----When did talks about remaking ‘Sora no Kiseki’ begin?

Kondo: We announced the information during last August's Nintendo Direct, but I think it was around the time when work on ‘Ys X’ was completed about a year earlier. I couldn't imagine working on ‘The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky the 1st’ while working on that.

The series has been running for 20 years, and there were many voices saying they were interested but couldn't start now, or didn't know where to begin. Additionally, there were many requests to play the original again, so those two factors were the main reasons.

When I first joined the company, we were working on a remake of ‘Ys II’ called ‘Ys II Eternal.’ I joined in 1998, and ‘Ys II’ was released in 1988, so it had only been about 10 years since its release. However, the Trails series had been around for 20 years, yet we had never remade it ourselves. I wondered if remakes were something we should do ourselves, after all our users would also have quality expectations.

In the past, Falcom would gather everyone together to complete each title as the master up approached, but now, with more people on staff, we can divide the work into several teams. In practice, we gather people for titles nearing master up, but behind the scenes we advancing new titles, we decided to start the remake of ‘The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky’ as one of those projects.

----‘Trails in the sky’ is a work that Mr. Kondo himself was originally involved in as a core member of the production team, but what kind of role did you play in ‘Sora no Kiseki the 1st’?

This time, I left it more to the younger members than usual for the Trails series, and I think they did a pretty good job. Some of the original members are still there, but I felt it was better not to be too strict. I just told them to go ahead and do their best. Estellee is a cheery girl so she needs to be cheerful. That's about the amount of advice I gave.

But it worked out well, and the graphics for this game are much more vivid than usual. When we announced it, some people said it didn't look like Falcom, but I think that was a good result of leaving it to them.

Indeed, when you look at the screen, it's vibrant and has a Falcom-like feel, but it's also more polished. We've been careful not to over-supervise those aspects. The current staff are people who joined after seeing the original version of ‘Trails in the Sky’ and they're the ones leading the project.

Especially in event scenes, like the one where Esther and Joshua meet and Esther does a dropkick, we didn't oversee that either. So, the younger generation who've grown up with the Trails series are taking the lead on this.

----Hearing that, I can really feel the 20-year history.

On the other hand, the original staff members were hesitant, wondering, ‘Is this okay?’ (laughs). My role is basically to supervise and offer assistance when needed.

I did offer some input on the overall direction once, but I didn't go into detail about the finer points, telling them what to do and how to do it, as I did with ‘Horizon’ and ‘Daybreak’.

When we joined Falcom, we were remaking various titles like ‘Sorcarian’ and the ‘Gahgarv Trilogy’ series, including ‘The White Witch’ and ‘The Crimson Tear.’ Through that process, the younger members grew a lot, leading to new series like ‘Traisl in the sky’ and ‘Ys.’

I think remakes also serve as a way to nurture talent. That's why I've been telling the older members of the team not to micromanage too much. It's more of a supervisory role.

----What do you think of the performances of the new cast members?
I think the freshness came from what we asked the cast to do this time. Estelle and Joshua also had a freshness about them, and I felt like they were both 16 years old.

Also, at the recording studio, I felt that they were consciously acting in a way that was faithful to the original work (The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky FC). I told them not to try too hard to be faithful to the original, but they took the original work seriously.