Kotaro Uchikoshi Details The Development Journey of the Infinity Series

Today, Kotaro Uchikoshi is a well-known name among fans of mystery and puzzle games; he's responsible for the Zero Escape series, the AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES games, and many more. But long before Zero Escape and AI there was the Infinity series, visual novels thematically linked by science fiction elements and themes of time looping and escaping from confined spaces. Over 20 years after their original release, the first two Infinity games, Never 7: The End of Infinity and Ever 17: The Out of Infinity, finally debuted in the West in remastered editions developed by MAGES and published by Spike Chunsoft, Inc.

The Best War Games spoke to Kotaro Uchikoshi about the development process of the Infinity series, both what it was like initially creating the games and how it felt to see them remastered two decades later. Uchikoshi described the initial development as "a nightmarish scenario" because he had so little time to complete Never 7, but one that ultimately turned out for the best as he was given time to re-work the game and later make games more in tune with his interests.

Related

6 Best Fantasy Visual Novels For Beginners, Ranked

Get lost in worlds of high fantasy or magical realism with these visual novels for beginners.

Posts 1

By  Will Buckley

From Glitch To Hit: The Journey Of Never 7

Never 7, originally titled simply Infinity, was released in Japan for the PlayStation in 2000. Uchikoshi and his team had had only six months to develop the game, and had been unable to complete the romance route for one of the girls, Izumi Morino. "We had to release the route in a cut-off form," Uchikoshi explained, "On top of that, we didn't have time for debugging, which resulted in a terrifying major bug that made it impossible to even reach the unfinished Izumi Route."

The original release of Infinity was "completely torn apart by criticism." However, the game was already planned to be ported to the Dreamcast, so Uchikoshi and his team were given more time and allowed to debug the game and finish Izumi's route. Never 7, in the form the developers intended, was released to much more positive results; Uchikoshi credits the continuation of his career to this opportunity:

"If that bug had never existed, the higher-ups would have surely ordered a direct port of the PlayStation version to the Dreamcast to cut costs. In other words, Never7 only came to be because of that bug. To me, Never7 is like my origin story. If that bug had never happened, Ever17, the Zero Escape series, and even the AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES series would never have existed. Fate truly is ironic."

The Development Of Ever 17 And Beyond

Because of concerns about what would sell at the time, Never 7 was in many ways a traditional visual novel, focusing on romance with multiple girls for protagonist Makoto to date. "At that time, I believed that only that type of story could be accepted as a visual novel," Uchikoshi said. But when it was released in its full form, Never 7 sold well, and Uchikoshi found himself able to experiment more with what he wanted to write. Ever 17, which was released in 2002, lowered the focus on romance and introduced the mystery / science fiction hybrid plots he would come to be known for.

Uchikoshi described Never 7's success as a revelation. "When the complete version of Never 7 was released, it was surprisingly well-received, and sales were strong! That’s when I realized: 'Wait… I can write what I want, and people will still embrace it?'" He maintained that philosophy as he went on to write Ever 17, the following Infinity games, and the Zero Escape and AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES series.

Despite the difficult development process, Uchikoshi is thrilled to see Never 7 and Ever 17 re-released after so long. "It's extremely rare for a title to get a remastered version a quarter of a century after its original release. This is all thanks to the fans who continued to support it. I'm truly grateful from the bottom of my heart!"