With Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club being Nintendo’s big August release for this year, Nintendo has opted to make Emio – The Smiling Man their next covered game, as part of their “Ask the Developer” interview series. Across three chapters, many questions were asked of Producer, Yoshio Sakamoto and Assistant Producer, Kaori Miyachi.
When talking about how they came up with the idea for a new Famicom Detective Club game, they provided the following responses:
Emio Devs on Coming Up with a New Famicom Detective Club Game:
Yoshio Sakamoto: I was declaring to the whole world my inability to keep writing – most recently I even said it in an art book. (Laughs) But the desire to create something new again was always in my heart. I was gathering ideas in my mind, and one of the ideas I had for a long time was a scene in which the victim is found dead with a paper bag over their head, which I thought would be quite scary
So, even though I hadn’t started writing the plot at the time, I told Miyachi-san that I was thinking of a story called Emio (smiling man) and she said, “Wow, that sounds interesting!”.
While I worked on two remakes with MAGES., they became much more than just remakes. Seeing the broad range of expressions and potential to take the animation quality even higher, I began to seriously think about creating something new again and was motivated to write a new story.
Kaori Miyachi: A few months after I first heard about it from Sakamoto-san, I asked him, “How is the story about Emio going? I’m looking forward to it!”.
Yoshio Sakamoto: I interpreted this how I wanted: “Someone I’ve always wanted to rope into development is asking me these questions… I see what this means. She must want to be part of it!”. (Laughs) So I thought I’d better get serious about writing this story.
Kaori Miyachi: I never said I wanted to be part of the development. I was just genuinely looking forward to it. (Laughs)
Yoshio Sakamoto: I couldn’t develop an entirely new title by myself, but if Miyachi-san was willing to work with me, and if MAGES. wanted to create it together with us, I felt that now is the time to jump in, and I started writing the plot.
For the full interview, why not click here to check out Ask the Developer Vol. 12, Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club – Chapter 2.
Ask the Developer | Emio – The Smiling Man: Famicom Detective Club (Participating Developers)
- Yoshio Sakamoto | Producer
- Kaori Miyachi | Assistant Producer
