This is the fourth and final part of my retrospective article series about the Sega Saturn exclusive game Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari.
You can read the previous parts here:
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Because of the Black Wind Sweeping Through, Nanakaze Island falls into an eerie silence…
The wind user who can save the island… Garp.
The dragonborn burdened with sin… Garp.
A mysterious voice calls Garp, the one who remained on the island, by these names.
The final mystery left on Nanakaze Island.
The remaining, one last wind…
Two massive statues facing each other…
The full moon and the crescent moon…
Moonie, the lunar being who witnessed everything…
All secrets lie within the dream Garp will see—
the dream of his final previous year.
What happened in Garp’s past year…
That was the beginning of everything.
- from the Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari Picture Imagination Book
You might have noticed that I've left off something pretty major in these articles about Nanatsu Kaze - and that major missing thing is...the story.
Earlier, I showed you, patient reader/s, some quotes from Amemiya about how he did not want to structure the game's story in a typical way - but, nonetheless, eventually an overarching narrative does emerge throughout your exploration. However, because I think it is quite a nice story, I will try not to spoil much about it. What follows is just a bare-bones version that hopefully keeps the twists and turns under wraps but still piques enough interest for the uninitiated.
Once you, as Garp, hatch into the Island of Seven Winds, the first thing you/Garp will interact with on this island is a strange black claw. When you inspect it, Garp will feel a sense of nostalgia, though he does not know why. Then Garp will settle in as a new villager, and learn that one day a "black wind" blew through the island and erased its "story" (represented as blank pages in the village's "storybook"). Could the black claw and black wind be related? Hmm.
Thus, you will start to go about the island in Garp's rotund and wobbly way, creating your own "story", which usually involves helping another villager - and in doing so you will replace the blank pages in the Island's storybook with vivid recollections of your quests. The blank storybook will start to fill anew, and in this manner the game is divided into "Chapters".
Over the course of these chapters, Garp will not only make new friends, he will also acquire more of the wind wands. The progression is well done - and even though the game has a very "comfortable" vibe, there is actually always a lot going on. Eventually you'll have a variety of magical wands at your disposal, a bunch of interesting items, even a helpful teleporter of sorts that can bring you back to your home to make travel less troublesome. Also, throughout the journey you will be collecting the black items - artifacts Garp will find just as nostalgic as that black claw from the beginning of the game.
These black items and the black wind that erased the story of the Island are related to the most poignant character in the game. And this character's name is...
...well, what is this character's name? That is the big question! To not spoil too much, the character's name is something important. Do you recall earlier how I noted that a theme of this game is related to the idea of names?
One without a name is forgotten. One who is forgotten does not exist in this world.
Just a little something...to remember.
The story of the black wind slowly builds in the background of the entire game while Garp is doing silly little tasks for silly little villagers - and eventually that black wind becomes a full blown storm that cannot be ignored.
The creation of the black wind involves Garp's "sinful" past before he was reborn into his more quaint and cuddly Professor form - a past that will be revealed to the player through Garp's dreams as he collects the black items. Throughout the game there is an eerie undercurrent of an unsettling nature - especially in the dream sequences - that threatens to disrupt the peaceful vibes of the village in a frightening way. It makes for some quite tense moments in an otherwise relaxing game.
As for Garp's dreams, I will not spoil much about them...and this will end my talk about the story of Nanatsu Kaze, because I feel it's just a really nice thing to play for oneself.
I do want to mention the dream sequences in Nanatsu Kaze, as they are quite novel. While the game is a testament to Givro's ability and the Sega Saturn's 2D prowess, the dream sequences make use of Amemiya's film-making skills, as they are live-action and stop-motion.
In the Picture Imagination Book, Amemiya reflects:
As for the live-action movie parts… stop-motion takes time. Even if we filmed all day, we’d only get about 8 seconds of footage. On average, we got about 5 seconds per day, and that lasted for 40 days, which was the toughest part (laughs).
