Breath Of Fire (video Game), Breath Of Fire
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''Breath of Fire'' is a
role-playing video game Role-playing video games, also known as CRPG (computer/console role-playing games), comprise a broad video game genre generally defined by a detailed story and character advancement (often through increasing characters' levels or other skills) ...
series developed by
Capcom is a Japanese video game company. It has created a number of critically acclaimed and List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil'', ''Monster ...
. It originated on the
Super Nintendo Entertainment System The Super Nintendo Entertainment System, commonly shortened to Super Nintendo, Super NES or SNES, is a Fourth generation of video game consoles, 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan, 1991 in No ...
in 1993. The series has recurring characters and ambiguous continuity; though each game is its own self-contained story, the names of the two lead characters are usually Ryu and Nina. The story commonly involves an adventurer named Ryu (name usually changeable) who can
shapeshift In mythology, folklore and speculative fiction, shapeshifting is the ability to physically transform oneself through unnatural means. The idea of shapeshifting is found in the oldest forms of totemism and shamanism, as well as the oldest exist ...
into different types of
dragon A dragon is a Magic (supernatural), magical legendary creature that appears in the folklore of multiple cultures worldwide. Beliefs about dragons vary considerably through regions, but European dragon, dragons in Western cultures since the Hi ...
s. Over the course of his journey, he befriends Nina, a girl with wings. At its inception, ''Breath of Fire'' took place in a
medieval fantasy Historical fantasy is a category of fantasy and genre of historical fiction that incorporates fantastic elements (such as magic (fantasy), magic) into a more "realistic" narrative. There is much crossover with other subgenres of fantasy; those c ...
style fictional world. Following the mainstream success of
Japanese role-playing games While the early history and distinctive traits of role-playing video games (RPGs) in East Asia have come from Japan, many video games have also arisen in China, developed in South Korea, and Taiwan. Japanese role-playing games Japanese c ...
in the 1990s, the series began using the original
anime is a Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, , in Japan and in Ja ...
-style artwork for later
Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...
releases of the games (rather than the Westernized art that was drawn specifically for the Western releases of the first two games),
post-apocalyptic Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction are genres of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astronom ...
themes, and an increased emphasis on character development. Despite these changes, the core structure of ''Breath of Fire'' remains largely
linear In mathematics, the term ''linear'' is used in two distinct senses for two different properties: * linearity of a '' function'' (or '' mapping''); * linearity of a '' polynomial''. An example of a linear function is the function defined by f(x) ...
and plot-focused. , six ''Breath of Fire'' titles have been released, with three games being
ported In software engineering, porting is the process of adapting software for the purpose of achieving some form of execution in a computing environment that is different from the one that a given program (meant for such execution) was originally desig ...
to
handheld game console A handheld game console, or simply handheld console, is a small, portable self-contained video game console with a built-in screen, game controls and speakers. Handheld game consoles are smaller than home video game consoles and contain the con ...
s as well as
Nintendo is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles. The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...
's
Virtual Console The Virtual Console was a line of downloadable retro video games for Nintendo's Wii and Wii U home video game consoles and the Nintendo 3DS family of handheld systems. The Virtual Console lineup consisted of titles originally released on pa ...
, and two ported to the
Nintendo Switch The is a video game console developed by Nintendo and released worldwide in most regions on March 3, 2017. Released in the middle of the Eighth generation of video game consoles, eighth generation of home consoles, the Switch succeeded the ...
's Super NES games library. By 2022, the series had sold over 3.3 million copies.


