, also known by her pen name, , is a freelance

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

ese illustrator,

designer A designer is a person who plans the form or structure of something before it is made, by preparing drawings or plans. In practice, anyone who creates tangible or intangible objects, products, processes, laws, games, graphics, services, or exp ...

, and

video game Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...

story writer.

Biography

Final Fantasy

Saga joined Squaresoft as a graphic designer in the early 1990s through an advertisement in

ASCII ASCII ( ), abbreviated from American Standard Code for Information Interchange, is a character encoding standard for electronic communication. ASCII codes represent text in computers, telecommunications equipment, and other devices. Because of ...

computer magazine. Saga was a graphic designer at Squaresoft for ''

Final Fantasy IV known as ''Final Fantasy II'' for its initial North American release, is a role-playing video game developed and published by Square (now Square Enix) for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. Released in 1991, it is the fourth main insta ...

: Easy Type'', ''

Romancing SaGa ''Romancing SaGa'' is a 1992 role-playing video game developed and published by Square for the Super Famicom. It is the fourth entry in the ''SaGa'' series. It was subsequently released for the WonderSwan Color in 2001 and mobile phones in 2009. ...

'', ''

Final Fantasy V is a fantasy role-playing video game developed and published by Square in 1992. It is the fifth main installment of the ''Final Fantasy'' series. The game first appeared only in Japan on Nintendo's Super Famicom (known internationally as the ...

'', and ''

Final Fantasy VI also known as ''Final Fantasy III'' from its initial North American release, is a 1994 role-playing video game developed and published by Square for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. It is the sixth main entry in the ''Final Fantasy'' ...

'', She helped create the characterization for Final Fantasy VI characters Edgar and Sabin, beginning by choosing two playable character classes, in this case monk and machinist, choosing the desert as a setting, and then creating an extensive character background in a private booklet for herself.

Xenogears/Xenosaga

Saga and her husband

Tetsuya Takahashi (born November 18, 1966 in Shizuoka Prefecture) is a Japanese video game designer and director. Takahashi worked at Square (now Square Enix), in the 90s as a graphic designer and director, participating on some of their most well-received title ...

submitted a script for '' Final Fantasy VII'' which was called "too dark" and "complicated" for a fantasy game, but were allowed to start a new project based on the script, which was worked into a full treatment with cutscenes, eventually being released under the name

Xenogears ''Xenogears'' is a 1998 role-playing video game developed and published by Square (video game company), Square for the PlayStation (console), PlayStation video game console. It is the debut entry in the larger ''Xeno (series), Xeno'' franchise. ...

. The story was inspired by the writing pair's interest in Jung,

Nietzsche Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his car ...

, and Freud, addressing questions of "where do we come from, what are we, where are we going". Saga and Takahashi went on to write the plot of ''

Xenosaga Episode I ''Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht'' is a role-playing video game developed by Monolith Soft and published by Namco for the PlayStation 2; the game was released in 2002 in Japan and 2003 in North America. It is the first entry in the ''X ...

'', ''

Xenosaga Episode II ''Xenosaga Episode II: Jenseits von Gut und Böse'' is a 2004 role-playing video game developed by Monolith Soft for the PlayStation 2. It was published in Japan (2004) and North America (2005) by Namco, and in Europe by Sony Computer Entertainme ...

'', and ''

Xenosaga Pied Piper ''Xenosaga: Pied Piper'' is a 2004 role-playing video game co-developed by Monolith Soft, Namco, and Tom Create. The game was published by Namco in 2004 for mobile devices. A spin-off of the ''Xenosaga'' trilogy and forming part of the '' Xeno'' m ...

''. ''

Xenosaga ''Xenosaga'' is a role-playing video game series developed by Monolith Soft and primarily published by Namco. Forming part of the wider '' Xeno'' metaseries, ''Xenosaga'' is set in a science fiction universe and follows a group of characters as th ...

s use of many religious references reflected Saga's interest in belief and its power.

KOS-MOS (recursive acronym for Kosmos Obey Strategical Multiple Operation System) is a fictional character from the ''Xenosaga'' role-playing video game series by Monolith Soft and Bandai Namco Entertainment. KOS-MOS also appears as a major character in ...

was designed by Takahashi, reflecting a reversed view of human construction, giving the character a powerful body and fragile soul. Several designs that were not used were created by designers

Kunihiko Tanaka is a Japanese manga artist and character designer. He designed the characters for ''Xenogears'', '' Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht'' and ''Xenoblade Chronicles X'', as well as character concept design for the anime ''Key the Metal Ido ...

and Kouichi Mugitani. Originally intended to be six games, the series was cut short, and many plot points had to be changed and moved because of the second episode's plot. At some point during the production of ''

'', Saga was informed that her services would no longer be needed in the production of the remaining installments of the series.

Later works

She also helped develop the story for ''

Soma Bringer is a 2008 action role-playing game developed by Monolith Soft and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS. The player, controlling one of the eight main characters, explores dungeons and fights enemies in real-time combat across three-dime ...

''. She also did a draft for Monolith Soft in 2000 for a sci-fi RPG called "Titus 12".

Games

*''

'' (1992): map design *''

'' (1994): field graphic designer, script *''

Romancing SaGa 3 ''Romancing SaGa 3'' is a 1995 role-playing video game developed and published by Square for the Super Famicom. The sixth entry in the ''SaGa'' series, it was also the last developed for the platform. Originally released on the Super Famicom syste ...

'' (1995): graphic designer *''

'' (1998): scenario writer *'' Xenosaga Episode I: Der Wille zur Macht'' (2002): event scenario writer *'' Xenosaga Episode II: Jenseits von Gut und Böse'' (2004): assistant author *'' Xenosaga: Pied Piper'' (2004): script co-author *''

'' (2008): scenario *''

Xenoblade Chronicles 2 ''Xenoblade Chronicles 2'' is a 2017 action role-playing game developed by Monolith Soft and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo Switch. Released on December 1, it is the third installment in ''Xenoblade Chronicles'' and the seventh main en ...

'' (2017): guest artist

References

External links

Soraya Saga
on Twitter {{DEFAULTSORT:Soraya, Saga Final Fantasy designers Japanese illustrators Japanese video game designers Living people 1969 births Square Enix people Women video game designers