Tags: Phantasie; Phantasie II; Phantasie III: The Wrath of Nikademus; Phantasie IV; Phantasie V; Retrospective Interview; Star Command; Star Craft, Inc.; Strategic Simulations, Inc.; Winston Douglas Wood
Back in the 1980s, there used to be a popular CRPG series that would vie in popularity with the two titans, Wizardry and Ultima. That was SSI's Phantasie, designed and coded by Winston Douglas Wood, who also co-designed (with Eric Liebenauer) another SSI-published CRPG, Star Command. Today we present you our interview with the man himself.
The West saw Phantasie as a trilogy, but actually - and this is major news that hasn't been known before - WD Wood went on to design Phantasie IV after Japanese company Star Craft, Inc., approached SSI for a publishing deal. Unfortunately, as the interview tells us, Winston didn't have the time to adapt the fourth game to non-Japanese PCs, so SSI never published it in English and it has remained a Japanese exclusive. In other news, old-time Phantasie fans will also be excited to find out that Winston is currently working on a Phantasie V in his spare time! We'll be sure to keep you informed about the game's progress.
Here are some tidbits from the interview:
Be sure to read the full interview.
Back in the 1980s, there used to be a popular CRPG series that would vie in popularity with the two titans, Wizardry and Ultima. That was SSI's Phantasie, designed and coded by Winston Douglas Wood, who also co-designed (with Eric Liebenauer) another SSI-published CRPG, Star Command. Today we present you our interview with the man himself.
The West saw Phantasie as a trilogy, but actually - and this is major news that hasn't been known before - WD Wood went on to design Phantasie IV after Japanese company Star Craft, Inc., approached SSI for a publishing deal. Unfortunately, as the interview tells us, Winston didn't have the time to adapt the fourth game to non-Japanese PCs, so SSI never published it in English and it has remained a Japanese exclusive. In other news, old-time Phantasie fans will also be excited to find out that Winston is currently working on a Phantasie V in his spare time! We'll be sure to keep you informed about the game's progress.
Here are some tidbits from the interview:
Phantasie made use of passive skills during exploration to inform the player of such things as traps, hidden treasure and upcoming monsters. These features were rare at the time and are still rare today. How important do you think these mechanics were in terms of the overall gaming experience? Did you have any ideas for further skills that failed to make it into any of the games?
Those skills came from RuneQuest and D&D. They encourage the player have a greater variety of characters so that all of these skills are well balanced in their party. To imagine that your characters are listening for monsters and searching for traps gives a greater sense of realism and danger that was typically more present in tabletop games. I would have liked to have added rock climbing to Phantasie and generally make better use of the other skills but time and resources prevented that.
In 1990 Phantasie IV was released exclusively in Japan for MSX, NEC and Sharp computers. The game credits you as the creator of the series, but the actual development is credited to a Japanese company called Star Craft, Inc. What do you know about this game and did you have any involvement in it at all?
I designed Phantasie IV completely. I was able to go to Japan and meet the programmers from Star Craft but I was never able to test the game to any extent. I did consider doing another fantasy RPG but decided to do Star Command instead.
That's exciting to hear! Did you design Phantasie IV specifically for Star Craft, or have you already had it designed (for SSI perhaps) by the time Star Craft approached you? And why wasn't it published in the West?
Starcraft approached SSI with the idea of doing Phantasie IV in Japan. SSI then contacted me and I designed the game. SSI would have published it if anyone had been available to adapt it to computers like the Apple II or Commodore 64 but that never happened (I was busy designing and programming other software).
As far as I'm aware you left the industry at some point after the release of Star Command. What was the reason for your departure and what have you been up to since?
After Star Command I designed three games for Japanese companies. I thought designing the games without doing the programming would give me a chance to improve graphics quality and game play. However only one of the games (Phantasie IV) actually made it to the market and I found that I missed the opportunity to interact with the games during the design process.
At the same time I was given an opportunity to do some programming for a civil engineering software company (KYPipe, LLC). This proved to be a more stable source of income since sales of one product would continue for years instead of just a few months. I am still in that field to this day as part owner of KYPipe, LLC.
By the way I am currently working on Phantasie V. I don't get much time to work on it so its a very slow process. If you want you can check back with me in about a year and I will let you know the status of the project.
We will be sure to! Can you maybe tell us a bit about how you approach it? Will it look and play similar to the previous Phantasie games, or are you aiming for something new with it?
It is still very early in the development stage and it's really just for fun right now. I haven't given any thought to publishing. It will be a PC game though if it turns out well I may consider Android and IOS versions.
In general the scope should be quite a bit bigger but it should play very similar to the previous Phantasie games. I don't yet know how it will look but the main visual feature will still be the scrolling map on which all combat and exploration takes place.
Those skills came from RuneQuest and D&D. They encourage the player have a greater variety of characters so that all of these skills are well balanced in their party. To imagine that your characters are listening for monsters and searching for traps gives a greater sense of realism and danger that was typically more present in tabletop games. I would have liked to have added rock climbing to Phantasie and generally make better use of the other skills but time and resources prevented that.
In 1990 Phantasie IV was released exclusively in Japan for MSX, NEC and Sharp computers. The game credits you as the creator of the series, but the actual development is credited to a Japanese company called Star Craft, Inc. What do you know about this game and did you have any involvement in it at all?
I designed Phantasie IV completely. I was able to go to Japan and meet the programmers from Star Craft but I was never able to test the game to any extent. I did consider doing another fantasy RPG but decided to do Star Command instead.
That's exciting to hear! Did you design Phantasie IV specifically for Star Craft, or have you already had it designed (for SSI perhaps) by the time Star Craft approached you? And why wasn't it published in the West?
Starcraft approached SSI with the idea of doing Phantasie IV in Japan. SSI then contacted me and I designed the game. SSI would have published it if anyone had been available to adapt it to computers like the Apple II or Commodore 64 but that never happened (I was busy designing and programming other software).
As far as I'm aware you left the industry at some point after the release of Star Command. What was the reason for your departure and what have you been up to since?
After Star Command I designed three games for Japanese companies. I thought designing the games without doing the programming would give me a chance to improve graphics quality and game play. However only one of the games (Phantasie IV) actually made it to the market and I found that I missed the opportunity to interact with the games during the design process.
At the same time I was given an opportunity to do some programming for a civil engineering software company (KYPipe, LLC). This proved to be a more stable source of income since sales of one product would continue for years instead of just a few months. I am still in that field to this day as part owner of KYPipe, LLC.
By the way I am currently working on Phantasie V. I don't get much time to work on it so its a very slow process. If you want you can check back with me in about a year and I will let you know the status of the project.
We will be sure to! Can you maybe tell us a bit about how you approach it? Will it look and play similar to the previous Phantasie games, or are you aiming for something new with it?
It is still very early in the development stage and it's really just for fun right now. I haven't given any thought to publishing. It will be a PC game though if it turns out well I may consider Android and IOS versions.
In general the scope should be quite a bit bigger but it should play very similar to the previous Phantasie games. I don't yet know how it will look but the main visual feature will still be the scrolling map on which all combat and exploration takes place.
Be sure to read the full interview.
and thanks for the interview, MMXI and Crooked Bee!
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