Interviews

Collection of excerpts from online articles featuring interviews with Liber staff or people related to A3!

2018

Fujiwara Ryo Interview

One of the works you're involved with, A3!, is extremely popular at the moment, but how did you come to be involved in it?

Fujiwara: They approached me at the start telling me it was a game about raising good-looking actors, and I thought it sounded fun so I accepted. I remember the producer told me, "We thought for sure we'd be rejected. I'm really glad things were settled quickly!"

It was written in the proposal that the characters differed by troupe, so I drew lots of characters and said which colours suited them. It was fun lining them all up after that and looking at the balance. The higher ups were really understanding of what I wanted to do; when I brought them something and said 'something like this' they'd perceive where I wanted to go from there, so it was easy to work. There were lots of boys, so we talked about fashion too, but the producer is male and he himself is very fashionable. When I said I wanted to use some slightly strange, edgy clothes, he approved, so it was the easiest risk I've taken. In some sense they left it to me, and even when I didn't have confidence and went to discuss it with them they took the time to respond properly; I think that's why I was able to make something good. [...]

Recruiting a New Director/Producer

Was there anything which particularly made an impression on you, looking back over this past year?

Okita: That we were able to release A3 properly. And on the day of the release, the word "Masumi-kun" trended on Twitter. When you play A3!'s main story, you start with the Spring Troupe's story first, and "Masumi Usui" has quite a strong impact. The fact that the word "Masumi-kun" suddenly trended on Twitter means that a lot of people played the game and put their feelings on social media.

On each character's birthday, too, their names tend to trend. In other words, that meanst there are a lot of players who spread their enjoyment of the game and love of characters on social media, and I'm always very grateful for that, so it leaves an impression.

Female-oriented games were thought to grow slowly, but A3! recorded strong sales right from its release. Was that something you had anticipated?

Okita: Things were looking good at the preregistration stage, but the players' response was even better than we had anticipated. We think that was due to the hype over the pre-release information such as the illustrations and cast. We were able to commission Fujiwara Ryo-sensei, who draws wonderful male characters, and cast popular voice actors; I think that was a big factor in the pre-release hype.

In addition to the pre-release information, we put our energy into the design aspect of A3! too. The design agency BALCOLONY. created our website, site logo, and each of the characters' logos, so the visual aspect of it was quite refined. The users all took note of that, so I think that was also a factor.

Was there a disaster that you can laugh about now?

Okita: Definitely the new year's leading up to the release. [...] In order to squash as many bugs before the release as possible, we rely a lot on each member of the development team looking individually at the app. We had a narrow escape with a bug one of our newly-graduated female staff found, and the last month was really an all-out battle.

Thanks to that, A3! was released without any major bugs, and people could play it smoothly the first weekend after its release. I think the efforts of everyone on the server side played a large part in that too. Apart from strengthening the server during the emergency maintenance on the day of release, and doing that once more the next morning, we were able to ride out the weekend peak without conducting any further emergency maintenance. I talked about Twitter trends earlier, but looking at the thoughts written on social media, I think it was important that people could download the app and play smoothly at the time they decided they wanted to give it a try.

If we'd looked at the reactions on social media and people had downloaded the game but not been able to play, the users' frustration would have built up and they might have uninstalled the game. That's a huge waste of opportunity, so our engineers planned very carefully for that and in the end we were about to avoid it. It really is hard to gauge how many people will download the app right when you're releasing it.

It honestly would have been fine if we'd just built a server with all the bells and whistles, but if we went too far at the start the running costs would have been too high and it would have led to losses in terms of wasting resources; it was really difficult to judge. So I was relieved that A3! went well there. Looking back on it, the period pre-release was tough, but it was good that we worked as a team to fine-tune things right to the very end.

How large is the team working on A3! right now?

Muta: At the time of release there were 20 people, but it's grown slowly with recent graduates and mid-term hires, so there are about 30 people now. Female-oriented games have about that number of staff in development and twice as many for the business side of things. In addition to the game itself, related work for CDs, karaoke, events, goods, and stageplays etc exists. Then there are overseas releases too.

Hearing that, managing all that seems like rather busy work. Okita: I think A3! has an elite promotional team. It has less people than the planning or development teams, and each of them has so many companies and contacts to work with, they're just supervising and replying to emails all the time.

