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Interview with Blossomsoft (Eternal Eden)

By Heath | September 15, 2008 at 4:57 am

Joseph Wartick of RPG Land got the chance to speak with Elder Prince of Blossomsoft.

Joseph Friggin’ Wartick: “First off, can you please introduce yourself and mention what role do you play at Blossomsoft?”
Elder Friggin’ Prince: “I’m the creator of Blossomsoft, a gaming company that I’ve aspired to build since 1994, approximately fourteen years ago. But I truly started to put efforts around 2003.
I’m actually fulfilling many other positions inside our development team such as producer, director, 2D artist, game designer, story designer, level designer, et cetera.”

Joseph: “I gotta ask…. Blossomsoft. How’d you come up with that name?”
Elder: “I think there was a weapon called ‘blossom’ in Final Fantasy VI and I hooked with the name. But that’s probably not deep enough to describe us.”

“The meaning of Blossomsoft is all about determination growing inside us. That’s why we’re seeing a sparkling star in our logo. Each branch from the star symbolize one precise thing; creativity, passion, willpower and enjoyment. We cannot accomplish our work without them.”

Joseph: “What are some challenges you’ve faced while developing games?”
Elder: “Each of my projects represented different challenges. Money was a big one for my past projects even if my faith was strong.
“For Project Eden, my psychological state was probably the only real challenge, I wasn’t feeling very good in the past months due to many circumstances, I lost faith, but I’m hoping things will improve for me, and I’m hoping that Project Eden will allow me to discover a better future. I hope people will love what I’m doing so that I can focus on bigger developments.”

Joseph: “Judging from your forum posts, you’re working on five projects (Project Eden, Mimic Book, GUNNARr, Sagrada Guardians, and Western Lords). What can you tell us individually about each of these games?”

Elder: “During the recent years many game concepts crossed my mind, and I still aspire to complete each of them.
“I started with Western Lords/Sagrada Guardians in 2004, but I couldn’t complete it due to inexperience and tight budget. Besides, it was a GIGANTIC project. But it’s thanks to this project that I could develop various facets of my skills.
“Mimic Book and GUNNARr were two other game concepts I started to elaborate later. And both games were splendid even though they were less ambitious than Western Lords in term of development and budget, BUT I never expected that my determination would suddenly start to diminish considerably after many personal events in my life such deaths, love pain and aging.
I started to realize that life wasn’t eternal, and time wasn’t infinite for me. Therefore I had to find realistic solutions to reach my goals, and finally, I started to work on Project Eden, which is 95% completed.
“I should note that Mimic Book and GUNNARr are both very special, and I will develop them once my budget get better. I have Nintendo platforms in mind for them.”

Joseph: “How do you plan to distribute your games? What platforms do you intend to develop for? Do you have a publisher or are you going to put them up for download online?”
Elder: “As I explained earlier, I’m aiming realistic solutions now. As far as 2008 is concerned, I’m not thinking very much about developing anything on consoles such Nintendo or Sony.
“My first games are intended only for online digital distribution on PC.
The good thing with online distribution is that a publisher isn’t needed, so if my incomes prove to be great I could try to self-publish my games later. The future will tell.”

Joseph: “What should we be looking for from Blossomsoft in the future? Are you planning to go back and finish the aforementioned projects?”
Elder: “Absolutely. Each project that I mentioned will be realized.”

Joseph: “Now let’s talk Project Eden. You mentioned it’s 95% completed. How long should players expect the game to be? How soon can we expect to see it released?”
Elder: “Unlike my previous projects, Project Eden is a ‘short’ project. Development started on May 2nd and I worked on this project non-stop during two months, 15 hours a day. The release date is planned soon at the end of this summer. It won’t be the standard four hours RPG, but you can expect between 15-20 hours of gameplay.”

Joseph: “Finally, what are you most excited about for Project Eden?”
Elder: “Even though I used the ‘RMVX alternative,’ I am very happy to have one game completed. I should mention that some years ago I felt disdain for RPGmaker, I thought it was disgraceful to make a game with this tool, but companies like Amaranth Games proved that I was wrong. RPGmaker is very powerful to anyone that has enough creativity.
“Actually RPGmaker isn’t very different than someone who uses a tool like Photoshop. Creativity makes the whole difference at the very end.”

RPG Land thanks Mr. Friggin’ Prince for taking the time to address our questions.

See also:
Project Eden Hands-on preview and bunch of pictures

Topics: Eternal Eden, Indy games, Interviews