Eve, the main character of the game, will have 20-30 costumes. So there will be plenty to choose from…
Famitsu, a Japanese publication, has interviewed Kim Hyung Tae, CEO of Shift Up and director of Stellar Blade (there’s also a comment from Dongi Lee, the technical director, but he’s just giving the usual PlayStation 5 praise, bowing to the fast SSD and DualSense controller…) Why did the studio choose PlayStation 5? “I felt that I wanted to release a high-quality game on a single platform. And so when it came to deciding on which platform, I determined PlayStation 5 would deliver the most optimal gameplay experience. I loved video games even before the emergence of PlayStation, but I didn’t have much money at that time… It was only when PlayStation launched that I really started playing games. So PlayStation played a large part in shaping my personal values about games,” Kim said.
He also confirmed NieR: Automata being a vast inspiration for the game: “NieR: Automata was a huge driving force behind me working on this project. It made me realize once again that I wanted to make a game like Stellar Blade. Also, as a fan, God of War is really just my favorite game. It taught me that you can experience a vast world without being completely open-world. I’ve also gotten inspiration from a lot of other titles like Bayonetta, Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, and Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order.”
What about the action-packed gameplay? “When it came to the action, we started with the idea that “we want to express everything a female character can do while wielding a sword. We also want to make it fun with fast and flashy movements. But we didn’t want one-sided fights where the player just spams skills, so we created a balance where you have to carefully assess the enemy’s movements. In the beginning, you will mainly use combos to defeat enemies. But as you progress, other gameplay mechanics will appear, such as responding to enemy attacks with actions like a perfect parry or perfect dodge. In the second half, we introduce organic interactions where the player fights using the skills and energy they have acquired so far. So I think it’s a kind of action game with a solid sense of strategic enjoyment. On top of that, there are some pleasant and exciting actions, as well as original actions that differ from monster to monster for the player to experience.”
Regarding the flow of the game, Kim said, “Various factors will contribute to the protagonist’s development. Some parts of the game will progress in a linear fashion, but once you encounter villages inhabited by humans, it will feel like a semi-open world where you can move around freely to a certain extent. After that, the game goes back to linear gameplay, to another semi-open world, and so on. It’s all seamless, so there are no unnatural interruptions to your gameplay experience.” He added that it’s not a stage-based game, and Lee confirmed that it will be a single-player title.
What about the character design? “I aimed for an evolution that reflected the design style I had developed so far, while not straying too far from the world of Stellar Blade. I also wanted to intentionally create a sense of discomfort by making Eve, a character who arrives in a post-apocalyptic world, feel a little out of place”. And what about the world view? “It’s the distant future, where the concept of ‘years’ that we live in now has long been lost. That doesn’t mean that all traces of the past have disappeared, but rather that the world is culturally connected.”
And finally, the costumes: “As you progress through the game, you can obtain materials or design documents for costumes. There are also costumes that can be purchased in the village, so Eve can acquire and switch between a variety of different outfits. Costumes are not closely related to the story, but are included as an element to enhance the character’s charm. Eve has approximately 20 to 30 costumes. Like Eve, costumes for (her companions) Adam and Lily are in the works. There are some rare costumes as well, so I hope players can look forward to them.
Stellar Blade will be available for PlayStation 5 on April 26.
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