Muta: That's why we're looking for new people (laughs).

Okita: A3! didn't have enough people by far as the start, so the director and I did the rounds, but before the release we weren't able to do it as much and we got some really excellent promotional people. After those people came, we were just able to make it. Something I'm grateful for with A3! is that with all the good reviews directly after release, we were contacted a lot about licensing. It was tough just replying to all those enquiries, so I'm glad we added to our promotional team.

It's true that all the developments that took place over a single year couldn't have become a reality if you weren't working from the start.

Okita: Female users tend to enjoy multiple expansions like goods and comic adaptions more than male users. In order to make it each of those contents a hit, not just the game, we have to be aggressive with those expansions or the users won't be satisfied. We consider it essential to keep up a steady stream so as not to betray users' expectations, so we're putting effort into more expansions in the future, too.

Muta: Our way of thinking is completely different to that of an IT company. In the digital world, you look at the KPI to increase profits, and I think if you saw 4000 people you'd think it wasn't that much, but 2200 people at each session of the 'A3! FIRST Blooming FESTIVAL' was actually an incredible number.

That's completely different to an IT company, so we're actively pursuing related work like digital prints with FamiMart etc. We think the most important thing is to produce opportunities for users to experience the charm of these contents in the real world in addition to the digital one. We're proactive about doing things that IT companies wouldn't do.

What sort of history led Liber Entertainment to think that way?

Muta: [...] We used what we did with I-chu as a base for working on A3!. At that time, we were a completely tiny and unknown development company, so we didn't understand how to handle promotion well at all then. But we wanted to pay back the people who supported us passionately when I-chu was released, so we thought of various expansions after that.

It's honestly pretty tough to both work on a game and handle the related work too. But I think it's important to offer consumers the existence of 'A3!' through the goods they buy and place in their rooms, even when they're not playing the game.

So you're building up A3! as an entity made up of both the game and the related products. I'm sure you've got a lot planned for 2018 too, but what's the outlook on this coming year for A3!?

Okita: We plan to release Part Two of the Main Story fully voiced. One of the major themes in A3! is getting to see lots of different sides of the characters, so I think the characters' charms will show as they challenge themselves to new roles and through their relationships with the new characters. I'd like 2018 to be a year where users grow to love the characters they're interested in even more, and come to realize new charms of other characters they don't know so well.

Muta: In that sense, we plan to recreate the dorm the characters live in as an event in a tour format through the "MANKAI Dormitory Tour" that's already been announced. In terms of the image, it'll be like a TV film set.

Okita: THat's right. I think it's very important that everyone can take photos with the set and leave memories. We're pursuing measures so people can enjoy themselves in the real world as well as the the app, and though there are restrictions, I'd like to bring the charm of A3! to everyone in regional areas too. I'd like all sorts of people to come to like A3!, so please continue supporting us in 2018 too.

Please tell us what the background is for your company recruiting new producers and directors.

Muta: Liber Entertainment's application development team is comprised of about 30 people working on A3! and 30 working on I-chu. Soen no Kantai is planned and produced by us, but the development and running of it is done by LAND HO!, so we specialize in the development and running of female-oriented games. At the moment, we're focusing on improving A3! and I-chu's development teams.

Of course, we also have plans for our third female-oriented game, and we've got ideas for male-oriented games too. None of those new projects can start without a producer and director, so that's why we're recruiting. [...]

So at the moment, you don't have enough producers and directors

Muta: That's right. For example, if we wanted a content producer for A3! we'd need one person, and you'd need a director under them too. New titles need a new producer too. For us, we'd like to do at least one more fully native female-oriented app, but in terms of producers and directors we just don't have enough people. Other positions can be settled later, but you can't do anything if you don't decide who's in charge of a new title.

Okita-san, what do you think is important for a producer?

Okita: Rather than someone who makes something that "seems like it might be well-received", someone who creates the world that they have built up inside themselves. If you create a world that just cobbles together its contents from elements that are trendy at the moment, consumers will detect that "it's just because that other work is popular". That's not good at all, so I think it's important to start with a vision of the world you want to create.

