If you’re a Unreal Tournament player, you may remember Killing Floor as a mod for UT2K4. Since then, the mod team behind Killing Floor has teamed up Tripwire Interactive to bring their mod to retail release as a standalone title, and it looks to have some serious potential.

We recently had the opportunity to chat with a few of the people responsible for Killing Floor. Read on to find out a little bit more about the upcoming survival horror title.

Gaming Today: Let’s get the boilerplate stuff out of the way up front. Can you tell us who you are, what your role in the production of Killing Floor is?

Alan Wilson, VP of Tripwire Interactive. I get all the non-tech stuff to do. Some writing and design, bit of voice acting this time, project management, PR and trying to manage the testing.

I’m Alex Quick. I’ve worn a few hats over the course of KFs production, but primarily I’m working as a level designer, and texture artist. Oh, and the mod this game is based on was largely my undertaking, so I’ve been pretty active in gameplay design discussions for the sake of consistency.

Dayle Flowers, Senior Programmer at Tripwire Interactive. Aside from the typical working on game play, I get much of the highly technical stuff that many people overlook and simply expect to work. I was responsible for connecting Killing Floor to the Steam system to support Authentication, the Master Server, and Perks/Achievements. [Edit: and designing a lot of that stuff, too! AW]

Dan Nassick, audio designer and musician. I’ve worked on the Killing Floor mod since 2005 and my responsibility on the audio team has been to organize a complete audio overhaul in the transition from modification to commercial game.

Myles Lambert, part of the original mod team. I get to do a great mixture of work, environmental art and level design and when I’m not working on that I’m working on some future DLC map content.

GT: So, judging from everything I’ve seen, Killing Floor is a survival horror game featuring some very interesting adversaries. Can you tell us a little bit about these zombies?

AQ: Think of it like going to a carnival and wandering into the wrong tent, and there’s just a group of weirdos who look like they’ve been playing dress-up in an industrial scrap yard. That’s Killing Floor. They aren’t undead, they don’t have past lives, and they largely aren’t wearing clothing because they were bred and raised in a dank hole in the ground among scientists who got a kick out of poking them with sharp things and replacing their limbs with dangerous doohickeys. The inspiration for these guys came from everywhere; games, films, books, rage against ex girlfriends. What was important is that there is a very basic slow moving character who would serve as a foot-soldier for the lab freaks. After that, all the enemies fulfill some sort of tactical role. Some of them will soak up bullets and push you back, others will nullify your explosives in mid-air so you’re forced to use alternative tactics around them, and some of them are sneaky and will use devious paths which let them circumvent your defenses. It winds up being like abit of real time strategy. But in a gorey, immediate sense; and with fewer cries of “Zug Zug”.

DF: My two favorite zeds in Killing Floor would have to be the Crawler and the Stalker as they take a more indirect approach to scare the crap out of you. They will both appear as if out of nowhere if you are not intensely looking for them when you hear them. The Crawler has black skin, which helps him blend into certain environments. He moves across the ground pretty fast and leaps at you from long distances to attack. If you don’t kill him before he leaps, you often have a hell of a time looking down to find him when the rest of the horde is closing in on you. The Stalker also moves quickly and her cloaking means you hardly ever see her before she’s right on top of you. When they attack from outside your view, they often cause players to panic and fire off full clips but hit nothing.

ML: Adding onto what has already been said, these are experiments and if you are unlucky enough to get close to one you will notice the horrific tests and mutilations made to the specimens to make them more combat effective and unstable, for example the Flesh Pounds with steel shrapnel thrust into their skin or the Gorefast with a large blade cut and wrapped deeply into his hand.

One thing that beginners will very much appreciate is that all specimens have a graphical style consistent with their combat style, meaning when you see a Crawler with half a dozen spider legs you know for sure that he’s gonna be fast.

GT: Almost every survival horror game has a corporation or government behind the ‘creation’ of the zombie outbreak. Is that the case in Killing Floor?

AW: Amazing how many of these Evil Corporations and Mad Scientists there are these days. Worrying times. Yes, in KF’s case, Horzine Biotech were engaged by the British government to conduct super-secret work into man-made soldiers, on a nice cheap basis. Mix some nice genetic engineering with handing out some large weapons and you can save a fortune on defense costs! By the time the government realizes it is NOT a good idea, the Mad Scientist has already gone off (WAY off) in some odd directions, and lies about shutting the program down. And, of course, then It All Went Horribly Wrong ©

GT: I’m sure that Killing Floor will contain many weapons to beat back the zombie hordes with. However, I’ve heard that it also has some in-game items that players might not expect. Can you tell us about some of those, such as the welder?

