FFXI Adventurers Special Interview
Mamoru Nagano — Part 1 of 2

First off, Mr. Nagano, can you share with us your personal history regarding video games?

I've been playing video games since their early days. I started with the table tennis-style arcade games in coffee shops, and I also played one of those block-breaker games. I was rather obsessed with Atari's wireframe Star Wars game*1. I also played a lot of other games over the years, like Sega's After Burner*2.

So you were playing arcade games before home consoles were even released.

I actually had no idea that such consoles even existed when they first came out. Then one day, when I was working on Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam*1, Mr. Yamaura*2 and Mr. Tomino*3 were in the office and said, "This is the next big thing!" as they sat in front of a TV. Curious, I went over to see what they were doing and Mr. Yamaura said something along the lines of, "Going forward, people will be able to play games like this at home, so this is the kind of thing we need to do here at Sunrise. Got that, Tomi-chan!?"

Thinking back to when Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam aired, I guess he must have been talking about the Famicom?

Yes, that's right. I was watching them play Donkey Kong*1 for the Famicom, and that's the first time I knew anything like that even existed. At the time, I was quite busy with work and didn't have time to play video games, but I often went to visit my girlfriend, who later became my wife, and she had arcade cabinets for Galaxian and Moon Cresta*2 at her house, so I played them from time to time, but that was about it.

She had actual arcade cabinets in her house!?

Her parents ran a coffee shop, so they gave the machines to her when they were no longer needed. Other than those two games, I also remember being somewhat surprised by Xevious*1. After that, it was some time before I played any other games.

When did you start playing games again?

I think it was after I finished work on Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam, but there was a studio at Sunrise where a lot of younger people worked, and they were often there playing the Famicom at night. When I asked them what they were doing, they replied, "Would you like to play?" That game was Dragon Quest. Before I knew it, I played until I reached about Level 4 and was defeated by a wizard. I found the game super interesting and wanted to get a copy for myself, but my problem was that I didn't even have a TV at the time.

You what!?

I never really felt like I needed a television, so I never bought one. As such, even though I worked on anime like Ginga Hyōryū Vifam*1, Heavy Metal L-Gaim*2, and Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam, I never actually watched them when they aired on television. I watched the initial cuts*3 in the studio, so I never felt like I needed to see them on TV too. I guess that sounds pretty bad, huh? (laughs)

(laughs)

So I made a bunch of phone calls the very next day after playing Dragon Quest for the first time. After speaking with my circle of acquaintances, people told me they had a TV they weren't using and would sell it to me for 20,000 yen, or that they were thinking of upgrading to the Twin Famicom and would give me their old Famicom, while others mentioned where they'd found a copy of Dragon Quest. It all came together quite suddenly. So after a period of three days, I had gathered everything I needed and that was the first time I ever had a TV in my studio. (laughs)

Yes, it sounds like you were quite busy.

I was truly surprised to discover such a wonderful thing and that's how I got hooked on the Famicom.

These days, I think it's quite common for people to play video games as a hobby, but since you played some of the earliest arcade games, is it safe to assume that you always had an interest in computer-based entertainment?

I think more than that—and this might be hard for people today to understand—everyone was playing video games at the time, at least relatively speaking. I'm not talking about places like arcades, but there were video games in coffee shops even, so businessmen would be in there playing them, while children played the ones that were outside candy and toy stores. Video games were everywhere, so I feel like everybody was playing them, just like they would watch TV or listen to music. Therefore, I never really took a particular interest in them or felt like they were something that people specifically hung out in places like arcades in order to play or anything.

I see. It's like video games were simply present in people's everyday lives.

After that, I suppose the concept of what we consider to be arcade culture came about with Street Fighter II. And also games like Virtua Fighter. Until those titles came out though, I don't feel like people considered there to be anything special about arcades in particular.

Before you played FFXI, what other games had the greatest impact on you personally?

I'd probably have to say Dragon Quest. Actually, I bought the first two Dragon Quest games and also the first Final Fantasy game in the usual manner while I was in Kyoto, but I kind of had an unfair advantage in terms of getting my hands on FFIII. Dragon Quest III made the news with how hard it was for people to obtain due to its popularity, but the Final Fantasy series was also extremely popular from around the time of FFIII, so like Dragon Quest, it was also sold out pretty much everywhere. However, I was able to buy it on its release date without any real difficulty. As for where I managed to purchase it, it was actually Tokyo Disneyland.

Disneyland?

At the time, I did business with Tokyo Disneyland, so I had an annual pass. I knew that they had a toy store inside the park, so I went to take a look, even though I wasn't really expecting to find a copy of the game there. Back then, it wasn't nearly as crowded as it is today, so I just popped in with my annual pass and headed straight for the toy store. And I saw that they were selling it, so I said, "FFIII please!" Once I bought it, I simply left the park and headed home without even doing anything else.

I don't think there are very many people who go to Disneyland just to buy a video game. (laughs)

It's one of the advantages of being an adult. (laughs)

What was the first online game you ever played?

It was Diablo II*1. I'm a Mac user, and the Diablo franchise supported the Mac, so I played the first one, and then bought Diablo II as well. And when I shared online that I was playing it, various people ended up joining me and we all played it together.

That period saw the dawn of numerous online games.

