Development
Development for .hack//G.U. began in October 2002, towards the end of the first .hack series' production cycle, with CyberConnect2's president Hiroshi Matsuyama as director. It was first announced in June 2004 under the title of "Project G.U." with little information about it. Rather than making a direct sequel, Cyberconnect2 developed .hack//G.U. as an independent series connected with the first .hack series. As in the previous games, Matsuyama also appears as a character that the player meets, this time being Piros the 3rd. CyberConnect2 listened to people's feedback regarding the .hack series when creating .hack//G.U.. As a result, .hack//G.U. was composed of less games than .hack, series that was criticized for being split in four games. The first game's release date was delayed in order to coincide with the start of its manga adaptation and anime series. Matsuyama has stated that the acronym "G.U." has twelve meanings related to the plot of the games but the central theme is "growing up" in many respects. In order to attract Graphically and technologically, the game is an improvement on the original .hack series. Personally, Haseo grows up as a character, developing his inter-personal skills and his worldliness. As a series, the setting and concept presented in the games are darker and more mature than before.
In terms of gameplay, .hack//G.U. was made more action-oriented than the first .hack games with Haseo being able to connect combos with other characters from the party. The interactions between the characters outside The World was expanded to further simulate the idea the player is going through a MMO. This was based on the last game .hack and the .hack//SIGN anime in which the characters' had to leave The World in order to take care of "real life events." Matsuyama claimed that Rebirth was longer than the four games of the first series combined and that the three .hack//G.U. games would not be "three parts to the same game". Unlike the previous series where the animated tie-in .hack//Liminality was included as a bonus DVD, the development team opted to integrate the animated story into webisodes available in-game. Bandai also released a "Terminal Disc" with the special edition of Rebirth, which further expands the franchise's backstory and bridges the gap between the two game series.
Read more about this topic: .hack//G.U.
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