Luminous Productions is one of the studios at Square Enix aiming to create new Triple-A IPs. The studio, in the past, was helmed by Hajime Tabata, working on Final Fantasy XV and its Luminous Engine. You know the story, Tabata left Square Enix in November 2018 and Luminous Productions got a new leader in December 2018. This new head, Takeshi Aramaki, announced with a message back then that the studio is currently working on a brand new title.
Famitsu just published an interview with two developers of Luminous Productions: Saya Nakahara, a Project Manager, and Yuuki Matsuzawa, a Lead Concept Artist. The interview mostly focuses on the studio as a whole and their working conditions.
Luminous Productions has a 09:30-18:00 work schedule all employees need to stick too, in order to avoid crunching and sacrificing their private lives. Judging from the interview, this seems to function well. Saya Nakahara mentioned she joined Luminous Productions a year ago and the studio has great communication. She most notably mentioned everyone’s opinion is taken into account, regardless of hierarchy or how long they’ve been working in the studio. Personally speaking, while I’d like to avoid generalizations, seniority being prized above anything else seems like a pretty big issue in Japan overall, so I’m glad to hear otherwise for once.
Moreover, Nakahara and Matsuzawa were asked by Famitsu about the development status of this “Triple-A title created with a worldwide perspective”. It seems like the game won’t be ready anytime soon, but Luminous Productions is hard at work on it:
Yuuki Matsuzawa: “There’s not much we can tell you for now (laughs). We decided on certain elements of the game, but others elements are still under consideration. People like me who are at the top of the development process are very busy. It’s a brand new IP, so some things about it are different compared to what we’ve done until now. Meaning it’s a project difficult to work on and takes a lot of time.”
Luminous Productions is regularly pushing out interviews with its staff about graphics engines and stuff in games. They’re all in English so I highly recommend reading them if you hold an interest in these parts of game development.
Nowadays, Hajime Tabata made a new studio titled JP Games and they’re working on the first official Paralympics game ever, titled The Pegasus Dream Tour. It’s a sports RPG, seems like a pretty nice project, and tires maker Bridgestone just announced they’re among the game’s official sponsors. The game will be out worldwide in Spring 2020 on smartphones and multiple consoles. I personally believe Final Fantasy XV is a disaster, at least it was one at launch, but that Hajime Tabata obviously can’t hold sole responsibility for it, so I’m looking forward to his new game.
We’ll tell you more about Luminous Productions’ Triple-A game as soon as we learn more. 2019 might be ending but DualShockers is still going forward, and I’ll be here to bring you more Japanese games news. Of course, with Unneeded Opinions.
The post Square Enix’s New Triple-A Title By Luminous Productions Won’t be Here Anytime Soon by Iyane Agossah appeared first on DualShockers.