Zeno Robinson didn’t know what he was moving into.
The actor, who performs Cai in Hearth Emblem: Fortune’s Weave, was not a newcomer to Nintendo’s well-liked technique RPG collection. He’d beforehand portrayed Fogado in 2023’s Hearth Emblem Have interaction and Ross in 2017’s Hearth Emblem Heroes. Robinson auditioned for a number of elements in Fortune’s Weave, together with supporting characters like Peter, Simon, and Lysander. However he informed Polygon in a current interview that he wasn’t conscious Cai was one of many recreation’s 4 protagonists till he’d already landed the gig.
“I had no concept till we began recording that [Cai] was gonna be, like, a significant focus. So my thoughts was blown,” Robinson mentioned. As a substitute, he was anticipating a younger boy with a minor position. “After I auditioned, I assumed he was gonna be type of like Cyril — he is Griffin Burns’ character in Three Homes.”
Cai’s significance to the general story wasn’t the one nice shock for Robinson. “Because the auditions for Fortune’s Weave got here in, I used to be like, there is a lot of Black individuals on this one. It was thrilling,” he defined. “It is not daily that you just get to audition for a personality who’s going to be a protagonist in a Hearth Emblem recreation, a personality of colour, a younger, Black child with locs. I noticed quite a lot of myself within the design. He is bought this actually type, light coronary heart. He has the most important coronary heart, I feel, out of all people within the recreation, and that is how I’m in my life, too.”
The opposite three predominant characters in Fortune’s Weave are a battle-hardened warrior, a formidable queen, and a vengeful dancer with a kill-list a mile lengthy. In the meantime, Cai’s a 15-year-old from a rural village who enters the Heroic Video games within the slim hope of stopping the execution of his father, Castor. For Robinson, moving into character meant embracing a shift in perspective.
“It is largely the best way your mind sees and processes the world. As we get older as adults, there are issues that occur that type of get us away from that innocence that we now have as youngsters and likewise as youngsters. You have got a really idealistic [view of the world], like, ‘issues needs to be like this.’ It is largely in perspective and psyche, taking part in a 15-year-old Cai,” he mentioned. “The whole lot’s thrilling and every thing’s cool, you already know? And he is hopeful. He is bought the intense eyes, proper?”
Robinson mentioned one of many predominant challenges of this efficiency was making Cai extra relatable and memorable than a typical “shonen boy,” a plucky younger hero within the vein of anime and manga collection like Naruto and Dragon Ball.
“I knew he was a shonen protagonist. And I additionally knew that there could be a bunch of routes within the recreation, and all people had these actually complicated tales. And I feel I used to be actually, deeply afraid that folks would discover Cai boring,” Robinson mentioned. “So I went into every session making an attempt to make Cai as relatable, and as likable, and as multifaceted, and as nuanced as potential. So when issues have been unhappy, I needed you to really feel the load of that. I needed individuals to essentially, actually draw themselves to him. Like I am drawn to him. I actually care about him. So I needed to translate that care within the efficiency. I feel once you see somebody’s coronary heart, and their ardour, it is nearly inconceivable to dislike them.”
[Ed. note: Spoilers follow for the end of Part One of Cai’s route of Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave.]
A lot of Cai’s story in Fortune’s Weave facilities across the significance of household — each the one you’re born with and the one you select for your self. As Cai defies the percentages to advance by spherical after spherical of the Heroic Video games, each these households develop bigger. That provides him the boldness to confront his father, Castor, who makes an sudden look in Dagsion’s area — on the opposing facet. Robinson mentioned this was his favourite scene to carry out in your entire recreation.
“I liked the Castor-Cai confrontation within the video games, when he type of blows up on his dad, and he tells him you do not get to throw away your life. You are simply giving up, and with the restricted time we now have, I wanna cherish that with you and with the remainder of my household. And I feel that is such an necessary and actually particular message,” he defined.
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That message hasn’t been misplaced on Hearth Emblem followers. The actor mentioned he’s heard from quite a few individuals on social media who felt a very robust connection to Cai’s story — and the authenticity of his efficiency.
“There have been individuals who have associated deeply to Cai as a result of his story in the end is about his concern of dropping his father, and combating for his father’s life. So lots of people who’re coping with grief, of dropping their very own fathers or their relationship with their fathers, it was a shock that it reached them in that means,” Robinson mentioned. “Having the ability to put in a efficiency that helps individuals with their grief is an unimaginable honor.”