In a recent interview, Tsukihime -A Piece of Blue Glass Moon– scenario writer Kinoko Nasu reveals that the game was originally planned to release in 2014, but was delayed due to the development of FGO. Additionally, Nasu detailed how the remake’s concept began as far back as 2008. He also explained the game’s development process at TYPE-MOON. [Thanks, 4Gamer!]
Nasu recalls that development for the Tsukihime remake started back in 2008 after the creators decided to fix the “embarrassing” or “disappointing” aspects of the original Tsukihime. He admits that they ended up with a “Doujin-quality game” because the studio lacked the manpower to create a polished product at the time. Therefore, the team wanted to try their hands at a Tsukihime game that didn’t cut corners akin to Fate/stay night.
Furthermore, Nasu revealed that the team had actually finished writing the text for the Ciel route as well as around 60% of the character art by 2012. TYPE-MOON had finished developing Witch on the Holy Night by 2011, and the plan was to focus completely on Tsukihime and release the game in late 2014. However, around that time Aniplex had also approached the studio to work on a new mobile game.
That mobile game eventually became Fate/Grand Order. Nasu initially planned to work on FGO while waiting for upgraded art to come in for the Tsukihime remake, but says things did not go accordingly:
From there, “FGO Hell” started and development the Tsukihime remake was essentially frozen from late 2013 to late 2017. Though, the only people who couldn’t work on it at all were me and Takeuchi (CEO of TYPE-MOON), and scripts and artwork were steadily being worked on … From around late 2017, we started getting worried that Tsukihime would never release. Therefore, I slowly started moving over to Tsukihime remake development around 2018, and really started dedicating time and effort into the game around summer 2020.
This, according to Nasu, is why Tsukihime -A Piece of Blue Glass Moon- is set in 2014 — the year in which the game was originally planned to release before its delay.
Tsukihime -A Piece of Blue Glass Moon- is immediately available in Japan on the Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4. TYPE-MOON has also asked fans to avoid sharing Tsukihime spoilers online, in order for new fans to enjoy the visual novel’s story.
