Resident Evil 5 producer Jun Takeuchi on race, shooting while standing still, and the Wii

JT: Actually having the co-op in the game helped us in many ways to create the horror and present horror to the player. If you only played it at the start you probably haven’t experienced too much of it, but in parts of the game, especially the later stages, there are many places where you are going through levels together with partner, but have to split up and go alone.

If you’ve been playing the game alone the whole time and in another part you’re alone you don’t notice the difference. But if you’ve been playing the game with a partner the whole time and suddenly you’re forced to be alone, it creates a more frightening experience for the player. So in that respect having the co-op helps us to make a better horror game.

BF: And do you think you made the experiences, when they’re separate, of equal caliber in every way for both characters? Given that some people will play alone, obviously more people will have the experience with [main protagonist] Chris [Redfield] than [co-op character] Sheva [Alomar].

JT: Yes we think they’re equally as fun as one another when you split up. We never had the intention of making one better than another.

BF: Did you ever consider giving a single player the option to control Sheva?

JT: No it was never our intention to let you control Sheva in the single player mode. The reason why is because the story of the game is about Chris. If you were able to choose Sheva for the single player game we’d have to create Sheva’s story as well.

BF: Some of the control elements in “Resident Evil 5” are things other games have gotten away from, like not being able to move while you shoot and not being able to stop the game when you go through your inventory. I assume those must have been very purposeful choices?

JT: In regards to the inventory that was definitely a deliberate choice. In “Resident Evil 4” when you opened your inventory the game paused. We wanted to have – the way the game is divided up is into chapter. Between each chapter you can look at your inventory and sort through everything. But while you’re playing the game we wanted you to have a seamless experience so the game doesn’t stop even if you want to check your inventory. We wanted a seamless experience that pushes you through the chapter. Then at the end of the chapter you can go look in your inventory.

BF: What about the inability to move while shooting? That’s obviously a “Resident Evil” hallmark but other games used to have that and now in almost all new games you can move while shooting.

JT: We’ve always thought the fact that you can’t move and shoot at the same time is very important in the “Resident Evil” games. A situation we wanted to create in the game is where if this is the player [points at table] and the enemy is over here [points further out on table], we don’t want to create the situation where you can keep your distance from the enemy while you shoot at him. We wanted the player to be in a situation where if the enemy’s getting closer and closer at some point you have to decide when you’re going to stop shooting and if you’ll run away.

That situation, that tension is very important to what the game is. If we wanted to create a game where you can run and shoot at the same time, that would not be a problem. But that would become a very different game. Something like your standard FPS. That element of “Resident Evil” is very important. It’s something we wanted to preserve.

BF: Not being able to run and shoot and having to keep playing when you open your inventory both make the game more difficult. Some people have suggested that difficult combat is important to horror games because it’s it raises the tension level and makes the experience scarier. Do you agree that those elements are important to making the game more scary?

JT: I don’t think that they’re necessarily important for all horror games. I don’t think they’re must haves. I think there are many different styles of game design. I think those two elements are important to the type of horror game that we wanted to make.

I do think there are other ways you can create different types of horror games.  For example, “Dead Space” is a horror game where you can move and shoot and that design choice works. But I think it’s a good thing to have in the world of games many different types of control schemes. All games are not the same and that’s important.

BF: Now I need to ask a question about the issue of race in “Resident Evil 5.” What I want to ask is if in the design of the game, did you think about Western attitudes toward race? And what impact images from Africa, and of White people shooting Black people in Africa, might have in the United States or Europe vs. Japan and other parts of the world?

JT: I think there are many different ways people are going to look at things. Obviously not everybody’s going to look at things in the same way. But I think what’s most important is the intention of the people who made, let’s say, the image that you’re talking about of a White person shooting Black people. If they have ill will intended then I don’t think that’s a good thing.

But I think one of the good things about games is you can create many different situations. So you might have a game where a Japanese person is shooting Black people or a Black person is shooting Japanese people. I think what’s important is what the people intended when creating that. If they intended to create that with racial meaning behind it then I don’t think that’s a good thing. But at the end of the day we’re in the business of making entertainment and what we have created is a game that takes place in Africa and there are scenes where a White person is shooting Black people and other scenes where your African partner is shooting people of different races as well.