The idea was that the live-action could be used anywhere, so instead of using it in an exaggerated way in the opening or ending, we decided to use it properly in parts that were directly connected to the game… And that’s how the concept of having the 2D Garp’s dream be represented in 3D live-action came about. Thanks to that, we were able to create something that was closely tied to the story, and I think that’s the best part.
I'd say the highlight is probably the fact that we didn’t cut corners (laughs).
It might sound strange, but in this digital age, not relying on digital technology and instead making everything by hand is actually a rather luxurious approach.
And in fact, I think "luxurious" is a really nice way to describe Nanatsu Kaze as a whole. The game itself came in a 2-disc set, and the second disc has a bunch of cool extras. I haven’t mentioned the music yet, mostly because the majority of the game uses diegetic soundscapes to replace typical background music - so for the majority of your journeying you'll only be hearing the soothing songs of insects, the whispering of the wind, the rippling of water, stones clacking under your feet, and so forth. It's quite calming and fitting.
But there are also proper songs as well - and as such, the game received an awesome, luxurious I would say, soundtrack by BUDDY ZOO (composed of Hirokazu Ohta and Shinji Kinoshita, frequent collaborators with Amemiya). In the liner notes of this soundtrack are some "storyboards" of perhaps the most pivotal moment in the game - a moment involving Garp and the mysterious creature related to the black wind and black items.
The soundtrack is a really cool package overall, and the amount of time and effort that went into the artwork and sprite-work for the game is quite crazy - especially during a time period when people were leaving 2D for 3D in droves.
Plus, there is the artbook for the game, the Imagination Picture Book, which is presented in a fairy tale storybook format - and it has individually drawn artworks for every character, background, object and item. Everything about Nanatsu Kaze really goes beyond the norm - there is just an extravagance to its very existence. Extravagance...and ambition.
In Part One, I mentioned that Givro was always making ambitious games, and I feel that Nanatsu Kaze was their most ambitious title of all - but also the one where they really hit the mark and reached their highest point. Givro and Amemiya reached for the stars with this one. Enix is to be commended as well for even allowing such an un-commercial game the development time it needed.
I also mentioned that Givro games often deal with evolution or metamorphosis, and Nanatsu Kaze is one of these type of games. Metamorphosis plays a big part in the story of Garp and the mysterious creature related to the black wind.
The eggs (or cocoons, or chrysalis, or whatever you wish to call them), such as the one we see Garp hatch out of at the start of the game, are integral for arrival on the Island of the Seven Winds - and the game's penultimate (second to last) chapter is a particularly powerful one involving these egg things. In a way, Givro as a company really transformed into their own "final form" with this game. With Nanatsu Kaze, I believe they reached a high level as game developers.
And so naturally - with all that care put into the game to the smallest details, with all that investment in it, with Amemiya's unique vision, Givro's dedication, Enix's patience - naturally, the game...was a commercial failure.
I don't know the original sources, but I saw on some Japanese websites that only 5,500 copies of the game were sold on its first day of release - and maybe only 7,000 sold total. I can't verify these totals, those are just numbers I keep seeing come up on Japanese websites. Basically, even if those are not the actual figures, the actual figures were not very good.
It is not an unexpected outcome. This is just how the world works sometimes. Just because you put an intense amount of effort and care into something, it doesn't mean other people are going to care or even give it a chance. There is no guarantee that there is even an audience out there for some things that are off-the-beaten-path. Some things just do not have mass appeal. Amemiya knew it from the start, calling his fairy tale style "un-commercial" in his Fang artbook before Nanatsu Kaze was ever in development. Enix took a chance, they gambled on Amemiya's unique vision - and in terms of sales I am sure it is considered a failure by many metrics. A couple of the Japanese sites seem to mainly blame marketing, or the lack thereof (though Nanatsu Kaze does have a really cool commercial) - but even so, Nanatsu Kaze is simply a very niche game.
But regardless, I contend that the game being a commercial failure means little in terms of its own quality as an exploration game. Sure, it is not a perfect game. Many people will find it painfully slow, especially when Garp turns around each time he gets to the end of a screen to look back. That is probably the most egregious example of the game's "glacial pacing" - but, Nanatsu Kaze is also the type of game where once you get into its rare groove, you may find yourself enjoying the rhythm.