AW: The welder is very straight-forward. A hand-held, rechargeable electronic welding tool. Works on most doors, as just about every door uses SOME metal. So you can simply close a door – and weld it tight. Stops the zeds making it through, for a while at least. They WILL break through, but it will take time. Of course, they aren’t completely stupid and some will try to find other ways to get at you – other doors, windows, A/C vents – all sorts! You can cut the welds open again. It can be quite funny when the players realize there is an unstoppable horde coming through the other door – and you’ve welded up your only escape route!

GT: I know that Killing Floor can be played as a co-op or solo game. Are there major differences in the modes, or is it simply a matter of the numbers of players involved?

AW: It is the same game, automatically scaled to make sure it is a similar level of challenge for any number of players. How hard you find the Solo mode will depend on your play style. The “extra” challenge in Solo is that there is simply no-one to watch your back and that can make a huge difference, as you just can’t be shooting in every direction at once. You need to shoot fast and think fast to avoid being surrounded, cornered. And eaten.

ML: The Solo should really be used for getting used to the game and for times when you simply want to get killing without having to scream down the mic every time a Flesh Pound comes around the corner.

GT: What sort of game modes can players expect to see in Killing Floor?

AW: The game will ship with the core game mode – you and your friends taking on the specimen hordes. Try and get through all the waves and finish off the Patriarch at the end! Inevitably, there are a whole bunch of ideas on the drawing board that we can add in after launch, including the “Story” mode from the mod, for instance.

GT: With the timing of the release of Killing Floor, it’s almost inevitable that it will be compared to Valve’s Left 4 Dead. Have you tried Left 4 Dead, and if so, how would you compare the style of that game to Killing Floor?

AW: I love L4D! There, I admitted it. But the games are really two different beasts. L4D shows all Valve’s attention to detail and polish, as you’d expect. As you’ll see, we like attention to detail and polish too. L4D gives you these insane rushes of hordes, mad killing sprees, mixed with some creeping around to the next location. Versus is great fun with the right bunch of guys. The most obvious comparison though is with the new Survival mode. And the difference is very simple between the games there. L4D is about mad rushes, hordes charging at you, live as long as you can. KF is more variable in pace, much darker, creepier. So long as you think about it, you can buy yourself moments to breath, recover – but there is a sense of dread always there. Lots of yelling of “Fleshpound! Fleshpound!” going on in the office ?

DF: Having only played L4D a little, the biggest difference I’ve seen is that it only takes a few zeds to scare the crap out of you in Killing Floor. Often you hear things creeping about around you, but you can’t see them. This is particularly true for the Crawler, which only stands a couple of feet off the ground. Although they are not very deadly, they are a terrible bother if they get too close. Since they blend into the hordes and some environments very well, you often frantically look around for them when you hear them. This is more directly true for the Stalker due to her cloaking ability. This diversity in the zeds that are after you makes the game play out entirely differently.

DN: I tried L4D when it first came out and I’ll actually be getting it soon. I didn’t want to get it while working on KF else I’d never get anything done. Comparing the two games is about as productive as a Romero vs Russo debate. There’s absolutely no reason why you can’t enjoy them both. While there are similarities, the two games each have their own unique aspects to set them apart. The biggest difference I’ve noticed in KF is that things can go south very quickly. Once that happens you don’t quickly forget and that is what instills that sense of dread knowing that one second you could be turning Clots into pulp and the next you might be taking a tour of their digestive system; all depending on your strategy as a player and a team.

ML: I would say simply that they should not be compared. Comparing Killing Floor with Left 4 Dead would be like comparing James Bond’s Lotus Esprit to the latest racing car, it shouldn’t be done. They are two separate products and great at what they are intended to be. Killing Floor is all about atmosphere, tension and great cooperative fights against hordes of Specimens that would like nothing better than to rip you to shreds.

GT: Killing Floor started out as a mod for Unreal Tournament. What’s it like going from a mod to a retail release? What are some of the challenges your team has had to overcome along the way?

AW: Didn’t you ask us this question 3 years ago ? (Note: It’s quite likely! – Editor) The single biggest challenge (for me) isn’t technical. It is the one about how do you maintain all that is really good about the mod, not lose any of that – and yet still enhance it dramatically. And that was helped by the fact that the core gameplay in the mod was truly great. Mind you, that is what caught our eye in the first place.

