Hello! This is Eshiro, the producer on Okamiden. I keep wishing and hoping, but Japan’s rainy season just won’t end and the sun just won’t come out. I guess there’s no summer vacation for me this year…

I will devote my whole summer to providing as much information about Okamiden as possible per all of your passionate requests. More than anything, I’d love for more and more people to come to know the charm and magic of Okamiden.

Hit the jump for more!

However, if I put out too much information, it will take away from the excitement of experiencing Okamiden on your own. As a producer, this is always something I have to think hard about. And that brings me to my next topic. What are the differences between a producer and a director?

As some of you may already know, I was the director on such titles as Onimusha 2 and Shadow of Rome; and later the producer of Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth. The experience I received from both of these roles has been a major influence on how I think about creating games.

I believe a director and a producer should be able to trust one other, but they shouldn’t agree on everything either because they have different things to consider. The director is supposed to focus on making a fun and interesting game, so he will believe that the team should use more time to create such a game, while the producer wants to get that fun game ready and out to the fans as soon as possible.

As you can see, those ideologies clash with one other. However, the fundamental idea of having many people play a fun and interesting game is shared by both the producer and the director. Though the two roles may clash from time to time, I feel that as long as we both keep this one goal in mind, respect each other’s positions, and keep the lines of communication open, things will work themselves out in the end.

And yet, there are still times where I think to myself “Oh! He’s really making me mad!”, but I then realize there are things that I can improve about myself as well…

And that’s it for today. Maybe someday I’ll talk about the producer and director roles from a different perspective.

PS: That picture on top of the blog is me getting comfortable with the prototype of a puffy pillow. It felt good and I almost started day-dreaming when one of my staff members took a candid picture of me. Some of you might think I look scary but I’m NOT. Just saying… lol