Title: Working on the Scenario /「シナリオのお仕事」
Source: Gyakuten Saiban 5 official site
Working on the Scenario
Hello, nice to meet you. I’m Fukuda of Planning, and I worked on the scenario of Gyakuten Saiban 5 (Ace Attorney 5 – Dual Destinies). Today, I wanted to explain to you how the scenario of this game is created. Some of you might be yelling “Hold it!” at me now. “Isn’t Mr. Yamazaki the scenario writer of Gyakuten Saiban 5?” I hear them ask. This might be a bit confusing, but the scenario of Gyakuten Saiban 5 is actually written by multiple people. Mr. Yamazaki is the scenario director, so he’s the boss of the scenario team. He himself also writes, but all of us in the scenario team write, while he also supervises the team, and directs the complete scenario.
How a Gyakuten Saiban Scenario Is Created
Planning: Fukuda
So to get back to what I was saying, the first stage of creating a scenario is the process of brainstorming. At this stage, we just come up with all kinds of ideas, like the circumstances of the case or for example the setting of the story.
It is important these ideas make an impact, and are alluring. We in the scenario team let every grey cell in our brains work at full power to come up with all kinds of ideas. We are not be caged by conventions, but allow our thoughts to wander around freely. We are allowed to present the most random and wildest ideas at this stage, so it’s a lot of fun!
But sometimes we come with very outrageous ideas at these meetings where we allow our creative libidos to explode. For example, an idea for the second episode that was shelved was:
A murder case occurring in a mountain village. The victim was an immortal vampire. Was the murderer a Tengu?
Tengu Village is found deep in the mountains. A Western-style old castle is located not far from the village, and it is said an immortal vampire lives there. One day, the vampire is killed inside locked room, and a Tengu is witnessed in the vicinity! Tengu vs Vampire!
That was the gist of the idea. No, wait before you comment on it. The really wild part still has to come. Part of this idea included a scene where Odoroki-kun (Apollo Justice) and the others would find a red object, shaped like some kind of rod.
It seems obvious it’s the nose of a Tengu, but their unfamiliarity with the story of the Tengu leads to an outrageous misunderstanding.
Kokone [Athena Cykes]: Sempai. There’s something stuck on the floor beneath this desk!
Odoroki: What’s that? It looks like a red stick…
Kokone: Didn’t they say chili peppers are a local specialty of the village?
Odoroki: Oh, I know, this is a chili pepper!
Yes, I can hear you cry out “You can tell by tasting it!” or “You can tell by touching it!” already, so let’s skip that part. So then they go to the chili pepper store in the village to investigate. Later in court, when he’s cornered by the prosecutor, Odoroki finally thinks out of the box and realizes it is the broken nose of the Tengu…
Yes, it’s crazy.
Of course, this idea didn’t make it. When brainstorming, it is important not to limit your ideas in advance, but sometimes you do go off in weird directions. But it’s by sharing wild ideas like these, the scenario is slowly improved and perfected.
What follows after the brainstorming process is the creation of the plot. A plot is like a building plan, a plan that lays out how the whole story will develop. You could say that this process decides how the scenario will turn out in the end. You decide how the case starts, what facts are uncovered, where the turnabouts occur, how the player is led to the truth.
Everything is decided by the plot!
What makes the plot here different from a film or an anime is that Gyakuten Saiban is ultimately a video game. It is important that the story develops because the player is playing the game. So even for moments where Odoroki is supposed to turn the case around, those moments needs to be the result of a player-driven moment, like a cross-examination or multiple choice screen. If not, the story goes off on its own without the player.
Once the plot has been decided on, it needs to be turned into a script or screenplay. This is the stage where we finally get to write the spoken lines the players see in the game.
This was a very brief introduction and I skipped a few parts, but this is basically how the game scenario is created. People who have not played the game yet, might have gotten worried now having heard about our wild ideas, but don’t worry.
Mr. Yamazaki has kept an eye on us to make sure the scenario team didn’t go too wild!
And now I’d like to hand the word over to Mr. Fuse, also of the scenario team!
