Thursday, August 30, 2018

The Little Adventures of Mr. Takumi Entry 4: Mr. Takumi and "Games" (2015)

Title: Entry 4: Mr. Takumi and "Games" / 「第4回 巧さんと“ゲーム”」
Source: Nintendo Dream, December issue, 2015

Summary: Director/scenario writer of Dai Gyakuten Saiban (The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures) Takumi Shū wrote a six-part column in 2015-2016 for the magazine Nintendo Dream titled The Little Adventures of Mr. Takumi. The common theme for all six columns was "first meetings", and Takumi would write about his first encounters with topics that would have impact in his own personal life and his games. In this fourth column, Takumi writes about his memories with videogames and how he first get enthranced with the adventure game genre that would form the basis of the majority of his work.

Monday, July 30, 2018

The Little Adventures of Mr. Takumi Entry 1: Mr. Takumi and "Stories" (2015)

Title: Entry 1: Mr. Takumi and "Stories" / 「第一回 巧さんと“物語”」
Source: Nintendo Dream, September issue, 2015

Summary: Takumi Shū, director/scenario writer of Dai Gyakuten Saiban (The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures) wrote a six-part column in 2015 for the magazine Nintendo Dream titled The Little Adventures of Mr. Takumi. The theme of these columns was "first meetings" and had Takumi write about his first experiences with topics that would have a significant impact on his future life, like his first games or his first meeting with stage magic. In this first column, dating from the September issue, Takumi talks about a certain work of fiction that had a profound influence on his own writing, and surprisingly enough, it's not even a mystery story: Dr. Dolittle.

Wednesday, June 20, 2018

15th Anniversary Gyakuten Saiban Special Talk Session: Gyakuten Saiban 5, 6 - Yamazaki Takeshi X Fuse Takurō (2017)

Title: 15th Anniversary Gyakuten Saiban Special Talk Session: Gyakuten Saiban 5, 6 - Yamazaki Takeshi X Fuse Takurō / 「逆転裁判15周年記念トーク 逆転裁判「5」「6」 山崎剛 X 布施拓郎」
Source: 15th Anniversary Gyakuten Saiban Series Encyclopedia 2001-2016

Summary:  In this interview published in 15th Anniversary Gyakuten Saiban Series Encyclopedia 2001-2016, director, scenario writer Yamazaki Takeshi and character designer Fuse Takurō discuss Gyakuten Saiban 5 (Ace Attorney 5 - Dual Destinies) and Gyakuten Saiban 6 (Ace Attorney 6 - Spirit of Justice). They first discuss how it was to work as the new team on the mainline series in their different roles as (scenario) director and art director. A great art of the discussion is about creating new characters, and also bringing old characters back for the new stories, and the two also go in-depth in story elements of both games. 

Sunday, May 20, 2018

Naruhodō Ryūichi - This Is The Character Everyone Imagines Him To Be!? Takumi's Comments (2005)

Title: Naruhodō Ryūichi - This Is The Character Everyone Imagines Him To Be!? Takumi's Comments /「成歩堂龍一 みんなの考えた成歩堂龍一はこんな感じ!? 巧氏コメント」
Source: Gyakuten Saiban Fanbook

Summary: Gyakuten Saiban Fanbook was originally released in 2005 just before the Japanese release of Gyakuten Saiban Yomigaeru Gyakuten (Ace Attorney DS), and i  featured a couple of character profiles for Naruhodō (Phoenix Wright) and Mitsurugi (Miles Edgeworth), with information that was imagined by the fans themselves! From birthdays, place they live and bloodtype, to hobbies, their favorite foods and what they did on their days off, the fans had thought off all kinds things for the main characters of the Gyakuten Saiban (Ae Attorney) series. In return, director Takumi, producer Inaba and character designers Suekane and Iwamoto also responded to those 'fan-theories/head-canon' and also talked about their own 'head-canons'. In his reaction to Naruhodō's profile, Takumi added a couple of (unofficial) background ideas to the character, including his background as a Thespian. This translation only includes Takumi's comments, not the profile itself.

