Editing Nights into Dreams (section)

== Development ==
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| quote = I headed back to Japan so that I could work with [[Naoto Ohshima|Mr Ohshima]] and while I was waiting for the plane to take off, I thought, 'Let's make a game where we can fly!' So I guess that's where it all started.
| source = Producer [[Yuji Naka]] in an interview with ''[[Sega Saturn Magazine]]''<ref name="SatMag8">{{cite news|title=This is the Sonic Team|work=[[Sega Saturn Magazine]]|issue=8|publisher=[[Emap International Limited]]|date=June 1996|page=54}}</ref>
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''Nights'' was developed by [[Sonic Team]], the [[Sega]] development division that had created the ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'' games for [[Sega Genesis|Genesis]]. The ''Nights'' concept originated during the development of ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog 2]]'' in 1992, but development did not begin until after the release of ''[[Sonic & Knuckles]]'' in late 1994.<ref name="interview2">{{cite journal|title=Game Masters: Interview with Yuki Naka|journal=[[Hobby Consolas]]|publisher=[[Axel Springer SE|Axel Springer]]|date=1 August 1996|issue=59|pages=28–29 |url=https://archive.org/stream/HobbyConsolas059/Hobby_Consolas_059#page/n27/mode/2up/search/nights|access-date=7 March 2016|language=es}}</ref> Programming began in April 1995 and total development spanned six months.<ref name=interview2 /> [[Yuji Naka]] was lead programmer and producer,{{sfn|Hunt|2012|p=27}} while [[Naoto Ohshima]] and [[Takashi Iizuka (game designer)|Takashi Iizuka]] were director and lead designer, respectively.<ref name=interview2 /><ref name="big">{{cite web|author=blackoak |title=NiGHTS into dreams... – 1996 Developer Interview |url=http://shmuplations.com/nights/|website=Shmuplations|publisher=[[Sega Saturn Magazine]]|access-date=3 March 2016|date=1996 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160514132608/http://shmuplations.com/nights/|archive-date=14 May 2016}}</ref> Naka and Ohshima felt they had spent enough time with the ''Sonic'' franchise and were eager to work on new concepts.<ref name="SatMag11">{{cite magazine|date=September 1996|title=Pillow Talk: An Interview with Team Sonic|url=https://archive.org/details/Official_Sega_Saturn_Magazine_011/page/n37/mode/2up|magazine=[[Sega Saturn Magazine]]|publisher=[[Emap International Limited]]|issue=11|pages=38–41}}</ref> According to Naka, the initial development team consisted of seven people, and grew to 20 as programmers arrived.<ref name=interview2 />{{sfn|Hunt|2012|p=27}}

''Sonic'' creator and project director Ohshima created the character of Nights based on his inspirations from travelling Europe and western Asia. The character design incorporated Japanese, European, and American stylistics in order to give Nights as universal an appeal as possible.<ref name="SatMag11"/> Ohshima later decided that the character should resemble an angel and fly like a bird.{{sfn|Hunt|2012|p=28}} In the context of the game, Nights is a part of every human's subconsciousness, and so was purposely designed to be neither male nor female.<ref name="SatMag11"/> Nights' personality is intended to be a "a mirror of the child's personality."<ref>{{cite web|author=Justin Towell|date=2007-11-27|title=Nights team prefer Gamecube pad to Wii-mote|url=https://www.gamesradar.com/nights-team-prefer-gamecube-pad-to-wii-mote/|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110517134555/http://www.gamesradar.com/wii/nights-journey-of-dreams/news/nights-team-prefer-gamecube-pad-to-wii-mote/a-20071127112247116075/g-20070402143948293070|archive-date=May 17, 2011|access-date=2007-12-21|publisher=[[GamesRadar]] UK}}</ref>