As a puzzle game set in an odd world full of even odder inhabitants, whose conversations are translated via a "third party narrator" of dubious reliability, there are a few obtuse puzzles (though I contend nothing to the extent of more famous puzzle games that do have mainstream appeal - like many of those from the classic PC adventure puzzle game era). But generally, Nanatsu Kaze is very polished game. Actually, a lot of the complaints about the game on certain sections of the internet involve the language barrier rather than any game-play qualms - currently, there are no translation patches for it (though maybe you are reading this in a bright future where this has changed!).
I did find one possible glitch that could get the player stuck in the game, but I also found a solution - and I would like to recreate that glitch in a future play-through (and perhaps make an article on it to show how to not get stuck should it happen). Anyway, I am a big fan of the Sega Saturn console and consider Nanatsu Kaze to be in my top five titles for the system.
It is a beautiful example of 2D Saturn sprite-work and of top-form Amemiya originality, combined with a heartfelt story and quality game-play. Well, I hope some of you out there read this far. If so, you'd be perfect candidates to play the game. If you can make it through my writing style, then you can handle Nanatsu Kaze no problem. Compared to my long-windedness, Nanatsu Kaze is...a speedrun. A speed run like the wind.
And that is the story of...The Story of the Island of Seven Winds. So, now that you know all this information about the game's beginnings and its ending, how thing's ended up in terms of sales (which was not exactly a fairy-tale ending - certainly not a "happily ever after"), what about...its epilogue?
Despite the apparent commercial failure of the game, Amemiya, even with all his success with more commercial works, has continued to revisit the characters and world of the Seven Winds over the years.
In the year 2000, Ganapa no te, or Ganapa's Hand, was released. This is another Amemiya project done in the same storybook style as Nanatsu Kaze.
The easiest way to explain Ganapa no te is to say it is a "make your own adventure book" of sorts.
It is a full-color comic book full of Nanatu Kaze-esque creatures, where you have to use scissors to cut and fold and so forth to form parts of the story.
It seems that Amemiya was still not done with his idea of interactivity à la Peter Pan! And with scissors involved, it is no surprise that this particular project involved...Kisuke! Of Iho Kembunroku and Nanastu Kaze...fame...? Actually, where Nanatsu Kaze is the origin story of Garp and how he became Professor Garp and ended up on the Island of Seven Winds, so too is Ganapa's Hand the origin story of Kisuke...but I will not spoil it any further in this article.
Ganapa's Hand is quite a fascinating work of art in itself, and if anyone is interested, I could write an article about it in more detail.
Since 2000, Amemiya has made other references to the Nanatsu Kaze characters here and there in his various works...
Whether it be in live-action...
or anime.
...but one particularly noteworthy reappearance occurred in 2024, when an art exhibit was held at Space Caiman with Nanatsu Kaze and Iho Kembunroku on display.
Also of note concerning Amemiya is, apparently during 2020 or so (the lockdown era), he became a big fan of...Animal Crossing!
As for Givro, well, sadly they dissolved after Nanatsu Kaze. It was their last game, which is a real shame because it is a game that truly shows Givro at their best - as professionals and masters of their craft. Even as a small team, they did everything they were asked of by Amemiya and Enix, and the result was pretty awesome. It is a shame that we never got to see another Givro title, but at least they went out on top, I suppose. I am sure Nanatsu Kaze's lack of commercial success is what finally killed Givro, but I don't know if that was the only factor. Givro had run into trouble - presumably of the financial variety - before, like with their cancelled arcade fighter Burning Street from 1995 - but that is a story for another time.
As for Enix...well...they also no longer exist...in Enix-only form that is. Enix merged with Square in 2003 and the two companies become one: the imaginatively named Square-Enix. Don't worry everyone, they continue to publish Dragon Quest titles to this day.
As a side note - years later it was revealed by at least two Sega employees, one being Yumiko Miyabe (the art director of Space Channel 5), that Sega actually created a top secret Dragon Quest demo. Sega showed it to Enix in hopes that Enix would develop a Dragon Quest game for the Saturn, but Enix did not pursue that project. So there actually could have been a Dragon Quest on the Saturn, though not many people knew this until many years later.
