Speaking at “3rd Game Business Archive” conference in Japan, Camelot’s Hiroyuki Takahashi shared a few pieces of information regarding the Shining series. Shining in the Darkness - the first-person dungeon crawler which kicked off the series on the Mega Drive - sold impressively, shifting 300,000 units in Japan at a time when Sega’s 16-bit console was still struggling to gain attention against the NES and PC Engine in its homeland. He also mentioned that Shining Force CD was created almost solely to gain experience of working on the Mega CD / Sega CD hardware. Finally, he revealed that he would love to work on a fourth Shining Force title.
A new Shining Force game wouldn’t need an AAA budget. They could make something which looks like a high-res Shining Force III in Unity, for example. Still a massive undertaking, but not out of the question.
Keep in mind Camelot left towards the end of the Saturn’s lifecycle when they could have remained one of Sega’s third party developers. They could have made an RPG for The Dreamcast.
I understand why they left. A Distant Journey is my favorite song from the Shining Force 3 OST. The same composer worked on Star Ocean 3.
The reason why Shining Force III will probably never be fully officially translated and released by Sega is because it would be disrespectful to Camelot. It should have been fully translated at the time. Now would be an afterthought or a correction when there should have been no mistakes in the first place.
In my opinion, we should simply make a Shining Force IV with a modern graphics engine, and reset the lore. It can be done.
As for this argument about markets and the costs the development, and sales figures, I am not going to hear this again from anyone. The entire market has changed where huge developers/publishers are prepared to spend huge amounts of money on projects that they know will sell less than what they could, to send out the ideas that they want to send out.
I think the best Shining Force game was Shining Force II for The 16 Bit Sega Genesis.
I would actually like to combine Tony Taka’s art with Yoshitaka Tamaki’s art (SITD and SF1).
The reason why Shining Force III will probably never be fully officially translated and released by Sega is because it would be disrespectful to Camelot. It should have been fully translated at the time. Now would be an afterthought or a correction when there should have been no mistakes in the first place.
I don’t understand this logic. Wouldn’t you think Camelot would like to see the SF3 trilogy released here in some format? I would think putting the game in more hands would be a testament of the quality of game Camelot created.
As for this argument about markets and the costs the development, and sales figures, I am not going to hear this again from anyone. The entire market has changed where huge developers/publishers are prepared to spend huge amounts of money on projects that they know will sell less than what they could, to send out the ideas that they want to send out.
Never hear this again from anyone? Come on dude, this isn’t a dictatorship… As a developer in a non game market with some game dev contacts, I would say from what I have heard devs/pubs aren’t particularly keen to release a game that costs huge amounts of money without some expectation of profit. This is why the indie scene has exploded. There are a lot of people out there who are just interested in creating something. If it wasn’t for the indie/small dev teams working on new ideas, I honestly think the game industry would be pretty stagnant at the moment due large publishers gobbling up anything successful and commoditizing development of these games to continue reaping a profit. Large publishers such as EA are quick to kill off anything that doesn’t bring in large profit margins. Even devs such as Blizzard who used to be the exception have started to prioritize profit over creativity.
Ask Camelot if they want SF3 remade. Did they ever ask for this? As far as I know they offered to remake the game in 2D.
If they want the game re-released, I would respect their wishes. Did they ever ask for it? I am happy to stand corrected here.
EA is small. They are a vampiric entity that absorbs IPS, and maybe licences them. They have a few geniuses there such as the people behind Dead Space, but they were probably there to escape the politics of other companies. If EA only cares about making money, then someone with a popular idea and the means to work with them could make it happen. EA only care about making money and destroying people’s souls.
The entire industry has changed. Huge profits do not matter anymore. Unless you are EA. This is going to hit everyone soon.
The money made from the games industry is pocket change compared to what defense contractors make. And the powers that be are going to put their money into sending ideas to people even if they make less money.