Games


Main series


Mobile games

Beginning in November 2003, Capcom began releasing ''Breath of Fire'' titles specifically for
mobile phone A mobile phone or cell phone is a portable telephone that allows users to make and receive calls over a radio frequency link while moving within a designated telephone service area, unlike fixed-location phones ( landline phones). This rad ...
devices in Japan. Each game was developed for use on NTT DoCoMo, au, and
SoftBank is a Japanese multinational Investment company, investment holding company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, that focuses on investment management. The group primarily invests in companies operating in technology that offer goods and services ...
brand cellphones that use the
i-mode i-mode (, ) is a Japanese mobile internet (distinct from wireless internet) service operated by NTT DoCoMo. Unlike Wireless Application Protocols, i-mode encompasses a wider variety of internet standards, including web access, e-mail, and ...
, EZWEB, or
BREW Binary Runtime Environment for Wireless (BREW, also known as Brew MP or Qualcomm BREW) is an obsolete application development platform created by Qualcomm, originally for code division multiple access (CDMA) mobile phones, featuring third-party a ...
services. The first title, , is a replication of the Japanese card game ''
daifugō or , also known as Tycoon, is a Japanese shedding-type card game for three or more players played with a standard 52-card pack. The objective of the game is to get rid of all the cards one has as fast as possible by playing progressively stron ...
'' featuring characters from ''Breath of Fire IV'', and would be followed by a
sports game A sports video game is a video game that simulates the practice of sports. Most sports have been recreated with video games, including team sports, track and field, extreme sports, and combat sports. Some games emphasize playing the sport (such ...
called in October 2005, which contained an expanded version of the fishing
minigame A minigame (also spelled mini game and mini-game, sometimes called a subgame or microgame) is a short game often contained within another video game. A minigame contains different gameplay elements and is often smaller or more simplistic than th ...
also from the game. Two
action role-playing An action role-playing game (often abbreviated action RPG or ARPG) is a video game genre that combines core elements from both the action game and role-playing game genres. Definition Action role-playing games emphasize real-time combat wh ...
spin-offs of ''Breath of Fire IV'' titled and ' were released in November 2007 and November 2008 respectively.


Music

The music of each ''Breath of Fire'' games has traditionally been produced by rotating members of Capcom's in-house sound team. While the themes from first game were composed by five members of the company's sound team Alph Lyla, which included Yasuaki Fujita, Mari Yamaguchi, Minae Fuji,
Yoko Shimomura is a Japanese composer and pianist primarily known for her work in video games. She graduated from the Osaka College of Music in 1988 and began working in the video game industry by joining Capcom the same year. Shimomura wrote music for severa ...
and Tatsuya Nishimura, the second game's score was produced entirely by fellow company composer Yuko Takehara. ''Breath of Fire III''s soundtrack took a
jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...
-inspired approach, and was written by the team of
Yoshino Aoki (born August 19, 1971) is a Japanese video game music composer and lyricist. She began her career with video game company Capcom, and later co-founded the music studio Unique Note with another ex-Capcom composer, Tetsuya Shibata. Life and care ...
and
Akari Kaida is a Japanese video game music composer. She composed various soundtracks for Capcom games, including multiple in the '' Mega Man'' series. She has occasionally been credited as Akari Groves, taking the surname of her husband. Career Kaida was a ...
, with the music of ''Breath of Fire IV'' provided solely by Aoki herself. For the first time in the series, the music of ''Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter'' was created by an outside employee,
Hitoshi Sakimoto is a Japanese composer and sound producer. He is best known for scoring the video games '' Final Fantasy Tactics'' and ''Final Fantasy XII'', though he has composed soundtracks for numerous other games. Sakimoto first played music and video games ...
, with
Yasunori Mitsuda is a Japanese composer and musician. He is best known for his work in video games, primarily for the '' Chrono'', '' Xeno'', '' Shadow Hearts'', and '' Inazuma Eleven'' franchises, among various others. Mitsuda began composing music for his own ...
serving as music producer on the project. In March 2006, Capcom released the 11-disc ''Breath of Fire Original Soundtrack Special Box''
boxset A boxed set or (its US name) box set is a set of items (for example, a compilation of books, musical recordings, films or television programs) traditionally packaged in a box, hence 'boxed', and offered for sale as a single unit. Music Artists ...
on their in-house record label
Suleputer Suleputer (セルピュータ) is a record label the Japanese game development company Capcom uses for its releases. Its name derives from the full name of Capcom: "(CAP)(''SULE'') (COM)(''PUTER'')(S)". Select discography *Biohazard 2 ReMIX ~met@m ...
, which contained all music from the first five games in the series. The set includes the first-ever soundtrack release of the original ''Breath of Fire'', as well as the first complete soundtrack releases for ''Breath of Fire II'' and ''Breath of Fire III'', which had previously only received single-disc selections during their original printings, with a total of 307 tracks from all five titles. Capcom produced a limited run of only 2000 copies of the boxset, which was distributed on their online store e-Capcom, as well as special retailers, and included a 28-page booklet featuring art from the series.