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

Takumi Shū Explains How The Scenarios and Tricks of Gyakuten Saiban and Dai Gyakuten Saiban Are Created (GCC’18) (2018)

Title: Takumi Shū Explains How The Scenarios and Tricks of Gyakuten Saiban and Dai Gyakuten Saiban Are Created (GCC’18) / 「巧舟氏が『逆転裁判』と『大逆転裁判』のシナリオやトリックの作りかたを解説【GCC’18】
Source: Famitsu

Summary: On March 30th, 2018, series creator Takumi Shū headed a presentation about the Gyakuten Saiban (Ace Attorney) series at Game Creators Conference’18. In this presentation titled “About the Scenarios of Gyakuten Saiban / Dai Gyakuten Saiban”, Takumi explained how he creates the mystery plots for his Gyakuten Saiban and Dai Gyakuten Saiban (The Great Ace Attorney) series. He explains his methods for coming up with the stories, with the trick needed to pull off the fanciful murders and how he plays with the information flow to keep the player engaged in the story. He also explains about the worldview of the games, and other things he did to make this an entertaining adventure game series for players. Takumi also explains the concept behind Dai Gyakuten Saiban and some of its key points. At the end of the presentation, there was also room for a short Q&A.

This is a translation of the report of this presentation posted by Famitsu on April 3rd, 2018. Images are taken from the source column. Copyright belongs to their respective owners.

Thursday, March 15, 2018

Celebrating Gyakuten Saiban 4's Nintendo 3DS release! We Ask Takumi Shū This And That About Gyakuten Saiban 4 (2017)

Title: Celebrating Gyakuten Saiban 4's Nintendo 3DS release! We Ask Takumi Shū This And That About Gyakuten Saiban 4 /『「『逆転裁判4』ニンテンドー3DS版発売記念! 巧舟氏に訊く『逆転裁判4』アレコレ」
Source: Famitsu

Summary: Famitsu got the chance to ask Takumi Shū five short questions for the release of the 3DS port of Gyakuten Saiban 4 (Ace Attorney 4 - Apollo Justice) in this article published on December 4, 2017. Unlike his direction/script credits for the previous three games, Takumi was credited as original creator and series supervisor for this game. There are actually few post-Gyakuten Saiban 4 interviews with Takumi talking about this specific game, so in a way, these little short Q&A does feature some new insights that Takumi hadn't really voiced before, especially in regards to what his favorite episode of the game is.

Sunday, March 11, 2018

Gyakuten Kenji 2 Blog Entry 12: Director VS Producer (2010)

Title: Director VS Producer /「ディレクターVSプロデューサー」
Source: Gyakuten Kenji 2 official site

Summary: In this blog post published on 17 November 2010 on the Gyakuten Kenji 2 ("Turnabout Prosecutor 2") blog, producer Eshiro writes a piece about how he and director Yamazaki often have "fights" about what they want in the game. Their "rivalry" is often joked about in interviews and columns, as while both naturally want to make the best game possible, they both have their own opinions about what is best for the game. In this blog post, Eshiro explains how their differing views on the character of Mikagami eventually merged into the final character design.

Thursday, February 22, 2018

Naruhodo Gyakuten Saiban! 6 "Gyakuten Saiban 3" (2005)

Title: Naruhodo Gyakuten Saiban! 6 "Gyakuten Saiban 3" /「なるほど逆転裁判!第6回 逆転裁判3」
Source: DreaMaga 2005, Febraury issue

Summary: The column "Naruhodo Gyakuten Saiban!" ("I See! Ace Attorney!") in the monthly game magazine DreaMaga (an abbreviation derived from its old format titled DreamCast Magazine) ran for 19 months starting in the September 2004 issue and was written by Gyakuten Saiban (Ace Attorney) creator Takumi Shuu, as build-up to the release of the DS port of the first game. These columns usually consisted of a short essay by Takumi, some dialogues that had been cut out of the games, and a one-page dialogue-based short story starring the characters from Gyakuten Saiban, accompanied by an original illustration by Suekane Kumiko, the original main character designer of the games.. The theme for the sixth column is Gyakuten Saiban 3 (Ace Attorney 3 - Trials & Tribulations), with as highlight the original idea he had for the final episode of this game. Note that this translation only includes the column itself, and none of the other parts (short story/cut dialogues).

Tuesday, January 16, 2018

This is how the characters from the popular game Gyakuten Saiban were born. An interview with illustrator Iwamoto (2009)

Title: This is how the characters from the popular game Gyakuten Saiban were born. An interview with illustrator Iwamoto /「人気ゲーム「逆転裁判」シリーズのキャラクターはこうして生まれた。イラストレーター 岩元氏を直撃インタビュー」
Source: Wacom (article down)

Summaruy: On February 4th, 2009, Wacom, known for its graphics tablets, posted an interview on its official website with Iwamoto Tatsurō, one of the main character designers of the Gyakuten Saiban (Ace Attorney) franchise. In this interview, Iwamoto tells about how he first got into drawing, why he became a freelance illustrator after working at game developers, the thinking process behind creating characters like the ones we know from Gyakuten Saiban and of course, how the drawing tablet plays a work in his life as an illustrator.

Images are taken from the source article. Copyright belongs to their respective owners.