As for the speedy blue hedgehog? You may be wondering, how is that character from the Sega system faring these days? Well, Kisuke the quick blue hedgehog tailor is doing just fine, thank you very much! In fact, in the year 2024, some official Kisuke merchandise was released. Check it out - it's a Kisuke sofubi from T-BASE Japan.
But...what about Professor Garp? Is he doing okay? Does he still have writer's block? Is he taking care of himself in his comfy chair with his blanket held close when the cold winds blow?
Or has he been forgotten by time?
Well, let's let Amemiya answer that himself, in Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari's own in-game epilogue chapter.
Slight spoilers below...
In this chapter, which occurs after the ending of the game - it is basically just the post-game where you can continue to fish and hang out with villagers and so on - there is a sort of "hidden message" from Amemiya that you can find involving the Grau Dragon. The Grau Dragon is a creature in the game that represents something Nanatsu Kaze has in abundance: imagination.
The Grau Dragon is a fragment of imagination.
When someone thinks of something…
When someone has a thought…
The Grau Dragon bursts forth and takes shape.
It could be a living creature or a song…
Everything is what we have thought.
The Grau Dragon will never disappear…
Thinking… Feeling… It is always here, as many as the number of thoughts.
When you think of Garp… When you think of Kisuke…
They are always here…
On the Island of the Seven Winds…
Despite it's low sales, Nanatsu Kaze has a few but faithful following - and as long as they remember the name of Garp and a certain important creature related to the black wind, then all that hard work by the company that once went by another unique name, the name of Givro, was not for nothing. Amemiya's unique vision will continue to be seen - and Garp and all the inhabitants of the Seven Winds island will be just fine as long as there is even one person out there that still remembers the name of the game...
...Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari.
Are there any other types of video game articles you would like to read? Let me know in the comments. Thank you for your time.
Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari Article Series Complete:
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
You can read the previous parts here:
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Because of the Black Wind Sweeping Through, Nanakaze Island falls into an eerie silence…
The wind user who can save the island… Garp.
The dragonborn burdened with sin… Garp.
A mysterious voice calls Garp, the one who remained on the island, by these names.
The final mystery left on Nanakaze Island.
The remaining, one last wind…
Two massive statues facing each other…
The full moon and the crescent moon…
Moonie, the lunar being who witnessed everything…
All secrets lie within the dream Garp will see—
the dream of his final previous year.
What happened in Garp’s past year…
That was the beginning of everything.
- from the Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari Picture Imagination Book
THE STORY
You might have noticed that I've left off something pretty major in these articles about Nanatsu Kaze - and that major missing thing is...the story.
Earlier, I showed you, patient reader/s, some quotes from Amemiya about how he did not want to structure the game's story in a typical way - but, nonetheless, eventually an overarching narrative does emerge throughout your exploration. However, because I think it is quite a nice story, I will try not to spoil much about it. What follows is just a bare-bones version that hopefully keeps the twists and turns under wraps but still piques enough interest for the uninitiated.
Once you, as Garp, hatch into the Island of Seven Winds, the first thing you/Garp will interact with on this island is a strange black claw. When you inspect it, Garp will feel a sense of nostalgia, though he does not know why. Then Garp will settle in as a new villager, and learn that one day a "black wind" blew through the island and erased its "story" (represented as blank pages in the village's "storybook"). Could the black claw and black wind be related? Hmm.
Thus, you will start to go about the island in Garp's rotund and wobbly way, creating your own "story", which usually involves helping another villager - and in doing so you will replace the blank pages in the Island's storybook with vivid recollections of your quests. The blank storybook will start to fill anew, and in this manner the game is divided into "Chapters".
Over the course of these chapters, Garp will not only make new friends, he will also acquire more of the wind wands. The progression is well done - and even though the game has a very "comfortable" vibe, there is actually always a lot going on. Eventually you'll have a variety of magical wands at your disposal, a bunch of interesting items, even a helpful teleporter of sorts that can bring you back to your home to make travel less troublesome. Also, throughout the journey you will be collecting the black items - artifacts Garp will find just as nostalgic as that black claw from the beginning of the game.
