Interview: Operation Rainfall

 

Following the announcement of Xenoblade Chronicles's North American release, we contacted fan campaign Operation Rainfall for an interview. Richard Ross, one of the group's administrators, agreed to an exclusive interview to discuss the group's changing outlook on its efforts and whether or not Nintendo planned all along to bring Xenoblade across the pond.

 

North American Wii owners will finally get to experience Xenoblade next April.

 

NoobFeed: For those still unfamiliar, why don’t you tell us a little about Operation Rainfall? How you got started, what you’re all about.

 

Richard Ross: Operation Rainfall is a group of Nintendo fans trying to get three games—Xenoblade Chronicles, The Last Story and Pandora’s Tower—[released in North America]. Xenoblade was... announced. It should be coming out around April, I believe...

 

NF: That’s a big win for you guys. Were you surprised when it happened?

 

RR: Yeah, I was. I was actually just about to leave my house…, but I had a sneaking suspicion that I should check Facebook. And, what do you know! (Laughs.)

 

NF: Were any of you beginning to lose hope by that time?

 

RR: We, the admins and I, weren’t really losing hope. We were just wondering when they were gonna announce it. ‘Cause we really didn’t have any doubt that Xenoblade was at least coming. Just wondering when the heck they were gonna say something. So, no, we weren’t losing hope.

 

NF: You guys did have a lot of support. IGN, Kotaku and even [Soraya Saga], the wife of Xenoblade’s creator. Starting out, did you ever expect you’d find so much support?

 

RR: I’m sure the founders didn’t really expect that. I came in later on, but I have talked to Tyson [Gifford] and Marco, and I don’t think they expected this sort of support. Not in this magnitude.

 

NF: She (Soraya Saga)… gave Operation Rainfall a lot of credit on her Twitter feed. Do you guys claim any responsibility for this, or do you think it’s a decision Nintendo made independently?

 

RR: We like to think we had a hand in it, but of course we have to stay humble and always think that Nintendo had this planned… You never know, actually, what Nintendo is thinking. They may have planned this all along, but really, would [Xenoblade Chronicles] have sold this well in Europe without us? Or gained this much interest without us? I’m not sure about that. But, you know, it’s pretty cool nonetheless. (Laughs.)

 

NF: Now the obvious question is, “What next?”

 

RR: Well, we have two more games: The Last Story and Pandora’s Tower. We gotta make sureXenoblade Chronicles sells well, otherwise we look like fools. And if that sells well, hopefully that shows Nintendo there’s an audience for these games and it will encourage them to release the other two. And of course we have to continue the campaign with the other two, to help people let Nintendo know that we still want these games.

 

NF: So, you’ll be ramping up your efforts, then?

 

Sort of. The thing is, we’re not exactly sure how to go [about] this now, because they only announced one. And we don’t want to show that we’re ungrateful—because of course we’re grateful; we’re happy about this—but… right now we’re sort of thinking, “What do we do?” Because we can’t Facebook spam and do all that stuff ‘cause people will look at us and be like, “Wow, you can’t just be happy for one?” We are happy, but, you know, our mission was three games.

 

NF: So you’re kind of on hiatus at the moment?

 

RR: Well, December’s sort of an off-month for us. We definitely have plans for further on, though. I mean, we’re discussing and figuring it out.

 

NF: The future certainly looks brighter for those releases, doesn’t it?

 

RR: Oh, yes! Actually, since Xenoblade is getting some positive reception, especially if you look at the GameStop website. A couple of days ago, it was No.1 in most anticipated game. It was pretty neat… We were watching that.

 

NF: Is there anything you’d like to add before we finish?

 

RR: Don’t stop trying. We need to get all three games, so we gotta let Nintendo know.

 

NF: Thank you for your time.

 

If you missed it last time, here's the official trailer from Nintendo's Twitvid.

 

 

Aaron Kinney, NoobFeed