Kobayashi Tetsu first shooed the overexcited Nakayama Yuji aside to let him go brag somewhere else, then sat down with Kitagawa Takeshi in front of the computer.
Kitagawa inserted the floppy disk he'd brought, and Tetsu navigated through the folders, flipping through the raw art assets.
He had to admit—Kitagawa really was a veteran designer. The background he'd drawn, with its lush greenery and soft grass, had a convincing sense of depth and atmosphere.
"But it's a bit too detailed," Tetsu said. "Given the hardware limitations, we'll need to blur the assets a little. Otherwise the memory load will be too big."
Kitagawa nodded, silently engraving this into his heart.
Kobayashi Tetsu's highest decree: blur the assets.
Tetsu continued reviewing the sprites: a pixelated hunting dog, ducks, an aiming arm—each one animated with lifelike charm.
"Hmm…"
Tetsu frowned, thinking for a moment. Then he shook his head.
"Kitagawa-san, I think you'll need to redraw these. They aren't quite what I'm looking for, and they won't have the desired impact."
Kitagawa's head snapped up.
Damn clients…
He clenched his fist, face flushing, but in the end he forced out a restrained, "Then—what exactly is the issue? Please be specific, Kobayashi-kun."
But Tetsu didn't answer immediately. Instead, he pulled open a drawer, swiftly wrote a cheque, and slid it across the table.
"A cheque from Kyougyou Bank. Cashable for 50,000 yen."
Kitagawa stared at the cheque, then at Tetsu, then back at the sprites on the screen.
"Kobayashi-kun… your instructions, please."
Tetsu smiled.
He really pays.
He stood and led Kitagawa to the whiteboard. With a marker, he began sketching.
"You see, this game needs a lighthearted, exaggerated feel. For example, the hunting dog shouldn't look too proper. It needs to feel irritating—just one look should make the player want to punch it. Achieving that is easy."
He drew a stylized dragon's smirking face, then a wild, over-the-top rage comic expression.
Kitagawa folded his arms, watching. He didn't recognize the characters, but he immediately grasped the style.
The first face—simple lines, yet already fist-clenchingly punchable.
The second—comically exaggerated, but still rooted in human expression.
This distilled style… that kind of draftsmanship was not ordinary.
"Kobayashi-kun…" Kitagawa sucked in a breath.
"I originally thought you were just an outsider telling a professional what to do. But clearly—you're quite skilled at illustration. I didn't expect you to need my help."
The drawings were rough, but the ability to extract essence so cleanly—this man definitely had real art fundamentals, and not the casual hobbyist kind.
Tetsu spread his hands modestly.
"I'm just copying what I've seen. I can imitate, but I lack the skill to create original designs. Kitagawa-san, you're the one with true expertise. So I want you to push further—redraw the main characters according to this style: the protagonist, the dog, the game targets."
Kitagawa nodded fiercely.
He already had fifty thousand yen in hand—what else was there to say?
Time to work.
He left full of confidence.
And ran straight into Nakayama Yuji at the door.
Nakayama's goofy grin instantly made Kitagawa's stomach flip.
As a man in his thirties, he truly could not stand Yuji's personality.
"How was it, Kitagawa-san? Surprised?" Yuji beamed.
"Surprised by what?" Kitagawa muttered.
"By Kobayashi-kun! At first I thought he was all background and no ability, just some kid coasting on family connections. But he's the kind who shatters your assumptions fast."
Kitagawa paused.
…True enough.
He nodded with solemn agreement.
Atlus really was different.
——
Within days, Kitagawa completed the revised assets, and they were excellent.
Inside the garage, Tetsu and Yuji sat at their respective terminals, polishing the final code for Duck Hunt.
With the framework completed, inserting assets was simple. The only tricky part had been syncing everything with the light gun, but now that Tetsu had switched to a TV-emission detection system, even that was solved.
Yuji leaned over, hesitating.
Tetsu sighed. "If you've got something to say, say it. Don't stare at me like a creep."
"Well… what's this 'fourth wall' note on the whiteboard supposed to mean?"
He'd been curious for days.
Tetsu shrugged.
"It's simple. It means interacting across the screen. Remember the dog we designed? When the player misses their shots, the dog doesn't mock the character—they mock the player. Their big, dumb, smug face pops right up against the screen."
He tapped the monitor.
The image displayed was a ridiculously punchable dog face rendered in high detail—Kitagawa's masterpiece of annoyance.
Yuji stared, imagining the scene, and felt a chill.
He could already see it: the player firing wildly, missing every shot, then suddenly—
A stupid, smirking dog leaps onto the screen to laugh in their face.
Even a saint would get mad.
Tetsu wrote another word on the whiteboard.
"Interaction."
"If you want a game to stand out, the interaction between game and reality matters. Breaking the fourth wall, even in a simple way like this, is the most basic form of that."
Yuji quietly memorized every word.
Every time Tetsu explained something, it sounded mysterious and profound. He didn't know how Tetsu understood all this—but he knew it was all important.
"Kobayashi-kun," Yuji said with heartfelt awe,
"I used to think I was a hidden genius, just waiting for someone to recognize me. But perhaps… you are the true genius here."
Tetsu smiled and motioned downward.
Sit.
Calm.
Normal operation.
"The game is basically finished. Too bad it won't launch until next year bundled with the SG-2000. I can't wait to see what kind of sensation it'll cause when it finally releases."
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