DN: The transition was a good challenge. Given the differences and difficulty between working on a mod and a retail game can be great, years of working on, releasing and maintaining that mod can introduce you to the type of work environment required to participate in a retail production. The biggest challenge is shifting gears. You may have several tasks to complete in a few months with a mod. With a commercial title those tasks may double, you have significantly less time to accomplish them, and the production quality has to be superb. For the players that have asked why they should get the retail game when the mod is free, this effort will be clear once they get their hands on it.

ML: Personally for me, its a great experience. The step up from mod development to working on a commercial game is quite huge, but very rewarding. Working alongside the Tripwire team was great and it is quite unbelievable how much your work will improve just by working commercially. The largest challenge for me personally was simply management and organization, never before was it so important to get work done right and in time.

GT: As a mod team, how did you reach the decision to go to a retail release, and how did you team up with Tripwire Interactive? Was there ever a time when you thought that you might not find a publisher?

AQ: I think it might be better to say “was there ever a time when you thought that you *might* find a publisher?” And the answer would be: no. Killing Floor started as an art project for me, and evolved from that into a fun little game after almost four years of sweat and blood and trial and error. Ironically, there was a point a few years back when Tripwire approached us about porting to RO, and I remember my response being “sure!” followed by doing nothing. Roll on 2008 though, and things were looking a lot different for KF. UT2k4 was pretty much dead, and the community was dwindling. So there was probably a bit of “crawling back” that happened when I approached them a second time, and discussed porting (and later, the game deal). I guess if you look at it another way, the time between KF’s first talk with Tripwire, and the game deal were necessary to get the mod to a point where its qualities stood out enough to warrant being picked up for retail.

DN: I’ve contributed to every version of KF since it’s been a UT2004 mod. I’ve stuck with it for that long, I didn’t see any reason why I should stop now. The decision to turn KF into a retail game was a great one. As a mod, KF’s exposure was really limited by the number of players that owned UT2004, a competitive arena FPS, that got involved in the online community, were proactive in their search for mods, and enjoyed cooperative and/or horror survival games. There’s a lot of forks in that road on the way to discovering a mod like KF. Becoming a standalone game was an excellent decision as it greatly expands the potential audience that KF can be exposed to by eliminating several prerequisites.

I never considered the possibility of not finding a venue to publish the game on. While there’s still a good demand for physical media, digital distribution has proven to be very attractive for both players and developers and that industry has developed quite well over the past several years.

GT: What’s one thing our readers might not know about Killing Floor that you think they should?

AW: The Killing Floor mod was first released back in 2005.

AQ: The lead developer of the original mod is super sexy and still single. He bathes regularly.

DN: You’ll be missing out on a lot of cool stuff if you stick with the mod. Get the game. Take it from someone that’s played it for four years, it’s worth it.

GT: When can we expect to see Killing Floor on Steam? Do you plan a release to retail stores as well?

AW: On pre-sale right now. Scheduled to be available to play May 14th. And yes, in various discussions on a retail release for North America and Europe. And Japan, too.

GT: Thanks for taking the time to speak with us! Is there any parting thought you’d like to share with our readers?

AW: Killing Floor isn’t Left 4 Dead. You can buy BOTH of them and enjoy them both. They are different games. And we said “recession-friendly pricing” – and now you know we meant it!

AQ: Environments in a horror game should ooze with atmosphere.

DN: Looking forward to wiping out some specimens with everyone on the 14th. Get Killing Floor and join the fight, I could always use the help.

ML: Killing Floor is simply a fantastic game, with good, rounded core game play built and tested for over four years as a mod and later tweaked and perfected by a commercial studio. I don’t think it can get much better!

We’d like to thank the Killing Floor team for taking the time to talk with us. If you’re interested in checking out Killing Floor, it’s slated for release on May 14th via Steam. With a retail price of just $19.99 (and a pre-order price of $14.99), it’s definitely priced right. You can get more info by visiting the Killing Floor Steam site, or by visiting their official site.

This year, one of those bands is up-and coming British rockers Pint Shot Riot. Recently, we were afforded the opportunity to sit down and chat with the band, specifically bass player Baby Dave. We chatted about how they got involved with EA Games, and about what kind of gamers they are as well.

Gaming Today: To get us started, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and the other members of Pint Shot Riot?

Pint Shot Riot: We are a 4 piece British rock and roll band and we love making music and playing music together. We just try to write songs that come from the heart and mean something to us.

GT: How did you first become involved with EA Games? How do you feel about having your music placed in the Sims 3 and Fight Night? Do you feel these titles expose you to the type of people that might enjoy your music?

PSR:E.A and our publishers Artwerk were scouting U.K for some fresh artists when our name came up, we met, got on and the rest is history! We feel very happy about being in their games! Obviously, we knew all about what they do and it was awesome to be asked to be part of it. All kinds of people will be buying those games so we would hope to reach people who will like it and also some people who might not of found us otherwise.

