Source: Famitsu
Siren: Blood Curse: Archives Archives Archives 37~45
Good evening. This is Clockwork Toyoda. Thank you for visiting.
This blog aims to bring you the charms of Siren: Blood Curse. Today is part five of the archives, dealing with items 37 to 45.
Archive No.37 - Bizarre Chronicles of Gojaku Peak
Toyama: This is an archive that describes the Uryen.
Toyoda: What were you most aware of with regards to the Uryen this time around?
Toyama: The Uryen was a clay figure in Siren. Since this game will also be seen overseas, we thought that a clay statue wouldn't really bring to mind a destructive weapon.
Toyoda: It doesn't really have that image, no (laughs).
Toyama: Box-shaped things, like the one from the movie "Hellraiser", are quite familiar, so we wanted to make it into a cube, but...
Toyoda: Wanted to, but...?
Toyama: We settled on the design right in the final stages, so we hadn't filmed any motion capture for a box shape. Changing everything to match up was hard. Also, I think it might be kind of hard to tell, but when Howard fires the Uryen the box design changes and wraps around his arm, in a movement like sucking his blood...
Toyoda: Huh? I hadn't noticed that at all either...
Toyama: When you ready the Uryen three tentacle-like objects extend from it and pierce his arm, so make sure you look out for it.
Toyoda: Got it. By the way, I have another question - where did the Uryen's name come from?
Toyama: It got its name from the angel Uriel. We liked the way it was written, so called it the Uryen in this game too.
Archive No.38 - Bermuda 3 Record
Toyoda: This is the "Tulala, tulala, triangle..." one, right?
Toyama: I wrote this in "Good Evening from the Development Team" too, but the afros are modelled on the CG director, Mr. Kondo.
Toyoda: The song is quite long.
Toyama: I'd estimate that it's even longer than the ending (laughs).
Toyoda: You've gone too far (laughs). Speaking of which, is there any deep meaning to the lyrics?
Toyama: It's just the way it sounds. It was Sato who had the idea to give it a Nichome taste. By the way, like it says in the archive, only two people are singing on "SOS From the Bermuda Triangle of Love" - did you notice?
Toyoda: That's because the other was the tambourine player, right?
Toyama: That was actually added afterwards. At the time of recording, we didn't have the money to hire three singers (laughs). It's been pointed out that it's kind of strange to be obtaining a record by examining a radio-cassette player, but she's meant to be listening to the radio, so it's not incorrect to say you're obtaining a record.
Archive No.39 - Spool Knitter
Toyama: This was an actual spool knitter we bought and made a few modifications to. They don't have them overseas, so it was quite hard to translate into English.
Toyoda: There are two archives after this that are quite deeply connected to it.
Toyama: We had decided quite early on that we wanted to combine some archives, so it all went quite smoothly.
Archive No.40 - Bug-Catching Set
Toyoda: Is the "Hiroshi" written on the box the older brother? If you look at the order of the names written on the nameplate of the Ito house, you could also think he's the father...
Toyama: You've been paying attention (laughs). This is one of the things only Sato knows, so I'll check with her later.
Toyoda: Its design feels right for the time - did you actually make the box?
Toyama: We bought something that looked similar and put an illustration drawn by the head designer on the front. This box also shows up in Episode 0, but it's in night mode so apparently you can't tell at all (laughs).
Toyoda: (laughs)
Toyama: As far as issues with the archive go, we were kind of stuck by the fact that bug-catching isn't really a tradition in America... Bug-catching is a pastime unique to Japan. We made no effort to change it, so just overcame it by forcing the idea that Bella is a strange kid... We put in an explanatory line making it sound like some kind of pet for overseas and pretended (laughs).
Archive No.41 - Hanuda Horned Beetle
Toyama: At first I asked for it to have a kind of weird trait, and they talked about a giant beetle or giving it eight horns (laughs). But I asked them not to do that, and it settled into its current, non-showy form.
Toyoda: Did you photograph a specimen and modify it afterwards?
Toyama: We did. We put it on a tree growing in an abandoned village and took photos of it.
Archive No.42 - World UMA Encyclopaedia
Toyama: We took quite a lot of care with this archive. The photo of the twins from the bottom of the left-hand page was one we used for an archive in Siren 2, but it's not like we reused it wrongly. I'm always buying UMA books, and constantly seeing misused photos as I look through. Like they think, "Let's use the same photo again." So we misused the photo we used in Siren 2 as an homage to that style (laughs).
Toyoda: ...The wounds seem vaguely different in comparison to the photo from Siren 2, right?
Toyama: We made some slight changes. That's another thing we took care with (laughs).
Archive No.43 - Gojaku Peak Mural
Toyama: Out of all of the archive items, this is the only CG image. We used the one as it appears in the episode.
Toyoda: I had absolutely no idea.
Toyama: It was because we couldn't find a similar rock and ran out of time. Also, if we'd used a different rock we'd have had to change the graphics during the episode to match, so the head designer reluctantly did it in CG. I think that was one of his regrets.
Archive No.44 - Sam Monroe's Voice Recorder
Toyoda: The voice recorder is on top of his rucksack, right?
Toyama: Yeah. It's meant to be a situation in which Sam has left the voice recorder on top of the rucksack he carries around on his back. Its content is pretty straightforward, so I don't think there's anything else to explain.
Toyoda: The design is different to the one of the voice recorder that appears in Siren 2, right?
Toyama: This was newly-made as well, so they're totally different.
Archive No.45 - Cassette Tape
Toyama: There's surprisingly little to say about this archive too (laughs).
Toyoda: Why does the Hanuda Beetle grab onto the tape?
Toyama: Because there's jam on it. I guess a situation in which someone eats Hanyoodles, drops strawberry jam onto the floor and this lands on a tape lying there is unbelievable (laughs). Oh, about the voice recorded on it - at the time we also recorded a version of it in which you can hear the laughter of an attacker, but we reached the conclusion that the version without the voice was scarier...
Toyoda: Ahh, it really is creepier when there's silence.
Good Evening from the Development Team
We used things like synthetic material while filming the models, taking photos of the wounds and inflammation all over the place, meaning to afterwards use them as appropriate to accentuate the shibito, but there was something melancholy in the air during shooting. (Toyama)