"The honest truth is that I simply wanted to make an action game. When I sat down to think seriously about how to do that, and I looked at the PlayStation market, there weren’t a lot of games that were playable for both children and adults at the same time. I wanted to make something that would fill that void."

"Also, there were a lot of Playstation games with 3D fields you could freely walk around in, and those games tended to be confusing; players often don’t know what they’re supposed to do. That’s why we decided to retain 2D controls, but with a 3D-ish feel."

"The idea for 3D backgrounds was there from the beginning, but I didn’t want it to be only for show—I wanted the 3D to have a purpose in the game. That’s where I got the idea for “information depth”. For example, in a 2D sidescroller you’ve got to keep moving forward (to the right) to see what’s next. But with a 3D screen, if we place something interesting deeper in the visual field, it prompts players to consider what’s there in the background, and explore whether it can be interacted with."

"Also, once we started playing around with camera angles, like tilting the camera upwards so players can get a clear view around them, it turned out to be really interesting. Some of these weirder camera angles have never been featured before in an action game, I think, so it was definitely something we were excited about doing."

"As I thought more about how to appeal to a wider demographic, I decided that the character shouldn’t be too serious, but should instead evoke gentle, nice feelings. That idea came, by the way, after soliciting the different developers at Namco for drawings of the character, in an informal in-house contest we held."