You can find the rest of the interview after the break.

GT:: Speaking of games, do you find much time for gaming yourselves? What sort of games do you prefer?

PSR: When we play together, it has to be something competitive and either sporty, violent or both! We’ve been playing Streetfighter 4 and NHL ’09 recently and me and mini have been rocking guitar hero world tour.

GT: If you had to identify each of your band members as a character in a game, which game characters would you be?

PSR: Interesting question! Mini has just grown a big blonde moustache, as you do, so he’s Hulk Hogan! Rocket can be the Rock then I guess, staying on a legends of Wrestlemania theme. Rob is a natural born Warluigi I reckon and I’ll be Niko off of GTA4.

GT: Since you’re going to be in the Sims 3, does that mean you’ll have to sing in Simlish? (Simlish is the language spoken by the characters in the Sims)

PSR: Erm, I think that would be going one step too far! Maybe we could, but only if we can dress as our game characters.

GT: Are there any plans for you to have your music included in any of the rhythm-based games that are so popular these days, such as Rock Band or Guitar Hero? If so, would it be for a future game, or as DLC for a current game?

PSR: We haven’t discussed it at this point but we would love to in the future. It must be an odd feeling to play your own song that way.

GT: What bands or artists would you say were the biggest influence on your band’s style and sound?

PSR: I think there is an amazing history of British bands stretching from the Beatles, through the Clash, the Sex Pistols and the Specials and onto Oasis, Blur right up to today. That is something which has always inspired us.

GT: Obviously, you’re a British band. How much exposure have you received in the United States? Do you have any plans to visit the United States, perhaps on a tour?

PSR: We’ve had some exposure, with a few radio plays and things but we are still working hard in England. We are hoping to visit the States and tour as soon as we can though

GT: We’ve heard that you’re currently in the studio working on a debut album. Can you give us an idea of what we can expect from this album?

PSR: It’s hard to say as we’re so close to it but it definitely is the best work we’ve ever done together and we’re feeling very happy with the results. We all came up with the best we can and the songs have come together amazingly. We’re really looking forward to letting people hear it when it is completed.

GT: Thanks for taking the time to speak with us. Is there any parting thought you’d like to share with our readers?

PSR: Keep an ear out for Pint Shot Riot, peace, love and gaming. Baby Dave

We’re grateful to the band for taking the time to speak with us. Keep an ear out for their music in the Sims 3 and Fight Night from EA Games. If you want to learn more about the band, you can check out Pint Shot Riot’s official website here.

Stardock released its new distribution platform, Impulse, just a few weeks ago and I’ve already found myself using it all the time. Whether it’s the dock or the store of any of the other features it sports at this early stage, there’s a lot to Impulse, and I was interested in finding out more about the platform’s future.

In the games space, it feels like nothing more than a competitor to Steam, but Stardock CEO Brad Wardell explained that there’s much, much more that they have planned. Whether that’s the ability to easily jump into a game with friends or download all of your software and games at the click of a button, Stardock certainly has lofty hopes for Impulse. Brad shared with me his ideal scenario for what Impulse will ultimately be capable of, and it sounds phenomenal — I’m very excited to see where things go from here.

You can read the full interview after the break.

Gaming Today: First off, I’d like to thank you in advance for the future headaches I will suffer in trying to decide whether to buy a game from Impulse or Steam.

Brad Wardell: One nice thing about having multiple platforms available is that these platforms will be forced to be more consumer friendly simply because consumers have choices.

GT: That seems like a good place to start — you’ve said in the past that Impulse isn’t trying to replace Steam, but there does seem to be a significant overlap. Right now, how does Impulse differ from Steam in the games space?

BW: At the start, there is considerable overlap.  To use an analogy, in the early days of the PC, people bought Word Perfect and it was good. When Office started to gain popularity, there were a lot of comparisons between Word Perfect and Word. Over time, however, people began looking at Office as a whole rather than as a Word Perfect vs. Word comparison.

Steam and Impulse, right now, on the games side both let people purchase games and download and update them. But as time goes on, the two will diverge more and more based on the different concepts they have.  Impulse is designed less to be a store/download service and more like a universal platform for the PC.  As gamers, we all have a long list of things that PCs in general and Windows in particular need to address such as multiplayer matchmaking, NAT negotiation, universal rankings, standardized support, support for modders, etc.

One of the reasons why we lose a lot of gamers to consoles is that consoles are so much easier to deal with. The goal with Impulse is to do that with the PC.

