Those Brave Story covers

[Charlie]

My first experience with XSEED was when I bought Brave Story for PSP. Over here in Canada, packaging has to be labelled in both English and French. It's rather annoying when some distributors have to delay their shipment due to the additional prints.

Anyways, I loved how the box art for Brave Story was horizontal, unlike most PSP games that are vertical. The problem was that the initial print for the Canadian box art were on some poor quality paper. It basically looked like a print out from a regular inkjet printer. XSEED heard the complaints from their Canadian fans and they actually sent out cover sheets to replace the crummy originals for free.

Cheers to XSEED for keeping up with the quality. All of my bilingual XSEED games have the same quality cover prints as their American counterparts.

[Hero]

yeah that horizontal boxart was neat

the art itself was nothing special but the fact that it was horizontal was pretty friggin cool

[Wyrdwad]

Actually, since Brave Story was released long before I got my job at XSEED (but I'm a HUGE fan of it, regardless!), I'm going to nerd out on this topic, and say that I *really love* XSEED's cover art for Brave Story PSP. The reason? I played the game in Japanese before it was ever even announced for an English release, and the Japanese cover art basically put Wataru and his party front and center -- the cast from the Brave Story novel and anime. The game cast? They were there, I think, but they were basically shown as background characters.

Essentially, the Japanese box art existed so that fans of the anime would impulse-buy the game.

The American cover art, on the other hand, showed the actual MAIN CAST OF THE GAME -- the people you were actually PLAYING as -- and was eye-catching due to its horizontal orientation. When I saw it, I realized that XSEED knew what they were doing, and I was thrilled: one of the best games I'd yet played on my PSP was not only coming to North America, but it was coming out in STYLE, and it looked fantastic!

So yeah... reverting to a point in time when I was not an XSEED employee, I too would like to say, XSEED, you guys rock -- Brave Story was awesome. (:

-Tom

[Dust]

I said it before and I'll say it again Brave Story was right alongside Popolocrois as my favorite PSP title (until Trails). The cover art was pretty unique. It really made the game stand out. After reading Tom's post I'm really glad they didn't do the more "traditional" style of cover. Anyway yeah, love it, check out the novel, etc

[brightsuzaku]

......... Dangit, now I want this game. You did an excellent job selling it to me through mere words! Amaaazing~ :O

[Wyrdwad]

Oh, you've never played it? You definitely need to, then! (: It's an amazing game, and it complements the novel really well (and yes, the novel is available in English too, and yes, the translator of the novel worked with the game's translators to ensure that all the nomenclature and such is consistent). It's actually pretty cool how the two work together, as the game takes place AT THE SAME TIME as the novel, but stars a different cast of characters and features a totally unique plotline that only OCCASIONALLY intersects with the novel's. It's a neat way to expand upon the world Miyuki Miyabe wrote, and it makes for an excellent old-school-style RPG (with a really addictive battle system!).

-Tom

[brightsuzaku]

Do you like, hang out in elevators and pitch games? Because I swear, you could get VERY wealthy just doing that.... I'm sold!

[Wyrdwad]

(gasp) HOW DID YOU KNOW?!

-Tom

[WoottWinds]

Brave Story is a phenomenal game. Anyone that hasn't already played it should pick up the book first though, as Tom said above, it ties in with the game perfectly and is in my opinion an absolutely fantastic read. The book itself feels so much like reading an actual RPG, and it's really cool to then actually see the world and familiar locations on screen once you play through the game.

Tom, is the anime a retelling of the book or something slightly different (like the game)? I remember hearing about the series' existence but haven't had the chance to see it or find out what it's about yet. I'd love to hunt it down if it's good.

[Wyrdwad]

I'd say avoid the anime -- it's just a single movie, and it tried to cram the entire 820-page book into 110 minutes.

Oh, and it cut out anything that would be too disturbing for the kiddies, so in a way, it was kind of... Disneyfied?

It's an *OK* movie, and its soundtrack is quite excellent... but it definitely feels very half-hearted compared to the book, and perhaps even a bit confusing (if you haven't read the book, a lot of what happens in the movie comes across as random and unexplained).

The novel IS a fantastic read, though. I like to tell people it's kind of like a Japanese take on The Chronicles of Narnia, but MUCH, MUCH DARKER.

My favorite part of the book is actually the first 230 or so pages, as I think Miyabe paints a really vivid picture of what life is like in Japan for poor little Wataru...

-Tom

P.S. I've only read the first volume of the manga, which is ALSO available in English, but it seemed pretty cool. It's basically an alternate retelling of Wataru's story, and to say it's DIFFERENT from the book would be a huuuuuge understatement! I could tell that even from the first volume, where the mute, paraplegic girl from the book is portrayed basically as a very talkative ninja.