Naka originally intended to make ''Nights into Dreams'' a slow-paced game, but as development progressed the gameplay pace gradually increased, in similar vein to ''Sonic'' games.<ref name=interview2 /> The initial concept envisioned the flying character in a rendered 2D sprite art, with side-scrolling features similar to ''Sonic the Hedgehog''.<ref name=big /> The team were hesitant to switch from 2D to 3D, as Naka was sceptical that appealing characters could be created with polygons, in contrast to traditional pixel sprites, which the designers found "more expressive".<ref name=big /> According to Iizuka, the design and story took two years to finalise.{{sfn|Hunt|2012|p=27}} The difficulty was designed with the intent that young and inexperienced players would be able to complete the game, while more experienced players would be compelled by the replay value.<ref>{{cite magazine|date=July 1996|title=An Interview with Mr. Yuji Naka|url=https://archive.org/details/Next-Generation-1996-07/page/n45/mode/2up|magazine=[[Next Generation (magazine)|Next Generation]]|publisher=[[Imagine Media]]|issue=19|page=45}}</ref>

''Nights'' was developed using [[Silicon Graphics]] workstations for graphical designs and Sega Saturn emulators running on [[Hewlett-Packard]] machines for programming. There were problems during early stages of development because of a lack of games to use as reference; the team had to redesign the Spring Valley level numerous times and build "everything from scratch".{{sfn|Hunt|2012|p=28}} The team used the Sega Graphics Library operating system, said by many developers to make programming for the Saturn dramatically easier, only sparingly, instead creating the game almost entirely with custom libraries.<ref name="NGen19">{{cite magazine|date=July 1996|title=Sonic Team Presents: Nights into Dreams|url=https://archive.org/details/Next-Generation-1996-07/page/n41/mode/2up|magazine=[[Next Generation (magazine)|Next Generation]]|publisher=[[Imagine Media]]|issue=19|pages=40–44}}</ref> Because the Sonic Team offices did not include soundproof studios, team members recorded sound effects at night.<ref name=interview2 /> According to Naka, every phrase in the game has a meaning; for example, "abayo" is Japanese slang for "goodbye".<ref name=interview3 /> The team felt that the global market would be less resistant to a game featuring full 3D CGI cut scenes than 2D [[anime]]. Norihiro Nishiyama, the designer of the in-game movies, felt that the 3D cutscenes were a good method to show the different concepts of dreaming and waking up. Naka said that the movies incorporate realism to make it more difficult for the player to disambiguate the boundary between dreams and reality.<ref name=big />

The development took longer than expected because of the team's inexperience with Saturn hardware and uncertainty about using the full 560 megabyte space on the CD-ROM.<ref name="big" /> The team initially thought that the game would consume around 100 megabytes of data, and at one point considered releasing it on two separate discs. Iizuka said that the most difficult part of development was finding a way of handling the "contradiction" of using 2D sidescroller controls in a fully 3D game.<ref name="big" /> Naka limited the flying mechanic to "invisible 2D tracks" because early [[beta release|beta]] testing revealed that the game was too difficult to play in full 3D.<ref name="NGen19" /><ref name="nextgen" /> The standard Saturn gamepad was found to be insufficient to control Nights in flight, so the team developed the Saturn analog controller.<ref name="NGen19" /> It took about six months to develop, and the team went through many ideas for alternate controllers, including one shaped like a Nights doll.<ref name="SatMag11" />

Iizuka said ''Nights'' was inspired by anime and [[Cirque du Soleil]]'s ''Mystère'' theatrical performance.{{sfn|Hunt|2012|p=28}}<ref name=dev>{{cite web|title=Behind The Scenes: NiGHTS Into Dreams|url=http://www.gamestm.co.uk/features/behind-the-scenes-nights-into-dreams/|website=[[GamesTM]]|publisher=[[Imagine Publishing]]|access-date=24 November 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304094038/http://www.gamestm.co.uk/features/behind-the-scenes-nights-into-dreams/|archive-date=4 March 2016}}</ref> The team researched dream sequences and [[REM sleep]], including the works of psychoanalysts [[Carl Jung]], [[Sigmund Freud]] and Friedrich Holtz.<ref name=interview3 /> Iizuka studied dreams and theories about them, such as Jung's theories of dream archetypes. Naka said that Nights reflected Jung's analytical "[[Shadow (psychology)|shadow]]" theory, whereas Claris and Elliot were inspired by Jung's [[animus and anima]].<ref name=interview3 />