Giving The Characters A Soul!
Planning: Fuse
Fuse of Planning here. I was in the scenario team. It’s a bit confusing that I share my name with Mr. Fuse, the art director. Both of us turn around when our names are called. Because of our shared names, I thought I might have an artist residing with me too, so here’s Kokone wearing a mask with a doodle of Kokone’s face… I poured all of my drawing skills into this image. Please at least give me praise for that.
[Image missing?]
What were we talking about again? Oh, yes. I wanted to talk about how to give personality to characters. Fukuda used episode 2 as an example, so I will proceed with the character Atsui Chishio, from episode 3. Atsui Chishio and Shizuya Rei (a friend) are high school students who face each other in a mock trial held at the setting of episode 3, the Themis Legal Acedemy. The two follow reversed stereotypes on purpose, one being a hot-blooded arts student and the other a cool-headed sports student.
The matter at hand is this. Comedy is very important in the world of Gyakuten. It should be fun to talk with the characters, interesting to see how they react when driving into a corner, and they need to have memorable, impactful personalities!
Chishio:
I am Atsui Chishio! In the 3rd year of the Prosecutor Course! I’m in the Arts Club!
Here Chishio is introduced like a very normal hot-blooded boy, belonging to the arts club.
But how do we give a character a memorable trait so that after a first talk with them, you understand what kind of person they are?
Like, what does being a hot-blooded mean? Yes, it means the blood flowing through their body is hot! The power flowing through them leads to a scream, an urge that can’t be suppressed!
Chishio:
Ooaaaaah! I am Atsui Chishio!
3rd year of the Prosecutor Course!
So how about adding a roar? That sounds a bit more hotblooded already. But still not hot enough. What we need, is the heat of magma flowing out of a volcano. The dramatical heat of the plates that made the Himalaya rise to the heavens! As I was troubling our minds about this, our Savior arrived. Mr. Fuse had finished his design of Chishio.
***
Fuse: What’s this? A full-body exercise brace?
Fuse: This thing should be screeching all the time. Just standing there makes you sweat!
Fuse: That’s way too hotblooded, Mr. Fuse!
Fuse: This should fit right with his personality, right, Mr. Fuse?
Yamazaki: Which Fuse is which?!!
***
The impact, and convincing power of a single image is really not to be underestimated. It really helps your inspiration when deciding the personality of a character. And that’s how Chishio became even hot-bloodier.
Chishio:
Ooooh! Myyyyyyyyy! Naaaaaaaaame! Iiiiiiiss! Aaaaaaatsui! Chishioooooo!
Once we arrived at the idea of having Chishio yell to express hot-bloodiness, we went all the way in with it. What they call deformation or distortion in media. Of course, you can go too far with this. There was one time something silly happened with his testimony.
**Cross Examination**
Testimony 1
Uhh… Ooooaaaah!
Hiyaaah!
Testimony 2
Haaa! Grmph! Grmph!
Hyaaaaaah!
Testimony 3
Ugh! Cough! Cough!
Zooooooaaaa!
Testimony 4
Ha! Ha! Hiya!
Hyahyaaaaaaa!!
**End Cross Examination**
I can’t even bear looking at this. If you’d press at testimony 3, Kokone would point out Chishio choked first before yelling. At this point, it didn’t even have anything to do with the case anymore.
At these times, scenario director Yamazaki would gently tap my shoulder and look at me with a bright smile on his face.
“…Rewrite this”
Yessir. This wouldn’t make for a fun game.
And you’ll find lots of these wacky characters in Gyakuten Saiban 5, all created after a lot of trial and error. Each of these characters have been given life by many, from the members in the scenario team to the character designer, the modelers, the animators, the sound engineers and the scripters who use all of the aforementioned to bring them on the screen.
It would be nice if you would play the game, meet all of them and laugh and cry along them.
Next time you’ll find Mrs. Nakamura of Planning here. She also worked on the scenario. She’ll talk about the DLC Special Episode Turnabout Reclaimed. Look forward to it!
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