This interview with the two members of the GBF story team first appeared on Denfaminico Gamer on February 18, 2026. We’ve translated their interview while trimming some of the summary text in the original article. As always, any mistakes are vibratingsheep’s.
In 2025, Granblue Fantasy (GBF) ended its 12-year main story, the Estalucia arc. Then, it started the new Earth-Sky Oath arc.
With a new and mysterious landscape, never-before-seen earthdwellers, and new crew members on your journey, GBF sets out on a new voyage.
However, changing the course of a giant ship like the Grandcypher with its 10+ years of history is not an easy undertaking. When we went to the GBF story team to interview them about the new story arc, we learned about a huge battle that raged within the development team.
From what the team told us, the design process of the earthdwellers was a contest without honor or humanity as each team member championed their favorite concepts and pitted them against each other.
What emerged from the mountain of scrapped concepts and the prettyboy overpopulation crisis(?) to forge the new world? The secrets of development were filled with laughter, with tears, and with fetishes laid bare.
This interview was written by Denfaminico Gamer’s Takenaka President and fab, and edited by Denfaminico Gamer’s Takenaka President
The strength of a character’s bond to the MC. Narmaya is a “headcanon” character?
Denfaminico Gamer: Because your game has been running for so long, it must have been a huge undertaking to shake up the roster of the main crew. What was the guiding principle of the new lineup?
Story Lead B: GBF is a world inhabited by a wide range of races, but the original main crew was overwhelmingly made up of human characters.
That wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, but going into the new arc we decided that we wanted one character from each main race to make up the crew.
Denfaminico Gamer: Picking just one from each race must have been very difficult. Other than Darydara, the new character, how did you settle on Seox, Narmaya, and Sandalphon?
Story Lead B: We all agreed that the most important factor was the character’s connection to you as the main character. Since they would be traveling with you, we selected characters with that motivation and drive in mind.
Story Lead A: That was definitely the biggest factor. But Narmaya was less of a connection and more of a big sister title she gave herself (laughs)
Denfaminico Gamer: The self-titled sister (laughs)
Story Lead A: Out of the cast, Narmaya’s connection to the main character is much more her headcanon than reality. She just slid into the crew and before you knew it, it was like she was always there.
However, in recent stories she’s started to question her original goal of achieving the pinnacle of weapon mastery. She’ll have to confront that as the new story arc goes on.
That’s where her internal conflict lies, and we’ll be able to dig deeper into her character.
Denfaminico Gamer: We’re really excited to see how the new story showcases Narmaya. So, with these characters becoming the core of the new story, it must have been pretty a tough process to cast them. What was it like?
Story Lead B: We started by making proposals within the team. “This character would be good.” “No, this character would be better.”
For example, Charlotta and Haaselia were proposed as Harvin candidates, while other proposals suggested that if connection to the main character was a main factor, shouldn’t we consider Lobelia or Nier?
Other proposals included Vikala or Cagliostro as the Human representative. We proposed so many different ideas, and after considering each character’s potential for future roles in the story and how well they would do with a sustained spotlight along with many other factors, we created this lineup.
Denfaminico Gamer: So you went for a more balanced approach to your choices.
Story Lead B: Yes. In the end, we added FKHR (Granblue Fantasy creative director Fukuhara Tetsuya) to the discussion and finalized it with his input.
Denfaminico Gamer: Was there any reason for the number? You could argue that having a bigger cast wouldn’t have been a problem.
Story Lead B: The biggest reason was that we wanted to have room for new characters to join.
We don’t want to fill every possible role in the cast from the start, we want to leave some open space. So our initial cast also was chosen to team up well with characters who could join later.
The Prettyboy Overpopulation Crisis and the Darydara solution
Denfaminico Gamer: We’d like to dig deeper on the crew selection process. There must have been tons of scrapped ideas and impassioned discussions among the development team, right?
Story Lead A: More than we can count…
Story Lead B: Yeah… this was a very serious undertaking because of how important the main story is to GBF. Art, story, setting, everyone involved with all of these elements had to reach a point where they were satisfied, and that needed a substantial number of discussions and debates.
Denfaminico Gamer: Was there an especially contentious choice, or a very memorable discussion?
Story Lead B: Darydara was the topic of a particularly heated debate.
While we were thinking of what to do with the Harvin slot, the team split into two factions: the Cute Girl party and the Supporting Actor party.
Denfaminico Gamer: One look at Darydara shows us exactly which faction won in the end. How did that happen?
Story Lead A: We looked at the overall balance of the characters in the crew and thought about future story developments. When you only have cool characters like Sandalphon and Seox in the group, it’s hard to have anyone drive the story forward.
From a story writing perspective, we felt like we needed a lively character who could also bring the comedy, similar to the sanmaime (“third billing”) supporting actor in kabuki plays.
Story Lead B: So many popular characters are cool and detached (laughs)
So we needed someone who could keep the plot moving and also drive comedic moments without breaking character, just like a sanmaime.
Denfaminico Gamer: So he needed to be someone who could spur the normally detached Sandalphon and Seox to action.