Reception

As of the fifth game in the series, the ''Breath of Fire'' franchise has sold a total of 3.2 million units worldwide, with Capcom calling it their "best known and most successful role-playing game." Sales of each successive title continued on an upward slope which peaked at the PlayStation entries in the series, with the fifth game, ''Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter'' on the PlayStation 2, representing a significant dip. Each title received mostly positive reviews from aggregate review websites
GameRankings GameRankings was a video gaming review aggregator that was founded in 1999 and owned by CBS Interactive. It indexed over 315,000 articles relating to more than 14,500 video games. GameRankings was discontinued in December 2019, with its staff bei ...
and
Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...
, with critics such as
Gamasutra ''Game Developer'' (known as ''Gamasutra'' until 2021) is a website created in 1997 that focuses on aspects of video game development. It is owned and operated by Informa TechTarget and acted as the online sister publication to the print maga ...
finding each game to be good, but largely formulaic, calling the franchise "always solid, if not particularly ambitious". The series has routinely been compared to
Square Enix is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational holding company, video game publisher and entertainment conglomerate. It releases role-playing video game, role-playing game franchises, such as ''Final Fantasy'', ''Dragon Quest'', and '' ...
's popular ''
Final Fantasy is a Japanese fantasy Anthology series, anthology media franchise created by Hironobu Sakaguchi which is owned, developed, and published by Square Enix (formerly Square (video game company), Square). The franchise centers on a series of fanta ...
'' games, with
GameSpot ''GameSpot'' is an American video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information on video games. The site was launched on May 1, 1996, created by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady, and Jon Epstein. In addition ...
stating that "Though the Breath of Fire games have never been as well received as bigger RPG names like Final Fantasy, the series indicates that Capcom is definitely learning something about the fine art of RPG development." In May 2009, nearly seven years after the release of the latest game, ''Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter'', readers of Japanese ''
Famitsu , formerly , is a line of Japanese Video game journalism, video game magazines published by Kadokawa Game Linkage (previously known as Gzbrain), a subsidiary of Kadokawa Corporation, Kadokawa. ''Famitsu'' is published in both weekly and monthly f ...
'' magazine voted the series 6th in the publication's survey of the Top 50 Most Wanted Game Sequels.
IGN ''IGN'' is an American video gaming and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa district and is headed by its former e ...
would later name ''Breath of Fire'' the 4th greatest Capcom franchise of all time in June 2010, stating that "Though the Breath of Fire games evolved across the SNES to the PlayStation 2, the core held steadfast to Japanese RPG formulas – something that many gamers still celebrate."


Series future

In a December 2008 interview with gaming website
1UP.com ''1Up.com'' was an American entertainment website that focused on video games. Launched in 2003, ''1Up.com'' provided its own original features, news stories, game reviews, and video interviews, and also featured comprehensive PC-focused conte ...
, Capcom's Head of Research and Development
Keiji Inafune is a Japanese video game producer, character designer, game designer, and businessman. In 2009, he was chosen by IGN as one of the top 100 game creators of all time. Starting his career at Capcom in the late 1980s, his job was as an artist and ...
stated the ''Breath of Fire'' series would be put on hiatus due to the company's lack of staff and an increasingly competitive role-playing game market: "There are currently no plans on making a new Breath of Fire game. Apart from that, regarding RPG titles, they are very popular in Japan, but only certain RPG titles sell so Capcom doesn't really need to even consider making these titles as an option." Capcom USA Vice President of Strategic Planning Chris Svensson stated on the company's official message boards in June 2009 that the series remains a "resting IP". Other companies such as
Camelot Software Planning (trade name, doing business as Camelot! Software Planning) is a Japanese video game developer established in 1994 and headquartered in Shinjuku, Tokyo. It is known for developing sports games, particularly in Nintendo's ''Mario (franchise), Mari ...
have expressed interest in developing a title for the series if Capcom remained unwilling to do so.


