Crymelight, the latest game in FuRyu’s Cry series, may be the most extreme game in the series yet, according to story and story lead Naoki Hisaya. In new interviews, members of the development team also discussed how Crystar influenced the game’s emotional direction and soundtrack.
In an interview with Denfaminico Gamer, Hisaya-san explained that he doesn’t have a strict definition of what each Cry game should be. During development, however, FuRyu was specifically asked to have a stronger emotional impact on the character. Kuya-san recalled that he was told “to rock the character more emotionally, like in Crystal Stars.”
Perhaps Crymelight is the most extreme of the three. I thought we had come a long way with setting and plot, but Mr. Gannan has gone even further with this script.
Screenwriter Ren Jianan said she kept several recurring themes in the “Crying” series in mind when writing the game, including “crying as a way to become stronger,” relationships between girls, and “crime and punishment.” Mr. Canaan also placed special emphasis on the way the character cries. Each of the main characters has tearful scenes, but these moments aren’t limited to sadness.
They don’t just cry because they’re sad. Alice and others were in tears for many reasons.
These reasons include loneliness, pain, regret, attachment, despair, and regret. The goal, Mr. Gannan said, was to give each crying scene some emotional meaning related to the character involved.
Composer Sakuzyo, who has participated in “Crystar” and “Crymachina”, said that during the production of “Crymelight”, the soundtrack naturally began to develop in the direction of Crystar’s music. To test what would work with the game, Sakuzyo matched some of his old tracks with Crymelight scenes and found that Crystar’s music worked surprisingly well. The background music for the first stage was written specifically to retain some atmosphere, rather than directly recreating the earlier tracks.
There are elements of Crystar and quotes from her tunes, but they have their own meaning.
“Crymelight” is set in the Land of the Dead and tells the story of girls burdened with the sins of their past as they struggle for freedom. The game’s visual style is based on Alice in Wonderland, although Hisaya stated that he intentionally avoided having the story rely too heavily on the source material, aside from established themes and an Alice-inspired protagonist.
The character designer also talked about how he was able to create Alice’s character without being overly constrained by previous Cry games. During development, the team encouraged him to stop worrying about consistency with previous games and fully embrace his own visual style. As a result, Alice looks younger in the game than in the original version.