These black items and the black wind that erased the story of the Island are related to the most poignant character in the game. And this character's name is...
...well, what is this character's name? That is the big question! To not spoil too much, the character's name is something important. Do you recall earlier how I noted that a theme of this game is related to the idea of names?
One without a name is forgotten. One who is forgotten does not exist in this world.
Just a little something...to remember.
The story of the black wind slowly builds in the background of the entire game while Garp is doing silly little tasks for silly little villagers - and eventually that black wind becomes a full blown storm that cannot be ignored.
The creation of the black wind involves Garp's "sinful" past before he was reborn into his more quaint and cuddly Professor form - a past that will be revealed to the player through Garp's dreams as he collects the black items. Throughout the game there is an eerie undercurrent of an unsettling nature - especially in the dream sequences - that threatens to disrupt the peaceful vibes of the village in a frightening way. It makes for some quite tense moments in an otherwise relaxing game.
As for Garp's dreams, I will not spoil much about them...and this will end my talk about the story of Nanatsu Kaze, because I feel it's just a really nice thing to play for oneself.
I do want to mention the dream sequences in Nanatsu Kaze, as they are quite novel. While the game is a testament to Givro's ability and the Sega Saturn's 2D prowess, the dream sequences make use of Amemiya's film-making skills, as they are live-action and stop-motion.
LIVE-ACTION AND STOP-MOTION
In the Picture Imagination Book, Amemiya reflects:
As for the live-action movie parts… stop-motion takes time. Even if we filmed all day, we’d only get about 8 seconds of footage. On average, we got about 5 seconds per day, and that lasted for 40 days, which was the toughest part (laughs).
The idea was that the live-action could be used anywhere, so instead of using it in an exaggerated way in the opening or ending, we decided to use it properly in parts that were directly connected to the game… And that’s how the concept of having the 2D Garp’s dream be represented in 3D live-action came about. Thanks to that, we were able to create something that was closely tied to the story, and I think that’s the best part.
I'd say the highlight is probably the fact that we didn’t cut corners (laughs).
It might sound strange, but in this digital age, not relying on digital technology and instead making everything by hand is actually a rather luxurious approach.
And in fact, I think "luxurious" is a really nice way to describe Nanatsu Kaze as a whole. The game itself came in a 2-disc set, and the second disc has a bunch of cool extras. I haven’t mentioned the music yet, mostly because the majority of the game uses diegetic soundscapes to replace typical background music - so for the majority of your journeying you'll only be hearing the soothing songs of insects, the whispering of the wind, the rippling of water, stones clacking under your feet, and so forth. It's quite calming and fitting.
But there are also proper songs as well - and as such, the game received an awesome, luxurious I would say, soundtrack by BUDDY ZOO (composed of Hirokazu Ohta and Shinji Kinoshita, frequent collaborators with Amemiya). In the liner notes of this soundtrack are some "storyboards" of perhaps the most pivotal moment in the game - a moment involving Garp and the mysterious creature related to the black wind and black items.
The soundtrack is a really cool package overall, and the amount of time and effort that went into the artwork and sprite-work for the game is quite crazy - especially during a time period when people were leaving 2D for 3D in droves.
Plus, there is the artbook for the game, the Imagination Picture Book, which is presented in a fairy tale storybook format - and it has individually drawn artworks for every character, background, object and item. Everything about Nanatsu Kaze really goes beyond the norm - there is just an extravagance to its very existence. Extravagance...and ambition.
In Part One, I mentioned that Givro was always making ambitious games, and I feel that Nanatsu Kaze was their most ambitious title of all - but also the one where they really hit the mark and reached their highest point. Givro and Amemiya reached for the stars with this one. Enix is to be commended as well for even allowing such an un-commercial game the development time it needed.
