Feature: Chrono Cross Interview Part 2

From...

Chrono Cross producer Hiromichi Tanaka

by The GamePro Staff

(IDG) -- The Chrono Cross interviews continue! This week Chrono Cross producer Hiromichi Tanaka has answered a bunch of fan's questions from the Chrono Cross message board.

Question: How many people worked on it and how long did it take? What software were used (including the rendering) and was the majority of the animation motion captured? Were all the CG cutscene done by Square Visual Co.?

Answer: Motion capture was not used in this game. The director, Kato, and a number of others directed the cut scenes.

Question: Hi, I would like to know if you used any new programs or computer equipment to make Crono Cross better than the other Squaresoft games like Final Fantasy VII & VIII. Thanks for your time.

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Answer: Since our programmers came from a different team than the FF VII or VIII programmers, Chrono Cross had a different technological approach. So, even if the results seemed somewhat similar, everything from the design to the coding was totally different. No shared (program) routines were used. One of the most innovative techniques we created and used was the variable frame-rate code, which we applied to the game to allow fast-forward and slow-motion play for the second (and any subsequent) play-through. It's a sophisticated technique that was impossible to implement in RPGs up until now. Also, to make use of memory beyond the hardware limits, some of the required data resources (memory) were read and used off of the CD (CD read swap). This was done to compensate for the limited memory capacity of the PlayStation, which has been a bottleneck on previous PlayStation games. For that purpose, a proprietary program was developed to allow super-fast disc access.

Question: The translation team did an AWESOME job making the American translation just as intriguing as how I'm sure it is in its original form; were there any difficulties in doing so, more specifically in making certain all of the playable characters had believable and entertaining personalities?

Answer: Thank you for your praise, Michael. We are glad you liked our translation. Some of Chrono Cross's themes are quite deep and hard to translate. Then there is also getting the right balance of humor and keeping the style consistent among us three translators (particularly when I'm an Australian based in Tokyo, while Yutaka and Sammy are Japanese based in California).

But the biggest challenge with this project was that the characters' speech patterns had to be auto-generated, real-time by the program. The reason for this was that 40 or so different lines for each character would not fit into memory, so, for a large part of the game, we had to use one piece of common text and change it on the fly into all those funny accents, depending on which character was speaking. You can imagine coming up with different accents is hard enough (especially expressing them in text only). Working out a computer algorithm that can change one piece of text into multiple accents (with limited memory and speed constraints) was just mind-boggling. -Richard Honeywood Localization Director, translator & programmer for Chrono Cross

Question: What types of college courses or software application programs, languages, etc. would you suggest be taken or learned for a student wishing to pursue a job in the gaming industry - especially for a company like Squaresoft?

Answer: I don't believe it is necessary to select a specialized field. It doesn't matter if your major is science or literature. It's best that you go with what you are most interested in. Otherwise, you probably become bored, and you won't last long. It's more important to hone your sensitivity. Meet more people. See more things. I believe that experiencing many things matures your sense of balance. It's important to have a specialty, but you must learn how to take an impartial and objective view of things.

Click here for an unabridged version of this interview.

Interview: Chrono Cross producer
September 19, 2000
Review: Chrono Cross
August 21, 2000
Final Fantasy VIII: A worthy successor
September 22, 1999
"Xenogears" walks the line between adventure and role-playing
February 10, 1999
Review: Crimson Skies is aerial action
September 28, 2000

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