Later on, I was at an anime studio or somewhere like that and one of the staff members was playing a game, and as I was watching, I heard a voice say "La Foie." I asked, "Huh? Is that Phantasy Star*1?" and was told, "Yes, it's Phantasy Star Online*2 (PSO). It's still in beta though." I don't remember the exact details, but I was actually able to obtain a copy of the beta version of the game.

Once again, you were in the right place at the right time. (laughs)

So I started playing the beta version of PSO, but by coincidence, I happened to meet a person who was using a character name from The Five Star Stories . I asked if they liked FSS and they said that they did. So I played online with that person for a while and suggested that we play together once the game was officially released. I also added, "By the way, I'm the one who wrote that manga."

I'm sure that person was pretty surprised. (laughs)

After that, we tried to gather as many friends as possible so that we could play together when the game launched. I believe we ended up with over 500 people. Since we had so many people, we ended up slowing down the servers, which resulted in other players getting pretty mad at us.

It must have been tough to get 500 people together.

After that experience, I decided to build a new Windows PC in order to play Ultima Online*1 (UO). I had heard about how amazing yet unusual it was, and that it was also a great game, so I was curious to try it for myself. However, I didn't have a Windows PC at the time.

So that motivated you to buy a PC.

In Ultima Online, there was a Shard (server) called Baja that was known for PK*1 that I played on, and then I later switched to Mugen, which was a Japan-based Shard for advanced players. So those were my experiences with the online games PSO and UO, and that was also around the time I heard about FFXI. I heard a rumor that when a player forms a train*2 and tries to escape into town, pandemonium breaks loose as the players near the entrance get overrun. I thought to myself, "That sounds like fun." (laughs)

You seem like you just naturally came across various information about these games.

Yeah, I suppose so. When I was playing PSO, there were a lot of people who joined me in the game. I also received messages from various game developers.

They sent messages to you within the game?

Yes. There were various game developers in PSO who blended in with the regular players and contacted each other in secret. Everyone was very passionate about their jobs. (laughs)

(laughs)

So I was interested in FFXI from the time of its release, but it was hard to get all of the necessary hardware, since it required a PlayStation 2 as well as the HDD (PlayStation BB Unit). Furthermore, since I was playing both UO and PSO, I felt like it might be a bit difficult to make time to play FFXI too. However, a Windows version ended up being released as well, so I decided to give FFXI a try. At last, we can talk about FFXI. (laughs)

Did you play solo when you first started FFXI?

After Rise of the Zilart was released, I started playing on a World that a friend of mine was on, but my playing hours never really lined up with people in Japan. Also, I didn't have a grasp on the gameplay at the time, nor did I really know the difference between MOs and MMOs. I started feeling like the game wasn't for me, and stopped playing for a while.

Oh no... So what ended up bringing you back?

Later on, I was invited to join the World that a certain game developer I know was playing on, so I decided to make a new character on that server and try again. So I learned how to play the game on that server, but then another acquaintance who also happened to be a game developer invited me to play on their World, so I transferred my first character and started playing there.

It sounds like game developers were constantly inviting you to play the game. (laughs)

There were people who I played PSO with on that World, so I played with them too, but everyone really helped me out a lot within the game. While I was thankful for the assistance, I felt bad for keeping them up late at night helping out on my missions, which ended up being quite stressful. So that caused me to take another break from the game for a while.

I see.

Then one day, there was another player using the /shout command in English, and when I used /tell to say that I wanted to work on finishing a mission, they replied that they'd help me. That player and other linkshell members helped me out, and when the mission was finished, I ended up joining their linkshell. I think my job at the time was red mage so that I could help support everyone else.

So that's when you started playing with people from overseas.

In addition, a character I created on another World also joined a linkshell consisting of players based in the US, and it was mainly people from the east coast. The players in the first linkshell I joined were mostly based on the west coast, so our ideal playing time didn't really line up all that well. I realized that even within America itself, there is quite a time difference. There’s a three-hour difference between the east and west coasts. Eventually, with their help, I was able to make quite a bit of progress with both of my characters. I forget if I was able to reach Rank 10 with the missions though.

Did you play any other content besides the missions with those overseas players?

We often worked on leveling up our characters together. I feel like many Japanese players are pretty strict about where they hunt monsters or what jobs make up the party, but the overseas players I played with were more relaxed and simply asked if I wanted to join them. They didn't really care about the details. So I joined them and when we went to the spot, I found I was nowhere near the proper level. (laughs) In a sense, they were quite accommodating. They didn't really care about efficiency, and I found that to be quite interesting and enjoyable in its own right.

You've previously commented about how one time you arrived at the hunting spot and there were nothing but monks there.

Yeah, that's the kind of stuff I'm talking about. One day, I received a message saying that they're out hunting monsters but didn't have any healers, so I took my red mage to the Kuftal Tunnel to help, but when I got there, there were five Tarutaru fighting against some crabs, and all of them were monks. Everyone was asking me to heal them, but I had no idea where to target, so I simply looked at the party list and focused on those with the lowest HP and kept firing off Cure spells one after another like a game of whack-a-mole.

(laughs)

It was tough on me as a red mage, trying to use Convert right up to the limit so that I had the MP needed to heal everybody, but I had enough offensive capability to get through it and ended up earning quite a bit of experience points. I think I might've gone up about three levels? It sure was difficult, but I have many fond memories of that encounter.