Story Lead B: Well, our team has had extensive discussions about how we treat Sandalphon in the story.
Sandalphon would never work as a sanmaime, and we want to make sure that his appearances meet our audience’s expectations.
Denfaminico Gamer: He has a very rich history behind him, that’s true. There’s probably pressure to use him with care. So what role will he play in the new story arc?
Story Lead B: He’s one of the central characters of our first half, what we call a “motif character”. For comparison, the Black Knight and Orchis played similar roles in the Estalucia arc.
Story Lead B: As the story advances, he will get more and more spotlight in the new arc, and we hope you’ll enjoy it.
One of the new arc’s themes is Lyria’s search for identity.
Denfaminico Gamer: With the changes to the main crew and the sky itself, what would you call the themes of the new story?
Story Lead A: The Estalucia arc was about following your father’s footsteps, while the new story will be the main character taking the first steps of a journey that is uniquely their own.
On the way, a new focus will be put on our heroine Lyria. It could be described as a journey to find Lyria.
She’s always been one of our most prominent characters, but in the new arc you’ll see her in a whole new light.
Denfaminico Gamer: If the story is about Lyria’s internal journey of discovery, will there be any kind of set destination like Estalucia?
Story Lead A: At the start of this story, no destination has yet been revealed. After the first set of new chapters, the second story update, we’ll gradually get more of a sense for the path ahead and the goal.
Denfaminico Gamer: Is there anything in the new arc that you’re particularly excited to show people?
Story Lead A: In the new main story, characters who have never interacted before will be able to strike up conversations with each other with ease.
For example, we don’t think anyone’s seen Seox and Sandalphon chatting with each other before. We hope people enjoy the relationships that build between the characters.
Denfaminico Gamer: It looks like there will be plenty of new characters to meet*, and this one named Notus jumped out at us for being so cute. How was she designed?
*Denfaminico Gamer’s note: For this interview, we were shown the art and concepts for several new characters
Story Lead A: I was the one who sent the design notes for Notus to the art team.
She’s a Primal Beast of the wind who takes the form of a woman, so I prioritized making her visually distinct from Tiamat. Caesar has to go through a lot because of that, but… I’m sure that he doesn’t hate her, since he doesn’t have very many friends left from when he was young.
Her short hair and rough clothing were another way to distinguish her from Tiamat, and I thank the art team for making her a cutie.
Denfaminico Gamer: These dawnlight spirits look very cute, and we think a lot of skyfarers are in for a surprise when we meet them. What role will they play in the story from here on?
Story Lead A: The new arc starts after a major upheaval in the sky realm. This change affects the main characters as well, and the dawnlight spirits are a part of that change.
When you look at Phos and Uran in the journal, you’ll see the words “Edits forthcoming.” We still don’t know very much about them, so pay attention to how the main characters build a relationship with them.
Denfaminico Gamer: Is there anything else you want to call attention to in the new arc?
Story Lead A: I hope you’re excited to meet these new earthdweller races. The first story update will introduce you to the Levleath and Geonoids.
Story Lead B: We knew early on in the Levleath’s development that we wanted to give them a very distinct skin color. They are very different from not just the 4 main skydweller races but the new races as well, so it’s their most distinctive feature.
I remember that the Geonoids went through design very quickly because we already had Abramelin. Most Geonoids have either one horn or two horns, and some of them can be very tall. Maminas is tall even for them.
When we wrote her taking on Narmaya, we had their enormous height gap on our minds.
Denfaminico Gamer: What did you want to emphasize as you wrote these previously unseen new races?
Story Lead B: From the beginining of the game, we’ve had our four main races, and everyone that didn’t fit into those were treated as Other. However, with the new story there are entirely new races active in the sky realm.
The cultures in the sky realm were, aside from being on floating islands in the sky, based on fairly modern cultures for their food and customs. How will those contrast with the culture of the earthdwellers?
In very real terms, the earthdwellers come from another world entirely. Their origins are very different, and their cultures developed under very different circumstances. FKHR was very focused on questions about whether we should give them similar customs to the skydwellers, and if we needed to make them extremely different or not, and as a team we took great pains to build them up from scratch.
A mountain of rejected designs. A ruthless battle as the development team fought for their favorites
Denfaminico Gamer: You mentioned to us that making these new earthdwellers was a struggle. Does that mean that there were a lot of designs that never saw the light of day?
Story Lead A: To be honest with you, heaps of concepts were left on the cutting room floor… (laughs)
Story Lead B: Yeah. Two of the four new character races were unanimous additions to the world, but the other two additions were really hard to decide.
Story Lead A: Beastfolk, small folk, giants… goopy slime people, insectile races, pixies riding mechs, we dreamed big and wrote down everything we could think up.
And every last one was illustrated by the art team. The problem was, they all looked so good that it became impossible to pick from among them (laughs)
Story Lead B: Because of that… well, not all because of that, but at one point in the process FKHR rejected every single one of them. After that, the team started getting really opinionated about their favorites, and the surviving designs were taken to FKHR. We finally emerged with what we have today.