BF: So it sounds like you thought more about your own intentions as opposed to how people in different cultures might see the game and what kind of history they might bring to it?

JT: I don’t think it’s a very good thing to start off with the idea that if people from such and such a place see this, they’re going to get angry. That’s not a good way to start off creating something because then you’re going to start imposing limits on yourself and deciding what you can and can’t show in a game or a piece of entertainment in any media really.

I think it’s a good thing that you bring in different perspectives from different parts of the world, politics and different things into different forms of entertainment. What’s important there is, if you have somebody who has a message who’s trying to say “This group of people are bad” or “This way of thinking is bad,” obviously that’s not a good thing.

If we were to start thinking first about how people are going to respond to something we’d end up in a situation where we couldn’t have a game based in Africa or we couldn’t have a game based in X, Y and Z territories. At the end of the day it’s a piece of entertainment being made here. I don’t think it’s a good thing to place too many restrictions or think too hard about how people are going to respond.

BF: One horror game I played recently that very much impressed me and a lot of people I know is “Left 4 Dead.” The reason being that the artificial intelligence is the main reason that game was scary because you never knew what was going to happen.

If you played that game, what did you think of it and the A.I.? And relatedly, are there any significant changes in the A.I. of the enemies in “Resident Evil 5?”

JT: Yes certainly I have played that and a lot of people at Capcom are playing it. It’s a great game, a lot of fun, it’s really well put together. As you said, the A.I. system is very interesting. I think that element in creating that kind of game is really important because you don’t know what’s going to happen, where the enemies are going to come from. I think they did a great job creating a shooting game with zombies that’s very different from “Resident Evil” or any other zombie related games out there.

One of the things I think is really interesting about “Left 4 Dead” is that system works because the zombies are always running at you, always chasing after you. It works really well in that game.

As regards the A.I. system in “Resident Evil 5,” it has evolved and improved over “Resident Evil 4.” Probably the biggest change would be that there are lots of different environments in the game and no matter what environment you put the A.I. into, they don’t end up getting lost or not being able to find you. They’re always able to come after you and attack you. That has been a big improvement.

BF: There are a few little elements that have been in “Resident Evil” before that, well, it’s hard to understand why they’re there in “Resident Evil 5,” logically speaking. I couldn’t help but wonder why the healing herbs were in Africa. And in between the stages, when I was buying weapons, I was wondering, “Who I was buying these weapons from?”

JT: As regards the green herbs: A lot of people look at the “Resident Evil” games and they think that the zombies are the most important part of the game. Actually we disagree. We think that the green herbs are the most important part. (Laughs)

That was an element we wanted to leave in there for fans of the series who have been following it up until now. We think a lot of people appreciate that.

In terms of buying the weapons, that’s a game design choice. I think our image when we made it was that you’re buying from some weapons dealer who’s in that region. But I don’t think everything in the game world has to be fully realistic. You have a lot of conventions used in a lot of games. For example, in an online shooter, someone’s gamertag is always going to appear above their head. Or when you pick up a weapon you’re often times just picking up an icon. That’s not realistic either.

I think these are game design choices that help to make ultimately more interesting experiences.

BF: While you’ve been in development on this game, the Nintendo Wii has become extremely popular and grown much faster than the other consoles. In addition, the “Resident Evil 4” port for the Wii has been very successful. Were you surprised and has that made you question the decision to only do “Resident Evil 5” for Playstation 3 and Xbox 360?

JT: I guess this is probably down to our selfishness on the development team. When we wanted to make “Resident Evil 5,” we wanted to do it on the most powerful hardware that we could. We wanted to continue evolving the series, creating new experiences that we haven’t been able to make before. So in terms of the type of game we wanted to make, I think making it on the PS3 and 360 was the right choice.

Having said that, at some stage we would like to create an experience for Wii users as well. I think the Wii is a great machine. Obviously it’s got a lot of possibilities, a lot of things you can’t do on other consoles. We would like to think about something like tha tin the future. But for this game, I think it was the right choice.

BF: And do you think to make a game for the Wii, given how different it is, would you have to develop something new from the ground up? Or could you make “Resident Evil 5” work on the Wii, in some form, without creating something new from scratch?

JT: I think if we had to choose between those, it would definitely be to create something new from the ground up for the Wii.