The Guilty Gear series has a history of really changing up the formula, which can often lead to the feeling of alienation of some of the most hardcore players and fans. Guilty Gear Strive in particular, for better or worse, altered the direction of the series compared to how things felt in the previous entry, Guilty Gear Xrd.
We’ve even previously heard series creator Daisuke Ishiwatari describe Guilty Gear Strive as being “a complete reconstruction of the franchise.” Needless to say, some people refer to Guilty Gear Strive as being a “soft reboot” of the series, even though the game’s story continues where the last game left off.
Dextero recently had the opportunity to speak with key developers involved with Guilty Gear Strive, including Daisuke Ishiwatari himself. According to Ishiwatari, the team understood the importance of Guilty Gear Strive outdoing Guilty Gear Xrd during the development process.
“The decisive difference between Strive and Xrd is that Strive was made to destroy Xrd,” said Ishiwatari in the interview with Dextero. “In that sense, we were trying to make Xrd as an example of failure.”
To be clear, Ishiwatari wasn’t saying that Guilty Gear Xrd was actually a failure. Rather, they just wanted Guilty Gear Strive to really standout compared to its predecessor.
“Of course, it wasn’t a failure, but we had to change the direction completely,” continued Ishiwatari. “We had to be prepared for that.”
Arc System Works CEO Minoru Kidooka acknowledged just how risky this new direction for the Guilty Gear series could be for the company. Of course, the developers also wanted to branch out more to a global market rather than just focusing on the Japanese fanbase.
“There was a lot of risk involved in making that giant leap with Guilty Gear Strive,” stated Kidooka. “We really thought about, ‘What are our long-time fans going to think when we do this, when we go into this new direction?’
As it turns out, these risks ended up paying off for Arc System Works. According to Kidooka, they feel as though they’re audience has since expanded since the days of appealing only to the Japanese fanbase.
“Yes, there were a lot of risks, but I think it paid off, and we have an even bigger audience now that we took that leap,” continued the Arc System Works CEO.