I also mentioned that Givro games often deal with evolution or metamorphosis, and Nanatsu Kaze is one of these type of games. Metamorphosis plays a big part in the story of Garp and the mysterious creature related to the black wind.
The eggs (or cocoons, or chrysalis, or whatever you wish to call them), such as the one we see Garp hatch out of at the start of the game, are integral for arrival on the Island of the Seven Winds - and the game's penultimate (second to last) chapter is a particularly powerful one involving these egg things. In a way, Givro as a company really transformed into their own "final form" with this game. With Nanatsu Kaze, I believe they reached a high level as game developers.
And so naturally - with all that care put into the game to the smallest details, with all that investment in it, with Amemiya's unique vision, Givro's dedication, Enix's patience - naturally, the game...was a commercial failure.
I don't know the original sources, but I saw on some Japanese websites that only 5,500 copies of the game were sold on its first day of release - and maybe only 7,000 sold total. I can't verify these totals, those are just numbers I keep seeing come up on Japanese websites. Basically, even if those are not the actual figures, the actual figures were not very good.
It is not an unexpected outcome. This is just how the world works sometimes. Just because you put an intense amount of effort and care into something, it doesn't mean other people are going to care or even give it a chance. There is no guarantee that there is even an audience out there for some things that are off-the-beaten-path. Some things just do not have mass appeal. Amemiya knew it from the start, calling his fairy tale style "un-commercial" in his Fang artbook before Nanatsu Kaze was ever in development. Enix took a chance, they gambled on Amemiya's unique vision - and in terms of sales I am sure it is considered a failure by many metrics. A couple of the Japanese sites seem to mainly blame marketing, or the lack thereof (though Nanatsu Kaze does have a really cool commercial) - but even so, Nanatsu Kaze is simply a very niche game.
But regardless, I contend that the game being a commercial failure means little in terms of its own quality as an exploration game. Sure, it is not a perfect game. Many people will find it painfully slow, especially when Garp turns around each time he gets to the end of a screen to look back. That is probably the most egregious example of the game's "glacial pacing" - but, Nanatsu Kaze is also the type of game where once you get into its rare groove, you may find yourself enjoying the rhythm.
As a puzzle game set in an odd world full of even odder inhabitants, whose conversations are translated via a "third party narrator" of dubious reliability, there are a few obtuse puzzles (though I contend nothing to the extent of more famous puzzle games that do have mainstream appeal - like many of those from the classic PC adventure puzzle game era). But generally, Nanatsu Kaze is very polished game. Actually, a lot of the complaints about the game on certain sections of the internet involve the language barrier rather than any game-play qualms - currently, there are no translation patches for it (though maybe you are reading this in a bright future where this has changed!).
I did find one possible glitch that could get the player stuck in the game, but I also found a solution - and I would like to recreate that glitch in a future play-through (and perhaps make an article on it to show how to not get stuck should it happen). Anyway, I am a big fan of the Sega Saturn console and consider Nanatsu Kaze to be in my top five titles for the system.
It is a beautiful example of 2D Saturn sprite-work and of top-form Amemiya originality, combined with a heartfelt story and quality game-play. Well, I hope some of you out there read this far. If so, you'd be perfect candidates to play the game. If you can make it through my writing style, then you can handle Nanatsu Kaze no problem. Compared to my long-windedness, Nanatsu Kaze is...a speedrun. A speed run like the wind.
And that is the story of...The Story of the Island of Seven Winds. So, now that you know all this information about the game's beginnings and its ending, how thing's ended up in terms of sales (which was not exactly a fairy-tale ending - certainly not a "happily ever after"), what about...its epilogue?
EPILOGUE
Despite the apparent commercial failure of the game, Amemiya, even with all his success with more commercial works, has continued to revisit the characters and world of the Seven Winds over the years.
In the year 2000, Ganapa no te, or Ganapa's Hand, was released. This is another Amemiya project done in the same storybook style as Nanatsu Kaze.
The easiest way to explain Ganapa no te is to say it is a "make your own adventure book" of sorts.
It is a full-color comic book full of Nanatu Kaze-esque creatures, where you have to use scissors to cut and fold and so forth to form parts of the story.
