The creator of the books that impressed the Shin Megami Tensei sequence says builders ought to take inspiration from different media, not simply video games.
Aya Nishitani wrote a trilogy of books within the mid Nineteen Eighties known as Digital Satan Story. These books – particularly the primary title, Digital Satan Story: Megami Tensei – turned standard in Japan, and led to the Shin Megami Tensei sequence of video video games (together with its spin-offs just like the Persona sequence).
Earlier this week (as noticed by Automaton) Nishitani replied to a person on X who steered that trendy video video games aren’t as as a result of they appear to be primarily based on different video games, whereas builders within the ’80s and ’90s tended to take inspiration from films or music.
Nishitani agreed, saying he believes that as a way to evolve the medium of video video games and invent new gameplay mechanics, builders ought to think about drawing inspiration from different sources, somewhat than different video video games.
“Builders of the previous created video games impressed by films and music,” he stated (through machine translation), “however at this time’s builders create video games impressed by video games. There’s a perception amongst some that this method gained’t result in attention-grabbing video games, however I believe that’s an opinion value listening to.
“I additionally assume the identical – if you’re impressed by a unique medium, new recreation techniques may be created, however if you’re impressed by an amazing recreation, you have a tendency to finish up creating the identical system.”
He later clarified: “The primary Megami Tensei may be stated to be a recreation impressed by novels. Additionally, I believe the digital camera angles in very early polygonal video games like Alone within the Darkish have been influenced by films. What I’m speaking about is generally the system itself, not the floor degree story or graphics.”
A variety of different video video games have been immediately primarily based on novels through the years, together with The Witcher, Metro 2033 and Ubisoft‘s Tom Clancy sequence. Others have taken inspiration from them – BioShock is alleged to be closely influenced by Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged.
