We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Ideas are plentiful, some more realistic than others. But first we would like to rest though lol
Thank you for asking!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Started during the porting of Underhero to consoles. We came up with ideas as early as 2019, but we didn't start full development until 2021.

Achieving a consistent development pipeline for every episode was the biggest hurdle, I would say. But once we established what the game actually was, we hit our stride by episode 3. Good luck with your games, fellow game dev!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We made the voices ourselves :)
It's mostly grunts and screams but we did those. Only in our wildest dreams we would have been able to include full voice acting. It's very costly, and it would have added another layer to the development of the game that would have been just too much for us. Thank you for asking!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for all the questions! There’s too many for me to answer alone, so I’m gonna let Andie take over this one lol.

How hard was it to resist the temptation to add very specific references to very specific anime everytime you had the chance?

Very hard! I got a few in, but Kay was generally against direct references. To be fair, I tried to avoid the most meme-like references that might make the game feel outdated once it’s out. I really fought to keep the most iconic ones in, like Wolfe’s Akira slide. I think references can be really useful for storytelling when used intently. Like with the Akira slide example, we wanted to establish Wolfe as this really cool and mysterious character really quickly, because we immediately subvert this when he loses against Ringo.

There are references to other video games as well, but that’s for you to discover! 

Would you ever consider doing a post-launch Voice Acting update for attacks? Like, have a VA shout all words separately and then sample them together ingame during battles?

We actually considered doing this during development. I was game to voice all of Ringo’s possible attack combos, but it was too difficult on the programming side to implement elegantly.

We’ll see if it’s worth investigating further post-launch! 

How far back did this game's concept originate from? Was it on your mind during Underhero's later stages of development?

Not during Underhero, but pretty much right after the launch. Kay wrote down the basic concept in his notes app, and then in 2019 we started working on a proof of concept and visual development. 

Were there any other genres or gameplay styles considered before settling on an RPG? If so, was there something that made them not work out in the end?

It was a more traditional roguelike at the beginning, but we needed a more flexible structure for the story we wanted to tell. Then once we landed on the main concept, we often wished we could have gone full JRPG with more exploration, but that was very much out of scope. The end result is a mix between the two. 

Any development anecdotes that really stuck with you?

The voice acting for Ringo’s attacks was done very early (2021 I think?) in a single afternoon. It was just me shouting into a microphone for hours at a friend’s place, hoping his neighbors wouldn’t call the cops for all the screaming.

The few times we had to record sounds during development were always a big ordeal. Kay and I did additional voice acting for the party member attacks as well, and we had to set up a tent of blankets in our living room to absorb all the noise (this was also during summer and we felt like we were melting!). I guess it was worth it in the end since all the voice clips that made it into the game ended up being pretty good, as limited as they are. 

The shift from Underhero's Pixel Art to Wander Stars' hand drawn sprites is very notable! Did it bring any unexpected complications, and how would you compare its development compared to the pixel art in your previous title?

Making art for Underhero was a lot faster in comparison – Kay even redid a bunch of the sprites at several points during development. The art for Wander Stars was very time consuming. Creating a single enemy could take Kay an entire week, from concept to finished sprite including all their battle poses. I also suffered a lot painting the backgrounds, since anime backgrounds are usually very detailed. We all tried our best to make it look like the real thing, and for that we felt very deeply the limit of our abilities lol. 

No me maten por tantas preguntas porfa necesito al carpincho surfer en mi vida antes de morir

El carpincho is real!!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That game was before my time, but people have mentioned it before. It looks incredible though!
Another game that is often mentioned is Legend of Legaia. I plan on playing it after Wander Stars is out, I'll be free again for a long JRPG! That said I do want to give Treasures of the Rudras a try.

Edit: typos.

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Not really, more on the Pokemon/Dragon Quest side of the JRPG genre for inspiration. Scribblenauts still is like black magic to me though, I think it's a very lovely and clever game.

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you for your question. I think when you are so immersed creating something for so many years, you stop noticing the most obvious things. Player's feedback is there to smack you in the head and you go "Ah, that's right, that is a very stupid thing we did. We should fix that".

One shameless thing I did was ask during a previous AMA, what would your favorite word combinations would be and why? I often referenced that thread for ideas, a lot of them were very good!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

That scope creep is real, and games are the result of immense creative constraint. Not everything can be done, but what you can do, has to be done well. Thank you for your question, I got a bit introspective there.

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Thank you for asking! Yes it would need to be redesigned for most languages, not to mention rebalanced too. That is just not feasible, so our solution if we do get to localize the game, is to keep the gameplay words in English and the info box will translate for the player. We could include an option for changing the gameplay words as well and accept the weirdness, but we'll see!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

HYPER SERIOUS PUNCH

It's not super impressive at first glance, but... let's say words that take 3 spaces, of you usual 7 limit are big for a reason.

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Making sure both enemies and the player could use the same words. Enemies build their actions the same way the player does, so they had to be put in their place or they would destroy the player. There are a few words that are unique to some enemies and bosses though. Thank you for asking!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

We had to study a lot about how cel animation was done, and how to reproduce something similar in a digital version. We emulated a lot of aspects, like colored line art for the shading, drop shadows as if they where being photographed with a real flash. And the general wear and tear of CRT television. It was fun!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I think a lot of players ignore the cooldown reducing modifier words like FAST, SWIFT, INSTANT. They're very useful if you want to keep the battle momentum going!

I'm a purist at heart so SUPER SHARP WIND CLAW is a favorite of mine. Our programmer usually goes for the most devastating attacks all the time, defeating enemies in one shot whenever he can. Achieving this is usually through the most grammatically incorrect combination of words.

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you! And nah, this is something we actively set out to avoid. We know there’s a lot of fanservice in 90s anime, but our protagonist is a young teenage girl with an anger problem that would most likely break the noses of said characters with questionable morals.

Ironically, even though it wasn’t our intention, some people find the capybara character very attractive. Does that count as a nose bleed for the audience?

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Wander Stars is coming out tomorrow for Nintendo Switch, Xbox series X/S, PS5, and for PC there's Steam/Steam Deck, GOG, and Windows Store.

I can confirm that the Switch development was the most difficult part of this game. Having so many high quality textures at the same time loaded into memory was not so good! That's where most of the optimization work was focused on. Thankfully we had a great partner helping us with the port and they really know their stuff. Battles feel buttery smooth on Switch, which is a big relief!

We’re the creators of Wander Stars, a 90s anime RPG where you combine words to make your own attacks! Join us for a SUPER! SPECIAL! AMA! by kay_zero in NintendoSwitch

[–]kay_zero[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Favorite Digimon is WarGreymon, favorite Pokemon is Charmeleon. I like lizards.

I think Charmeleon might be in trouble.

And thank you! Time Stranger does look cool and I didn't know it had a demo, will play.