It seems that Amemiya was still not done with his idea of interactivity à la Peter Pan! And with scissors involved, it is no surprise that this particular project involved...Kisuke! Of Iho Kembunroku and Nanastu Kaze...fame...? Actually, where Nanatsu Kaze is the origin story of Garp and how he became Professor Garp and ended up on the Island of Seven Winds, so too is Ganapa's Hand the origin story of Kisuke...but I will not spoil it any further in this article.
Ganapa's Hand is quite a fascinating work of art in itself, and if anyone is interested, I could write an article about it in more detail.
Since 2000, Amemiya has made other references to the Nanatsu Kaze characters here and there in his various works...
Whether it be in live-action...
or anime.
...but one particularly noteworthy reappearance occurred in 2024, when an art exhibit was held at Space Caiman with Nanatsu Kaze and Iho Kembunroku on display.
Also of note concerning Amemiya is, apparently during 2020 or so (the lockdown era), he became a big fan of...Animal Crossing!
As for Givro, well, sadly they dissolved after Nanatsu Kaze. It was their last game, which is a real shame because it is a game that truly shows Givro at their best - as professionals and masters of their craft. Even as a small team, they did everything they were asked of by Amemiya and Enix, and the result was pretty awesome. It is a shame that we never got to see another Givro title, but at least they went out on top, I suppose. I am sure Nanatsu Kaze's lack of commercial success is what finally killed Givro, but I don't know if that was the only factor. Givro had run into trouble - presumably of the financial variety - before, like with their cancelled arcade fighter Burning Street from 1995 - but that is a story for another time.
As for Enix...well...they also no longer exist...in Enix-only form that is. Enix merged with Square in 2003 and the two companies become one: the imaginatively named Square-Enix. Don't worry everyone, they continue to publish Dragon Quest titles to this day.
As a side note - years later it was revealed by at least two Sega employees, one being Yumiko Miyabe (the art director of Space Channel 5), that Sega actually created a top secret Dragon Quest demo. Sega showed it to Enix in hopes that Enix would develop a Dragon Quest game for the Saturn, but Enix did not pursue that project. So there actually could have been a Dragon Quest on the Saturn, though not many people knew this until many years later.
As for the speedy blue hedgehog? You may be wondering, how is that character from the Sega system faring these days? Well, Kisuke the quick blue hedgehog tailor is doing just fine, thank you very much! In fact, in the year 2024, some official Kisuke merchandise was released. Check it out - it's a Kisuke sofubi from T-BASE Japan.
But...what about Professor Garp? Is he doing okay? Does he still have writer's block? Is he taking care of himself in his comfy chair with his blanket held close when the cold winds blow?
Or has he been forgotten by time?
Well, let's let Amemiya answer that himself, in Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari's own in-game epilogue chapter.
Slight spoilers below...
In this chapter, which occurs after the ending of the game - it is basically just the post-game where you can continue to fish and hang out with villagers and so on - there is a sort of "hidden message" from Amemiya that you can find involving the Grau Dragon. The Grau Dragon is a creature in the game that represents something Nanatsu Kaze has in abundance: imagination.
The Grau Dragon is a fragment of imagination.
When someone thinks of something…
When someone has a thought…
The Grau Dragon bursts forth and takes shape.
It could be a living creature or a song…
Everything is what we have thought.
The Grau Dragon will never disappear…
Thinking… Feeling… It is always here, as many as the number of thoughts.
When you think of Garp… When you think of Kisuke…
They are always here…
On the Island of the Seven Winds…
Despite it's low sales, Nanatsu Kaze has a few but faithful following - and as long as they remember the name of Garp and a certain important creature related to the black wind, then all that hard work by the company that once went by another unique name, the name of Givro, was not for nothing. Amemiya's unique vision will continue to be seen - and Garp and all the inhabitants of the Seven Winds island will be just fine as long as there is even one person out there that still remembers the name of the game...
...Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari.
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Nanatsu Kaze no Shima Monogatari Article Series Complete:
Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
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Nanatsu kaze no shima monogatari is one of them I didn't know about
