Shinji Hatano, head of Nintendo’s licensing department, which is the company’s first point of contact with third-party publishers, was the first person to speak with Monolith Soft and Mistwalker regarding Xenoblade Chronicles and The Last Story.
When Hatano discussed Xenoblade Chronicles with Monolith Soft and The Last Story with Mistwalker, he gave both developers the same basic advice: to to develop the games with a “romanticist approach”. Nintendo wanted both developers to design a story and world that would resonate with a large number of people, but to do it in a way that played their individual strengths.
For Monolith Soft, Xenoblade Chronicles was considered preparation for the next time they would need to take on the world with one of their games. The company currently has a title in development for the Wii U. You can read more about their collaborative experience with Nintendo here.
In the case of The Last Story, while Sakaguchi originally intended for the game to focus on the “all-important drama that takes place between a man and a woman,” as development progressed, its theme changed to that of companionship, although the original story remained the same.
You can read more about the two games and the thoughts of their directors, Tetsuya Takahashi and Hironobu Sakaguchi, in an Iwata Asks interview translated by Nintendo of Europe at this link.
