HAZUKI DIES: SHE HAS NO NAME
“Get ready to die!” With a tagline like this, I couldn't help but stop by to see this game at MAGFest. Hazuki Dies: She Has No Name is a story about a cute anime girl who just wants to pay for medical school. Like most of us, Hazuki finds out that life isn’t always as straightforward as we would like it to be. The story of this game is definitely endearingly quirky: Hazuki works in a taco restaurant, wields a golf club, and she somehow joins a gang. How in the world did a medical student find herself there?
I had a great time playing this demo. The classic RPG style combat includes rhythm elements which made it stand out to me. The game is still in the beginning stages of development and the demo has some assets missing but the overall gameplay is good. Hazuki Dies: She Has No Name is incredibly relatable, especially for those of us who have worked in the restaurant industry or at a low-wage job to try to make our way through school (or just life). I recommend adding this game to your wishlist if you’re a fan of unique JRPGs and tacos!
Puppet: Who are you and what do you do?
ChairGTables: I’m ChairGTables and I develop video games but I also like playing fighting games and speed running. (laughs)
Puppet: Nice, nice! Um, so… can you tell me: what is this? What are you working on?
ChairGTables: So this game is called Hazuki Dies. It’s essentially a game where you get to experience the life of playing a bottom-tier character because she’s actually the worst character in the game. That’s because you’re just a girl who wants to be a doctor but gets mixed up and becomes part of a gang, now she has to fight all sorts of people! And, yeah, so she gets into fights and all these fights are a rhythm RPG fight.
Puppet: That’s awesome, oh my gosh! I relate with that a lot, being a bottom-tier player myself. Um, yeah, life doesn’t always go the way that you want it to! Oh, it’s funny. Um, so... What got you… What inspired you to make this game?
ChairGTables: Oh, OK. So here’s the weird thing: it’s actually a mix of stories that got me into making this game. So the first thing is, there’s a game called Live A LIve, and it’s a really good game! However, it was never released in Japan–er, I mean it was never released in America. So I played it, and I’m like, ‘Ugh, I wish there was an English localization for this! I need to have more!’ And then I looked if there’s any other games similar to it, and there was Touhou A Live. It was a fan game, but with Touhou characters. I’m like, ‘Ah! This is so fun, but I want more of this!’ and there was not anymore. And I’m like, ‘OK. If there’s no English re-release and if there’s no other games like this, I will make this game!’ And it’s also a case of, um… So there’s another game that does have the protagonist of this game, but I made that for class and it was a Game Boy Advance game.
Puppet: Awesome!
ChairGTables: And I was like… But, the thing is, developing for Game Boy Advance is so hard that I basically only made like a one-minute game if you do it really fast, and I’m just like, ‘Ah! I want to do justice for this character, I want her story to be more!’ (laughs)
Puppet: Tell me a little bit more about her.
ChairGTables: OK, so Hazuki is… She is a girl who just wants to be a doctor, however, life is tough for her because she cannot afford tuition for medical school. So she’s in pre-med right now. And medical school is considered to be a lot more expensive. And right now she’s just working like, you know, small jobs, like working in a taco restaurant. Because she loves tacos a lot! (laughs)
Puppet: (laughs) Awesome.
ChairGTables: And yeah. So essentially this game is part of a whole big series with four different protagonists, and she’s one of them. So Hazuki Dies is basically her backstory before all four of them get back together after being separated for many years.
Puppet: So I'm hearing that there might be a sequel to this game then.
ChairGTables: Yes, there is. OK, so it’s really funny, because like–when I graduated high school many, many, many years ago, I was like, ‘I want to make this game about these four characters.’ But then college happened and I’m like, ‘I don’t have time to make a game this big with four of these characters!’ So I decided, I’ll make a backstory game for each character. And that’s why she has her own thing.
Puppet: That’s awesome! That’s awesome. I love the depth of story here already. So, let’s see… Oh, here’s a good one. If you could go back in time and change one thing or give yourself a piece of advice, what would you say to yourself?
ChairGTables: Oh! OK. One thing I would tell myself is all the reasons why I had to restart developing this game twice, at this point! (laughs) So, one of the things I had to do is I basically had to remake the whole entire battle system. That’s because the way I made it, it’s only for battles that’s like, one-v-one. Not really for multiple enemies. The other thing is that a lot of the things I was programming, this game was hard coded. I didn’t know that I’m gonna have friends who are willing to help out with the game, so I had to remake a lot of things in order for all of our contributions to work together in tandem. Because like I said, a lot of it is hardcoded, and it’s a lot more difficult to explain why this one works this way. So what I recreated, a lot of the systems were able to work a lot better together. So there was just a lot of times where I kind of just restarted, and I think if I could go back in time, I would do that so, just because… You know. I don’t think this game should take, like… We’re currently in our fourth year. I don’t think it should be taking this long to make this game. (laughs)
Puppet: Aahhh. Yeah, that’s the perpetual, you know, issue with indie games is it always feels like it takes longer than it should. But it will come out when it needs to, you know?
ChairGTables: Yeah.
Puppet: Yeah. Yeah, that’s awesome. So, uh, yeah! I’m gonna have you say your name again, and where can we find this game and where can we find you?
ChairGTables: OK. So, I’m ChairGTables, and you can find this game on Steam, that’s Hazuki Dies: She Has No Name. And you can find me on twitter @chairgtables.
Puppet: Perfect, perfect! Yeah, so this has been Puppet, and this has been a wonderful interview! Thank you so much!
ChairGTables: Mmhmm! No problem. Thank you so much!
Puppet: Yeah!
coverage by
EMILY KIND
transcription by