User blog:Deyuaru/CEDEC 2016 Fate/Grand Order Talk

This is a talk on FGO's development policies during CEDEC 2016 on August 24th. Three keywords for the development of FGO, as introduced by their Creative Director Mr. Shiokawa:

Rather than KPI, TPI Rather than social, personal Rather than continuing as is, embark on new developments

By following this they hope to overturn the common sense of social gaming development with their "uncommon sense". This also sums up the reason why I stopped doing pattern speculation or predictions.

Rather than KPI, its TPI now
 * KPI stands for Key Performance Indicator.
 * TPI stands for TYPE-MOON Performance Indicator.
 * The reaction from the TYPE-MOON staff is given priority over everything.
 * TM staff love the Fate series more than anyone else and are also super hardcore players of FGO.
 * The rationale is that if TM staff are happy with the state of the game, then no doubt so will the general playerbase.
 * Due to following TPI instead of KPI, elements like profitability and what other games are doing are given less priority.
 * "Players will be happy if we improve this part" or "Surprise the player while expressing gratitude towards them" or "FGO players will be pleased if we do this" are all important guidelines to the decision-making process.
 * The example would be the recent reduction in quartz summon cost, inventory expansion and refund of inventory cost.
 * Also, offering the popular Servant Scathach as a free Servant in her swimsuit version, even though they know it'd drive sales up even more if they placed her in the quartz summoning as they think everyone will be happier to get a popular Servant for free.

Rather than social, its personal now
 * Social games usually emphasize cooperation or competitive elements amongst their players.
 * In FGO they recognize that the most attractive element is the story, setting and characters of Nasu's Fate and it's important to be immersed into the world at a personal level.
 * These policies are heavily reflected in character creation and game balance.
 * Character variation during battle and voice-acting is treated the same regardless of rarity or gender.
 * Each character is also given a characteristic role to play during battle.
 * This is because they want "each player to find their favourite character" and for players to "fall in love with the characters and not just the setting".
 * For example, even if you like the character's visuals and setting, if the performance is weak in battle you'll still find it hard to invest in the character.
 * To avoid such a situation they are trying to work on the game's balance and improve the performance of even low rarity Servants so that everyone can be active in battle.
 * With collaborations which have become a staple of the industry, they try to do events in a way that does not break immersion with the TM world, such as with the Kara no Kyoukai Collaboration Event.

Rather than continuing as is, it's time to embark on new developments
 * Because of the emphasis on personal immersion, FGO will not undertake excessive publicity activities.
 * To that end to attract and retain players they need to constantly engage in new developments.
 * More specifically they try to introduce new elements in every event and don't just recycle or straight-up reuse old events.
 * The drawback is that there may be blank periods of time where there are no events but the players that know the quality of the events that have been implemented so far will understand and look forward to it.
 * Updates are released with a view to cause a stir with the most impact, such as the recent "Holy Grail Ascension" which allows even low rarity Servants to be upgraded on par with higher rarity units without having to spend cash.
 * Though there was concern it might affect sales, they figured it was better to do it and get players to talk and think about the game.

Lastly, Mr. Shiokawa states that DW's philosophy is to "purely make an interesting game".