions that were unanimous, for example, using the unit-leveling system from the original SNES instead of the class-leveling system used in Let Us Cling Together, and ulimately, we pinned down our approach after a number of discussions on how best to make Reborn into a title that people would enjoy.
RPG Site: Tactics Ogre Reborn has many changes from previous releases of the game. One of the most notable additions is that of the buff/debuff cards that randomly appear on the battlefield. How did the idea come about for the inclusion of these cards? Additionally, was there any consideration to give players an option to turn these off or adjust their spawn rates?
Naoyuki Takahashi (Lead Game Designer): A lot of changes were made to enhance or tweak the battle system, so that players would be rewarded for good strategy. The reason we've tweaked strategies for customising and building your forces that depend on skills or items since the previous games and bolstered certain class characteristics was because we wanted players to adapt and think about their party formation. We thought that buff cards were a good way to encourage players to strategize on the fly once the battle had already started.
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