Ben-DutkaThe East vs. West debate continues to rage, although it's generally accepted that the West is winning the battle, in terms of both sales and quality.
However, rather than addressing the cultural differences and contrasting interests, the DMC designers talked about the difference in how Japanese and Western developers approach gameplay.
In a recent Gamasutra interview (as cited at Siliconera ), Devil May Cry producer Motohide Eshiro said one of the biggest differences involves realism of animation.
"The main difference, if we were to really simplify things, is it seems that Western games tend to focus a lot on realism in animation, so that, if you’re walking along and you stop, you should go through a natural and proper stop animation, which tends to look very good.
But, when we’re talking about something like Devil May Cry, the concept has always been letting the user do what they want when they want—cancel things in mid-motion and suddenly turn on a dime, this sort of thing. We had to spend a lot of time getting this concept across, and bringing their way of thinking over to the mind space that we were in, and finding that balance between realism and ease of use."
If you break things down and analyze various East and West games, you will indeed spot small yet distinct differences like this. And for the record, we'd have to expect full freedom of movement and combination canceling and all that in the upcoming DMC , which is of course a reboot. As for other differences between West and East, we're certain you guys can talk about it. 😉 Just don't get too nasty.
Related Game(s): DMC