So my advice to Sega and Sony is to understand this reality. I think Sony did a while back with the PS when they sold each console for a loss, which they did.
Forget SF3. The composer is the same composer as the one in Star Ocean 3. The only person who could continue Shining Force now is King Arthur. Strangely enough, the main character of Shining The Holy Ark is Arthur.
As for this argument about not being a dictatorship, the entire damn US government is a benevolent dictatorship. People should have bought more copies of SF3 at the time, or bought more Saturns.
If the Saturn had sold 10 million consoles in the US, SF3 would have been translated. The reality is Camelot did not have to make the game, but they did.
Be real.
As for creativity, every idea you can imagine can be brought into reality and copyrighted with the right people. Few people will break away from that. I would love to hear Alex’s thoughts on this. I can see why he is into smaller IPs.
You know, the old me would say that with different marketing and development the Saturn would have sold better outside of Japan.
But here we are. Emulate the game with a translation patch. Sega should focus on SFIV. I know the developers at Camelot. If they want SF3 translated and rereleased they would say so. They felt wronged by Sega at the time.
Personally, I think an SFIV could sell very well. Medieval fantasy has always been very popular.
I think there’s a space for a smaller budget Shining Force III Remake (or Shining Force IV). Create a SFIII style engine in something like Unity, and recreate the sprite and model assets as higher quality 3D models, but keep things like the sound effects and music.
It would still be a lot of work, but in my opinion Shining Force doesn’t need a triple A budget.
Put it on Kickstarter and see how much interest it gets. It could be fantastic way to revisit the series for fans of the classic Shining Force games.
Electronic Arts annual revenue for 2020 was $5.537B , a 11.86% increase from 2019.
Electronic Arts annual revenue for 2019 was $4.95B , a 3.88% decline from 2018.
Electronic Arts annual revenue for 2018 was $5.15B , a 6.3% increase from 2017.
What defense contractors make is rediculous and also completely unrelated to this discussion. Game developers that don’t turn a profit shut down. This is true of any business throughout the world. No company can keep operating without making a profit. This has been true for the industry from the beginning or else Sega and Atari would still be releasing consoles.
Selling at a loss is a loss. Companies in the past have done that, but that trend just isn’t holding up. I dont think any of the consoles for the last three generations have been sold at a loss, but I know they are doing their best to no longer lose money on the hardware as these systems have become successful as more than just a games machine and more of a media platform.
I definitely believe more people would have bought SF3 if it wasn’t released on a failed system. The player base on the Saturn when SF3 was released was really small. Being able to leverage the existing content, story, music, etc. and do a solid re-release on modern systems would definitely give this trilogy a chance to shine. I would be fine with a SF4, but why throw away the chance to bring SF3 to a larger group of players. Hell, it would probably be fairly easy to do a classics compilation with SF1, 2, and the 3 trilogy (translated) using emulation and have some success. Sega has been pretty open to releasing classics via emulation on multiple systems and platforms. Would be nice to see them bring back some Sega classics from the Saturn era.
Compare them to Sony. EA is small. Imagine them without Mass Effect and Dead Space and C&C and Lord of the Rings. They know how to make money, but they are vampires.
Welcome to the new world. Publishers are going to make games knowing that they could make much more money if they made them differently, because they are backed by money from elsewhere that makes the profits from the games industry seem like pocket change.
It is a new reality that is going to hit certain people soon. How much fiction have you seen lately with political agendas in them? They lost money, but they are still there.
It is not the free market we knew in the 80s anymore. A good example is Ghostbusters. All the Ghostbusters are men. There is a strong female character in there, but all the Ghostbusters are men. That would not be made now. It could be made at the time because mostly men watched these types of movies, and it would have been more successful than something that focused on equality.
I think we should make a new game. Sega have the talent. Valkyria Chronicle type graphics. Etc. We could maybe hire the composer from SF3 as well (Star Ocean 2-3 as well). I think he might be up for it.