PolyPwn Exclusive: Rainbow Moon Interview

We recently had the opportunity to interview Side Quest Studios about their upcoming game, Rainbow Moon.  Here is how it all went down.

Being a new IP, a lot of our readers probably know very little about Rainbow Moon. Could you give us a little information about your game, as well as how it plays?

Rainbow Moon is a new role play game (RPG), that’s coming out for the PlayStation 3 in the next few weeks. The game incorporates a lot of classic elements, such as exploration, turn based battles and character improvements, combined with beautiful high definition visual and a lot of love for details.

We absolutely love the art style in Rainbow Moon. Can you describe what inspired you to go with this style?

We wanted to create characters and environments that appeal to many players. We were taking influences from games such as Final Fantasy IX, Dofus and several others. We are not a Japanese development studio and although we love a lot of Japanese games, our idea was not to mimic the Japanese art style but to find our own one.

Character designs combine a cartoon look with slightly evil looking elements. The actual designs were outsourced to two external studios. The drawings that you can find in some of our artworks were then transformed into 3D models, which eventually made their way into the game.

We are also very proud of all environments and monsters, about which we read a lot of positive feedback.

 

 

Could you describe the battle system used in Rainbow Moon?

Battles in Rainbow Moon are turn based and take place on grid-sized battle fields. Up to three characters of your party will form a team and will battle against numerous foes.

You have a variety of commands at your disposal. The ones that you are likely to use the most are "move", "attack", "defend" and "skill". Other commands let you use items, change your gear or escape from battles.

Depending on your character you can perform short and long range attacks. The most powerful attacks however are casted through your skill command. In total you will come across more than 100 different skills in the game. Besides attack skills, there are also support skills such as healing, analyzing enemies, casting light or food, and so on…

There’s a lot more about the battle system but it’s difficult to put this into a short answers. For more details, I’d recommend you to check out our official website www.rainbowmoongame.com, which contains a lot more details.

In the trailer you recently released, you describe the world as being “Open”, and ready to explore. Could you describe this in a little more detail?

Yes that’s right. Basically Rainbow Moon is one big planet that is free to explore. In the beginning you can explore only a small part of this world but as your story unfolds, new areas will unlock. You can at any time go back to places that you have visited before and for example solve side quests that you didn’t complete previously.

There are also a lot of areas that are optional and not part of your main story. So it’s really easy to get carried away from your main story and end up doing something completely different that you originally had in mind.

Apart from exploring the world, there are also more than 20 dungeons that you can find in Rainbow Moon. Also two methods of transportation (renting a raft and later during the game a boat) will help you to reach new and unexplored parts of the world.

Aside from combat and exploration, what else can our readers expect to see in Rainbow Moon?

Exploration and battles are two major features of the game. Another one is character improvement. In total up to six characters will be in your party during your journey. Each character is specialized in a different weapon type, can equip different weapons, armor and gear and learn different skills.

During battles, you can earn Rainbow Pearls. You can use these Rainbow Pearls to improve your character stats, which eventually makes them stronger.

Other ways of improving your characters include buying new weapons and armor, improving existing gear through crafting and by learning new active or passive skills.

 

 

Are there any previous games that gave you inspiration for Rainbow Moon? If so, what sets Rainbow Moon apart from those titles?

There’s probably some inspiration that went into Rainbow Moon, such as from older Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest games, Disgaea and a few other NIS games.

However all in all Rainbow Moon really plays very different than any of these games. Rainbow Moon is combining elements of the classic role play genre with ideas found in strategy RPGs.

For example we have a really strong focus on exploration, something that you will remember from let’s say earlier Final Fantasy games. But at the same time our battle system is grid based, which is something you will know from games like Final Fantasy Tactics or Disgaea.

All in our all battle system is on the one hand more complex compared to classic RPGs but on the other hand it’s much easier to understand and faster than the typical SRPG.

I really hope that people will enjoy what we have achieved with Rainbow Moon.

Rainbow Moon has gone gold, now. How much longer will our readers have to wait to play it?

Rainbow Moon is currently undergoing Sony’s final quality approval test. Subject to the condition that we don’t encounter any major hiccups, a release in June or early of July is most likely.

Rainbow loon will be launching on PSN. Can we assume that it is a PSN exclusive, or do you have plans on eventually releasing it for other platforms? If it is a PSN exclusive, what drove that decision?

It’s a PSN exclusive for the time being but depending on the success of the game, we are considering ports to other platforms in the future.

We are a small development team, so our resources to work with are limited. We felt very comfortable developing for the PlayStation 3 as we have already released two other games (Söldner-X: Himmelsstürmer and Söldner-X 2: Final Prototype) on the platform before, so this was our immediate choice to go with.

However if there is strong enough demand, you can expect Rainbow Moon on other platforms at a later time.

Will there be an online component, such as multiplayer, in Rainbow Moon?

There is no online multiplayer, Rainbow Moon was designed as a single player experience. However there is another online component in the game. The player can upload his game stats to our servers and once the game is released, players can look up their own as well as stats of other players on Rainbow Moon’s official website.

 

 

Is there anything else that you would like our readers to know about your game?

Yes, Rainbow Moon makes addictive. It will take most players around 40 to 60 hours to play through the main story alone. However if you want to get the maximum out of Rainbow Moon, earn all the 50+ trophies, solve all side quests and complete the entire end game content, be prepared for 100 hours or more.

If you ever enjoyed playing any RPG, then make sure to give Rainbow Moon a try. We promise you that you won’t be disappointed.

Thanks for your time!

Many thanks for the opportunity!

For more information on Rainbow Moon, be sure to check out the official web page:  www.rainbowmoongame.com