Story Lead A: We were at an impasse for so long. Unfortunately, my favorite out of the races didn’t make it through the design process. I’d already given them a name and started writing up their culture and back story… (laughs)
Denfaminico Gamer: The earthdwellers were a surprise to players when they first started reading Earth-Sky Oath.
Story Lead A: We wanted to preserve the surprise of meeting the earthdwellers for the first time, so that’s why we didn’t so much as hint at them in the promotional video.
We mention four new races of earthdweller in the story, but only two of them were shown in the early chapters, so hopefully people are curious about what the other two are like.
Denfaminico Gamer: So while you were designing the earthdweller races, the story team and art teams were in constant communication. Is it normal for the story and art teams to have frequent back-and-forth like this?
Story Lead B: No, until we were designing the earthdwellers we weren’t in such constant contact. Our teams have their own duties: the story team handles the story, the art teams handle the art, and it’s up to the director or the planner to go between them and lay down “This is the general flow of the story, and this is the art I’d like for it.”
However, since we started the development of the new story arc, we’ve been working together a lot more closely. There were some back and forth suggestions like “The story would be great with this general feeling for the art” or “The art would look great if we adjusted it this way”, we communicate with each other pretty directly.
Denfaminico Gamer: What was the catalyst for the relationship becoming so close?
Story Lead A: It was definitely when they moved the art and story teams together in the office.
Once we did that, we could put our desks together and provide real-time feedback. Thanks to that setup, communication between teams came very naturally.
Story Lead B: The art team’s love for GBF is truly impressive. The illustrations they post on the X (formerly Twitter) account aren’t requested by the producer or the social media team, most of them are actually drawn because the art team says “We drew something that we hope the players will really enjoy!”
Their enthusiasm really carried us when we were designing and developing the earthdwellers. What I mean by that is, trying to describe the image in your head with “This XXX would be nice” leads to a lot of losses in translation. But the art team would always say “We can sketch that” and just like that we could see our ideas given form. That really helped us bounce ideas around.
Denfaminico Gamer: That’s the power of having both your story team and your art team in-house together. But if it’s been so good, why didn’t you do it earlier?
Story Lead B: Put simply, because it had never been a problem. There were a lot of cases like Terashima, who wrote the entire Estalucia arc basically by themselves.
And getting everyone together and talking it out can be a double-edged sword. Bringing in too many cooks can risk spoiling the broth.
The GBF team has 12 years of experience working together, so I think we’re very comfortable with each other. If we had tried this right around launch, everyone might have pushed their own agenda and it could have been chaos. We’re able to work like this now because of how far we’ve all come together.
The sky realm will never be the same, and that will affect not just the main story, but the monthly story events
Denfaminico Gamer: What is the plan for future updates?
Story Lead A: By the time this interview publishes we will likely have announced this on the Granblue Fantasy Fes live stream, but we plan on updating 3 times a year. (translator’s note: the interview was published on February 18th 2026, while the announcement was made on December 27th)
Things may change depending on extenuating development circumstances, but we plan on updating every April, August, and December with the same volume of content as the December story chapters.
Denfaminico Gamer: 3 times a year? I see.
Story Lead A: We’ve stuck to the “4 chapters at a time” format, but the first chapters had so much information to impart, those chapters went pretty long. According to what I have here, it was around 62,000 Japanese characters.
In practical terms, that’s about as much prose as a monthly story event.
Denfaminico Gamer: So each main story update will have as much as a monthly story event?
Story Lead A: The first chapters had a lot of foundation to lay and that ended up making them run a bit long (laughs). The upcoming story chapters may be a bit more compact.
Denfaminico Gamer: The new chapters advance the story’s timeline from the Estalucia arc and start a new journey. I can’t help but wonder if this will affect stories outside of the main quest…
Story Lead A: We plan on advancing the timeline of story events so that most of them take place after the Grand Uplift.
However, there are ongoing series like the Dragon Knights stories that will be written as if they still take place in the Estalucia era. We’re planning to be flexible with that depending on the needs of the story.
Denfaminico Gamer: Thanks for going so deep on these topics with us today. Do you have a parting message for GBF‘s skyfarers?
Story Lead A: The new story chapters are full of new characters and introduce the new earthdweller races. They’re not just about new faces, though. The characters you know from the Estalucia arc are still around and will keep being a part of the story.
Stories that break new ground and stories that feel familiar to you. We’re writing them both in a way that you can enjoy them all, so we hope you’re looking forward to them.
Story Lead B: If you haven’t played the new chapters yet, please go experience them for yourself, and you can see the world of Granblue Fantasy is changing.
As for those who have already played the new story, you should know about the massive changes in the sky realm, along with the new earthdwellers and the new foes that rose with them.
From here on out, we should have opportunities to put these new earthdwellers in the draw so they can join your crew. Through them, the changed setting for our story events, and more, we should be able to give you an experience unlike what you’ve had before. I hope you enjoy this new world of GBF.
(end interview)