Appearances in other media

Breath of Fire would later be featured in
Archie Comics Archie Comic Publications, Inc. (often referred to simply as Archie Comics) is an American comic book publisher headquartered in the village of Pelham, New York. The company's many titles feature the fictional teenagers Archie Andrews, Jug ...
' ''Worlds Unite'' crossover event as one of several
Capcom is a Japanese video game company. It has created a number of critically acclaimed and List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil'', ''Monster ...
and
Sega is a Japanese video game company and subsidiary of Sega Sammy Holdings headquartered in Tokyo. It produces several List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises for arcade game, arcades and video game cons ...
guest franchises appearing in the company's ''
Sonic the Hedgehog is a video game series and media franchise created by the Japanese developers Yuji Naka, Naoto Ohshima, and Hirokazu Yasuhara for Sega. The franchise follows Sonic the Hedgehog (character), Sonic, an anthropomorphic blue hedgehog who battle ...
'' and ''
Mega Man ''Mega Man'' (known as in Japan) is a video game franchise developed and published by Capcom, featuring the Mega Man (character), protagonist of the same name. The Mega Man (1987 video game), original game was released for the Nintendo Enter ...
'' titles. Between August 26 - September 2, 2020, an online survey was held for ''
Teppen (stylized as ''TEPPƎN'') is a free-to-play digital collectible card game developed by GungHo Online Entertainment and Capcom. It released in North America and Europe on July 4, 2019 and in Asia on August 8 for Android, and iOS. The game was ...
'' players, one of the questions featured asked which
Capcom is a Japanese video game company. It has created a number of critically acclaimed and List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil'', ''Monster ...
characters or series the community would like to see, Breath of Fire was one of the options players could select, and it was also possible to type in specific names within the question. On July 1, 2021, Breath of Fire was added to ''Teppen'' via its Dragons of War
expansion Expansion may refer to: Arts, entertainment and media * ''L'Expansion'', a French monthly business magazine * ''Expansion'' (album), by American jazz pianist Dave Burrell, released in 2004 * ''Expansions'' (McCoy Tyner album), 1970 * ''Expansi ...
. Nina was added as a skin for the playable character
Jill Valentine is a character in ''Resident Evil'' (''Biohazard'' in Japan), a survival horror series created by the Japanese company Capcom. She was introduced as one of two player characters in the original ''Resident Evil (1996 video game), Resident Ev ...
, she is voiced by
Abby Trott Abby Trott is an American voice actress. She started out by acting in puppet shows in Japan, before moving to the United States and joining Bang Zoom! Entertainment, where she has worked on numerous anime, animation, and video game series. Some ...
(English) and
Kyoko Hikami is a very common feminine Japanese given name. Not to be confused with Kiyoko. Written forms The final syllable "ko" is typically written with the kanji character for child, 子. It is a common suffix to female names in Japan. The first syl ...
(Japanese). Her theme song is a remix of the soundtrack titled "Battle for Tomorrow" from ''
Breath of Fire III ''Breath of Fire III'' is a role-playing video game developed and published by Capcom originally for the PlayStation console as part of the '' Breath of Fire'' series. It was released in Japan on September 11, 1997, and in North America and Europ ...
''. In addition, the card pack features multiple characters, enemies and concepts from Breath of Fire.


See also

*
List of Japanese role-playing game franchises This is a list of best-selling Eastern role-playing video game franchises. For inclusion on the list, a franchise must have sold or shipped at least one million copies. For the purpose of this article, an Eastern role-playing video game is defin ...


Notes


References


External links

{{Authority control Capcom franchises Video games about shapeshifting Video games about dragons Role-playing video games Video game franchises Video game franchises introduced in 1993