Shujinkou Interview
Rice Games’s Shujinkou is a dungeon-crawling RPG that sees three protagonists — Shu, Jin, and Kou — banding together to take on the Akuma, language-devouring monsters that terrorize the land. Shujinkou offers a vast world, two-arc story campaign, sixteen different labyrinthine dungeons to traverse, and an optional language-learning element across its gameplay. Ahead of its release later this month, RPGamer was given the chance to ask director Julian Rice about the game’s features and development.
Jordan McClain (RPGamer): What inspired you to make Shujinkou, and where did you draw inspiration from?
Julian Rice (Rice Games Inc): The inspiration for Shujinkou started with the word itself — Shujinkou (主人公) in Japanese means “main protagonist.” Growing up, I spent time in both the USA and Asia, particularly Taiwan and Hong Kong, and my mother is Taiwanese. When I first started learning Japanese in high school, I would break down each kanji character and compare it to my somewhat limited knowledge of Chinese (Mandarin). When I came across the word shujinkou, I had a eureka moment—like almost every other word, each kanji within the word had its own distinct meaning. That sparked the idea of creating three characters—Shu, Jin, and Kou—each with unique personalities inspired by their respective kanji. In the early days, I imagined them sailing the seas, riding airships, and embarking on grand adventures to save the world from looming threats.
Six years ago, I didn’t yet know how to make a full-fledged game, so I started by following YouTube tutorials to create a simple platformer. But deep down, I knew that wasn’t the game I truly wanted to make. On top of that, the art team I had assembled wasn’t specialized in a style that suited a platformer. So I decided to pivot toward a genre I’ve always loved — dungeon-crawling RPGs — and that’s how Shujinkou really started taking shape.
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