In our Promise Mascot Agency interview, we chat with Rachel Noy, Art Director, and Oli Clarke Smith, Creative Director of Kaizen Game Works, all about their latest release, including how it came to fruition, what inspired it, and where it may go in the future.
You can check out my Promise Mascot Agency review to see what the game is about - but I'm sure if you're here, you know all about the weird world of Kaso-Machi, where mascots roam. Everything from a kappa to a block of tofu to a severed finger - you name it, it's there! That's why we wanted to pick the brains of the Kaizen team.
Pocket Tactics: Promise Mascot Agency is definitely one of my favorite games of the year, and definitely the most original title I've played in a long time. Where did the idea come from? Was there any specific inspiration behind a mascot agency? What led to the semi-vintage art style in the game?
Rachel Noy: I made a personal art piece of a kei truck in some rice fields, and the vibe just gave me the idea for a cozy game where you manage mascots. I just wanted to make a game that was set in the Japanese countryside, really. That was the initial spark, and then Oli Clarke Smith (Creative Director) came to it with the yakuza angle for the storyline. Then the game idea slowly got more twisted and weirder and became the mix of cozy and creepy that it ended up being by the end.
The vintage filter came from our programmer, Harry. I was talking about how nostalgia was the number one thing we wanted to get across, and I'd found all of these old Japanese home videos that we were looking at. Harry had the idea of taking vintage Japanese film stock and replicating it in the game, and that's how the vintage filter was born. It took a few tweaks to get it to where we wanted it to be, but I really enjoyed the effect we had by the end.
What, or who, inspired Michi? Is it my own wishful thinking, or is there legitimately Yakuza inspiration here, outside of Michi's voice actor being that of Kazuma Kiryu?
RN: The funny thing is that we always talked about not wanting to make a Kiryu clone, and then Michi ended up how he did. It's like the universe was pushing us towards it all the time, from Ikumi Nakamura's and Mai Mattori's designs, to needing a calm front character to complement Pinky☆'s chaos, to Kiryu's voice actor joining us on the project unexpectedly.
The Yakuza games were obviously a big inspiration for us. We love the different relationships that Kiryu has in the games, whether it's Majima, Haruka, Akiyama, Saejima, Date, whoever, Kiryu is always Kiryu, despite who he's talking to, and we love that about him. We definitely looked at Kiryu's cluelessness, stubbornness, and aura for Michi, but we actually wanted to make a more modern yakuza compared to Kiryu. Michi is more prepared to see the world change than Kiryu is, and is trying his best to move with the times but keep his moral code, whereas Kiryu is more set in his ways.
When we make a character, it's rarely based on one piece of inspiration. For Michi, we just hoovered up anything yakuza-related or adjacent that we could find for our research. We read a LOT of yakuza novels, watched a lot of Takashi Miike and Beat Takeshi films, and read a lot of yakuza manga like Way of the Househusband, Jealousy (content warning: explicit manga), and Sanctuary, and ensemble manga like Golden Kamuy and One Piece.
We basically trawled through an ungodly amount of media from different formats, picked the bits we liked about some of the characters, and put them into Michi. Oli is a MASSIVE One Piece fan and put a lot of Luffy into Michi, and Ikumi Nakamura and I put a lot of Asami and Hojo from Sanctuary into the bits of characterisation we did for Michi. It was a team effort, and Michi is a combination of all of those different thoughts.
How come you decided to go down the card battle route?
Oli Clarke Smith: We prototyped a number of different battle mechanics since the start of the project, and they were all bad. We knew we needed to include the physical humour of the mascots, so we had to include a battle system, but for a couple of years, we didn't have a clear vision of what it should be.
Phil Crabtree (Technical Director) came up with the idea of a light card game as it would strike the right balance of friction, engagement, and flexibility. We play a lot of card games together as a group, so there was some experience to draw on. Having the hero cards solved a lot of problems as they are easy to create and became a valuable reward.
Is it likely that there'll be a Switch 2 version of Promise Mascot Agency?
RN: We'd love to, but we've been unable to get hold of a dev kit like a lot of other indie studios. We're ready to go when Nintendo's ready unless something changes, but we're waiting on them for now.
PMA got a big, free update, which brings in rail-grinding (fantastic addition, by the way) - are there any future plans for more updates at this time?
RN: We don't have anything planned at the moment. It feels like the update wrapped up things quite nicely. If something changes and the game suddenly becomes mega popular, maybe we'll go back to PMA, but for now, that's it, I think.
The update included 'Hot Indie Bangers', which are new cards featuring designs from other indie games. Will this be an ongoing thing like Dave the Diver and Balatro's multitude of crossovers? Are there any more in the works?
RN: We hope so! We're starting work on our next game now, so things are getting busy again, but we've had a few games that are interested in setting something up. Hopefully, we can figure something out.
If you could add anything - or anyone - to the game, what, or who, would it be? Similar to that, is there scope for a sequel, and what would you aim to put in it?
RN: Well, now you've mentioned Yakuza, I'd love an Akiyama to pay a visit, maybe give Michi a bad loan or something. As for a sequel, there's definitely scope; we had so much story and dialogue that we had to cut as the game got too wordy. There are a lot of in-town relationships that we never got to explore, and I'd love players to get a little more insight into those.
Will there be any more merch for the game? For instance, a To-Fu plush or a Michi body pillow? Or even a manga like the panels in the game?
RN: Another plushie is on the way, but we haven't revealed who it is yet, I don't think. We've had a few requests for body pillows, actually, never say never… As for a manga, I'd absolutely love to do one with our game artist, Inko Ai Takita. She's a manga artist by trade, and she did a fantastic job on the game. Maybe if we get an extended break and find a way to fund it somehow, we could make one! Our game was more inspired by books and manga than other games, so that would mean a lot to me personally.
Who's your favorite mascot or character in the game?
RN: It changes every day. I honestly love all of them after working on them for five years. Bear-chan was based on our real-life dog, who sadly passed away just before we shipped Promise Mascot Agency, so she means a lot to me. I also designed a bit of Ichigo Love based on Bear-chan; they are both chubby shibas who I love to bits. I've enjoyed seeing the response to Ichigo; people seem to really love him.
Promise Mascot Agency is an excellent indie game that we recommend to anyone who enjoys whimsy and playing the best RPGs out there.