Zenless Zone Zero/Background

This page is dedicated to Developer Insights and behind-the-scenes.
==Production and Development Staff==
The staff presented in the table are people featured in official Zenless Zone Zero behind-the-scenes videos.
Name 	Role
Zhenyu Li [ZYL]	Game Producer
Joseph 	Narrative Designer
[y] 	Gameplay Designer
[x] 	Gameplay Designer
==Zenless Zone Zero x Street Fighter 6 Creators Roundtable==
Zenless Zone Zero x Street Fighter 6 Creators Roundtable
Zhenyu Li, the producer of Zenless Zone Zero, sat down with Street Fighter 6 producer Shuhei Matsumoto and director Takayuki Nakayama for an engaging discussion on "how to provide an exciting experience for players both new and old."
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Zhenyu Li: At the very beginning, I just wanted to give players moments of pure satisfaction. Because back in the day whenever we played Street Fighter, whether it was 3rd Strike or Street Fighters 4 or 5, it was very rare to have a button that would give players immediate, heavy impact and feedback. By the time they want to figure out how to play the Neutral Game well which might be quite a while into the game, and players might not have discovered the most interesting bits yet, but they are already leaving these rather hardcore games When it comes to Zenless Zone Zero I actually had the same considerations.
As I mentioned earlier, a game where if you only have dodges and reactions, monster attacks, monster offensives, and our own character's offense and defense — something along those lines — then it's a little dull. So, if we can put this really interesting mechanic that has impact — The feedback from this moment is stimulating enough for players, and they can easily access this move, then players get to feel that moment of joy faster.
And the reaction time is about 30 frames or so for most people. That's a timeframe within which you could be able to react if you are focused. Then take for example: They do something else that distracts the player so then the player might not have the ability to react at this point, that's just like when you're playing our game. You can't spare any attention for chatting or doing other things. I feel our game will test some players' reaction time, or perhaps the design of some time windows and then our game, you just played, the parry system — or rather the Perfect Assist system which lets you switch people in (during) the yellow flash.
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Zhenyu Li: If we look at Zenless Zone Zero, our parry is also a way of turning defense into offense. So, our early users—what are they most drawn to? Perhaps they might enjoy Sixth Street, or maybe another city area, or going out exploring. Our art, or our music, or perhaps our core gameplay—the strong visual and audio feedback from combat. For example, Street Fighter has its Shoryuken, and for Zenless Zone Zero, it's a series of chain attacks with strong feedback like slow motion that triggers a very strong attack. And this feedback from the attack will make players feel something like "Yeah! I did something awesome!"
That's actually the most surface-level that we designed for players to feel as though they can actually bust out this really beautiful, this really gorgeous move, giving players that kind of feeling. And then, the next time they fight, that's when players may slowly come to realize, "Ah, so this game system is for playing that. I should match these characters together and form a team like this." And they'll be able to feel there's synergy within the teams, and if they play like that, it'll be more fun. Then later, perhaps we'll start dropping in harder stages or more difficult enemies. At some point, adding enemies in for them, we let them feel that the time they take to play and adapt is actually something carefully designed. 
So, our team is always doing research over and over again. Why is it when players reach this point, they feel like they can't keep playing? Why did they feel when they get to this part that they aren't any good at this game? We focus on all of these points, analyzing them before thinking about some of the designs. How do we design what parts so that they can learn? What points make them invest more in the experience and get them playing more?
I actually saw some players comment on Zenless Zone Zero that this game's so easy that anyone with hands can play it. Actually, when it comes to this, I feel it's actually a process. If we take early-game, and if I give players the feeling right at the beginning, we are actually making this really, really hardcore action game, but we didn't take into account the base experience of the players and just gave them something super difficult. Then that might see people thinking, quite early on, "This game isn't for me, and I'm not going to play it." Really, I think this is a huge pity. 
So, I deliberately took some of the gameplay from the early-game, mid-game, and late-game and pulled it all apart. Then when you get to the late-game, we definitely hope that hardcore action gamers, when it comes to Boss fights later on, will feel, "Hey, I'm pretty worried about this. This game is a challenge and can be quite difficult." It's this that forms our core gameplay. But the time needed for each user to learn things is different, so when we designed this curve, it's especially important. But we still are going to come up with a way to let our players, both new and old, experience the fun of this game in the end.
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Zhenyu Li: We all think good art requires an eye for detail. And another thing that we have to achieve is to make players feel this is different from anything they've seen before. As to how to achieve that, we've actually tried out many different methods. Maybe we really put a bear in the game, make a robot and put it in. We think that's cool and interesting. But at the same time, if we do something new during the creative process, we have to consider whether or not existing users can accept something before making it. That's something which my teammates and I are always discussing and researching.
For example, Zenless Zone Zero has an urban theme. But for an urban theme, if I just use a currently existing car, or airplane, or skyscraper, is that going to be fresh enough for our players? This week, I was thinking, "actually, possibly not." So then how about we try retro cars—super old ones from back when I was very young. I'm talking 7 or 8 years old when I was in grade school. Some of the art and aesthetics that I saw, take that and bring it into the modern era. Is that not a fresh experience for users? I think that most people wouldn't have seen it again recently; they wouldn't go back and look at those things. I even feel if we bring some of the aesthetics from the past forward to the present, it still has a lot of artistic and aesthetic value here and now.
So, we deliberately use a few retro elements, including old cars from back in the day, or old videotapes, or old arcade machines.