[TGS24] Kazutaka Kodaka Shares His Ambitions on The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy-

Since its official announcement a few months ago, The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy- immediately attracted a lot of attention thanks to the art style and story concept that felt so typical of Danganronpa. This impression is understandable, because the game does involve Kazutaka Kodaka as the former creator of the Danganronpa franchise who is now the head of Too Kyo Games and has the support of Media.Vision and Aniplex.

To get a better idea of what kind of ambitions the game is trying to realize, our team participated in an interview session with Kodaka-san at the Tokyo Game Show 2024. Unfortunately Kotaro Uchikoshi, one of the other main creators of the game, was not able to participate, but Kodaka himself was accompanied by producer Shuntaro Ino who joined in a separate presentation session that focused more on the gameplay.

Limit x Despair

The idea behind the development of The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy- dates back to the establishment of Too Kyo Games back in 2018. At that time they described it as an ambitious project involving all the creators on the team, especially from the collaboration between Kazutaka Kodaka (Danganronpa, Master Detective Archives: RAIN CODE) and Kotaro Uchikosi (Zero Escape, AI: The Somnium Files). They labeled it as “Limit x Despair” with a key visual that looks very different from the final game, including characters that ended up as concepts only.

We were naturally curious as to how much the game has changed since then, and Kodaka himself didn’t hesitate to reveal it, “This project is significantly different from the last one. They cancelled the project once, which led to this change. So, we had to rework everything. We changed the characters and even the genre of the game. As a result, I think I have been able to incorporate more of myself in the game and this is evident with some of the grisly scenes that are in this game. I think this is a game with some extreme content, which is rare in this day and age.”

A very interesting answer indeed, because it turns out that The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy- has the potential to be a game that is far different from its final version, even from the genre that will be carried. It’s no wonder they took a long time to develop the game since the initial formation of the team, as they had canceled the original project to create a game more suitable for Kodaka’s style and possibly Uchikoshi’s as well.

A Dream Collaboration

Hearing Kodaka and Uchikoshi on the same project is a dream come true, especially for fans of games with deep stories full of mystery and extreme scenarios. Each creator has their own specialty, so there are more elements that can be implemented in this game than in their previous work.

“This is my first multi-end game. Uchikoshi is good at multi-endings, so I left that to him and wrote the scenarios as I usually do. The story of this game changes dramatically depending on the choices you make, and the story can become completely different depending on the player, so the scenario develops freely, just like an open world you could say.” says Kodaka.

This is an example of how each creator can focus on what they do best. Kodaka used to focus on linear stories with fixed endings, but now thanks to his collaboration with Uchikoshi he can create stories that have so many scenarios that change the storyline drastically right down to the finale. They even claim that the game has 100 “extreme despair-filled” endings.

Creating An Ambitious Scenario

Creating a game with scenarios filled with different plot branches and endings is certainly not easy, but The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy- has so far given a peek into the concept that is certainly very curious. One such example is the “Extreme and Despair” trailer, which shows the deaths of many of the game’s main characters, raising questions about whether these are all examples of various “Bad End” scenarios.

For this Kodaka has explained, “The scenario will change dramatically depending on the player. So, while some players may see those scenes, some players will never see them in their own playthroughs.” Although the trailer does seem to contain massive spoilers, in the end it is just a small part of some of the extreme scenarios that players can find in the game depending on their decisions, so The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy- is a game that really takes you in a roller coaster of story that is difficult to predict even when you already get to play it.

Character deaths have become a very normal sight in Kodaka and Uchikoshi games, and how each moment always leaves a big impact on the player’s feelings and the development of the game’s story. We also asked about the process behind creating such scenarios, and whether there is a specific sequence to follow, such as choosing which character should die first before thinking of ideas for the moment of death.

Kazutaka Kodaka then replied, “Characterization, drama, and tricks are all considered in parallel while creating the murders and trials. We consider what drama (story aspects) and tricks are appropriate for that character and sometimes adjust the characterization accordingly.”

Deciding these things might be no trouble in the past, but since this is a game that involves Kodaka and Uchikoshi as the creators, there are bound to be some moments where they have to reach the same decision or can even disagree on an idea. But it turns out that Kodaka and Uchikoshi can work well as a team because they’ve focused on a solid direction that fits the game.

“We decided at who would die at the plot stage, and there was no particular disagreement at that time. We do not really focus so much on who is going to die, but instead on what kind of story we want, and which characters’ deaths fit into that narrative.”

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