Many people break the boredom of their daily commute with a quick burst on their PSP. Ironically, creator of sublime widescreen title
LocoRoco, Tsutomu Kouno, came up with the initial idea for the tilting, bouncing colourful creatures while travelling to work.
He sketched down a rough image of some blobs being squeezed together down a tunnel on his PDA. Then, over the following mornings, he went on to refine the concept.
"I wanted to create a game in which many characters moved around," he said of that sketch, during his keynote speech entitled The Making of
LocoRoco at the Develop Conference currently taking place in Brighton.
Kouno's approach meant there were three other concepts he was keen to include: making the game very easy to play; making sure it was fun to play; and ensuring the 2D graphics were dramatic (or as he put it, "creating something I wouldn't be tired of watching").
It took a while to persuade his bosses to make
LocoRoco, though. Twice his presentations for funding to develop a prototype were rejected, and it was only after he had put together a rough demo that Kouno was finally given the go-ahead.
The resulting 'trial' version took eight people three months to build but locked down almost all of the ideas that would make it into the final version.
However, one area Kouno still wasn't happy with was the art style. So, together with his lead artist, he worked on several versions, including a clay look, a paper collage look and a watercolour look. In the end, though, all three were rejected as the bold colours of the original concept came back into favour.
Other ideas, such as enemy character Mojya (originally a ball of fur on legs), came from games Kouno had tried but failed to made in the past.
The unforgettable audio, meanwhile, stems from Kouno's lifelong interest in the role of music. His focus in this area quickly resulted in the quirky chorus-singing styles of the different coloured LocoRoco.
As for the bug-eyed character of MusuKusu, well, that came from the face of Kouno's pet fish.
The Japanese developer ended his presentation by talking about the future, and showing off new
LocoRoco footage that highlighted some of the concepts (such as crowd AI, better physics-based models and use of music, as well as new gameplay ideas) that he expects to incorporate in future titles.
"I would like to create games that surprise and entertain people around the world," he said cheerfully.
Based on his past achievements, we have no doubt he'll succeed.