2017

GameGift Interviews

Spring

Character Settings

OkitaP: The first concept of the work was "To make those seeds bloom". If perfect people stand on stage and act perfectly that's boring, so I wanted to treasure the process of bringing children who were still inexperienced in some areas or had some kind of struggle into full bloom. In that sense, the character settings are quite elaborate. [...] They have lots of slightly negative and embarrassing points. They all live in the same dorms and spend all their time together, so they come to know each other a bit better. It's a story where they slowly change by interacting with and influencing each other. I'd like people to love the characters complete with their hard-to-love traumas and weaknesses as well as their cute and cool points.

I wrote the basic plot for the main story myself, but within that I created personalities thinking, "It'd be interesting if there was an actor like this" and "It might be interesting if this sort of character came up against this other sort of character"; I created the characters thinking of their relationships too, and then divided them into units. Tom-sensei, who was in charge of the main story script, reviewed the plot too and gave opinions on it, so there are lots of characters who we touched up to fine detail through discussions. [...] They have lots of weak points as well as good points. What I most wanted to create was a story where they overcome those with the heroine.

Troupe Comment

OkitaP/SuzukiD: The Spring Troupe starts from a point where not a single one has proper acting experience. It's the start of the reborn MANKAI Company, aka the start of everything. We created it hoping everyone would want to support the characters. As individualistic as the other groups are, it's the group with the most orthodox "protagonist feel".

Character Comments</d>

[Sakuya is] a child who just loves acting. He's a really honest and hardworking character, but he has the least grounding in acting out of the five. As he acts with them, he often holds them back, but he won't lose to anyone in terms of how strong his feelings are, so as he works hard, he shows amazing growth. He's a character who pulls everyone along with his feelings and his growth.

[Masumi] has the best knack for acting out of everyone in the Spring Troupe, but his entire motivation is the heroine. That's why he works hard to be recognised by her. In that sense, he's a character you really want to support. But with acting, everyone has to be in sync with each other. There are problems that arise because of him, but we want you to look forwards to how he changes through the influence of the other members of the Spring Troupe.

[Tsuzuru is] an older brother type of character with an overinvolved personality. He shares a room with Masumi, who's only interested in the heroine, so he has to look after him. He's basically the epitome of a nurturing type. He's been dreaming of becoming a playwright since before entering the company, so I'd like you to look forwards to his growth in that area too.

[Itaru] produces strong results at his company, can work smart, and is good at getting along with people. He's a skilled character who can cope easily with anything. He has his own reasons for entering the troupe, but that'll be revealed in the main story, so definitely look forwards to it. He requested to be in a single room himself, but there's a secret in that room too. He's a tricky character full of mysteries.

We hadn't planned on making a character this eccentric at the start (laughs). Thanks to Tom-sensei's wonderful sense and Igarashi-san's careful, passionate voice acting, he became a fun and lovable character. He's the Spring Troupe's moodmaker and a relaxing presence when everyone is in a pinch; he brings peace with him.

Summer

Character Appearances

OkitaP: At release, Part One of the Main Story is unlocked. Park one is comprised of four acts which are each the starting point for the Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter Troupes. The actors join the troupe through auditions, being scouted, or for completely different reasons. (So there aren't many characters at the start?) That's right. It'll become clear in the prologue, but at the start Sakuya-kun is actually the only company member. [...] With that said, if you obtain cards through scouting, you can raise characters who haven't yet appeared in the main story. The cards have stories about the respective company members. Stories for specific characters depict their everyday lives as 'Backstage Stories'. The company's play stories and the stories that delve deeper into the characters are covered in detail in the fully-voiced Main Story, so I'd like users to enjoy both. [...]

Troupe Comment They act out comedies, so we wanted to make them the loudest and most youthful unit. All of their members are teenagers. Like the Spring Troupe, there aren't many with experience, and their talent across the team isn't that high either. The leader Tenma's ability is too distinct from the other kids', and one of the episodes during practice at the start is worrying. Please look forwards to how that unit develops.

Character Comments</d> [Tenma has] been acting since childhood, so he has confidence in his own acting. To put it bluntly, he's a kid with few friends (laughs). It's the first time he's interacting deeply with kids his own age, but in a theatre troupe you have to communicate properly, so because he's not used to it he often gets into conflict. He has the most experience and talent acting, but he's a child who's zealous about making a good play.

Autumn

#JustActorThings

OkitaP:

Troupe Comment

Character Comments</d>

Winter

Character Settings

OkitaP:

Troupe Comment

Character Comments</d>