GT: Half-Life 2 is what initially got Steam installed on many computers. While you’re pushing Impulse with things like The Political Machine 2008 and Sins of a Solar Empire, those are fairly niche games. Are you expecting exclusive-to-Impulse games (like Demigod) and software to be the driving force behind getting Impulse on people’s machines, or are you only looking at the install base in the long term?

BW: I don’t know if you could call Sins of a Solar Empire a niche game given it’s been in the top 10 best selling PC games all year – despite massive digital sales which aren’t counted in those charts. But that aside, Impulse has a very different distribution model than Steam. With Impulse, starting with Phase 2 (in August) people will be able to sign up to be affiliates. Any user who installs and creates an Impulse account from an affiliate gets 15 percent of the gross revenue on any sales.  For example, you could have a FileFront Impulse.  If someone downloads and installs FileFront Impulse and then buys say Corel Draw X4 for $500, FileFront would get $75 off that sale – even if the sale took place a year from now. We’ve already gotten a significant queue of sites that want to sign on to this program.

Moreover, Impulse can also be used as a company’s native store. We have a number of software developers evaluating Impulse to be their default store since it’s less expensive to use Impulse than a typical eCommerce solution.

Additionally, Stardock’s non-game programs have millions of users already.  Once these users migrate to Impulse in the coming months, we’ll have a few million Impulse users just from that.

GT: What have you learned from Steam in its years on the market that played into the design of Impulse?

BW: Steam has delivered a lot of innovative concepts into the industry.  But in terms of designing Impulse, most of our work came from what we had done on Stardock Central which precedes Steam.  What Steam really brought to the table is the importance of third-party content.  When we made Stardock Central, we didn’t really encourage third-parties to put their titles on it because, as the name implied, it was meant for our programs.

GT: Are there any plans to flesh out the back catalogs of companies that distribute their games through Impulse, or will we only be seeing new games going forward?

BW: To us, building up back catalogs is extremely important.  We are actually favoring back catalog titles initially while we build up our installed base.  There’s a lot of challenge in getting older titles because the various publishing agreements from the time didn’t contemplate digital distribution and digital distribution doesn’t yet generate enough sales to justify someone doing a legal review of some of those older agreements.  But as digital distribution grows, I think you’ll see all of the digital distributors get stronger back catalogs.  Me, I’d like to see Total Annihilation on Impulse or Steam or anywhere for that matter.

GT: Impulse sports a store where you can buy games and software, community features where you can blog — is there anything we won’t see Stardock try to include? Saying you’d like to distribute Firefox makes me think we won’t be seeing an integrated web browser, but where exactly do you draw the line between providing useful features and doing too much?

BW: There’s a lot of features we won’t touch because we don’t want Impulse to feel bloated. Right now, a lot of the early feedback has been so positive because Impulse is so fast and sleek.  It’s pretty well known that I’m not in favor of programs that sit in the system tray. If a program isn’t doing something useful, it shouldn’t be using up my memory.  But for users who want auto-updates and notifications, we could, for example, build a notification app but it would be a separate applications.  So with Impulse, what you’re more likely to see are additional optional component programs that people can use. But Impulse itself we want to keep as streamlined as we can.

GT: You’ve been an outspoken individual on the subject of piracy. Did piracy play any role in the way Impulse was designed?

BW: Very much so.  One of the big goals we have for Impulse is to try to win the industry over to our SSD technology (Secure Software Delivery).  Essentially the idea is that a user downloads a .Impulse file which can only be installed by Impulse. But once installed, it’s yours.  It provides good and proven intellectual property protection but allows our customers to play their game or use their software wherever without worrying about being online or what have you.

Users of Stardock programs hence don’t have to mess with annoying copy protection. We know that users could pirate our stuff if they wanted, so the goal is to reward them for buying our software legitimately. That said, Impulse itself will support whatever copy protection the publisher insists on. But we are hoping that we can continue to demonstrate the benefits of SSD.

GT: Are you playing any games right now? What are you most looking forward to playing?

BW: Spore is certainly the game I’m most excited about.  I’ve been a Will Wright fan since I was in college when I did a..ahem, “report” for IE102 on “urban planning” using Simcity’s city print outs as my “data”.  I even loved Simearth.  And with Soren Johnson involved, you know the game’s going to be insanely good.

GT: With the launch out of the way, what’s the next major milestone for Impulse in your eyes?

BW: The big milestone coming up is Phase 2.  There’s going to be some announcements at the end of August that I think will be of great interest to the game industry.  With Phase 2, we will have the universal player rankings in, unified match making system in, ImpulseReactor should be released and MyImpulse should be ready for beta which will let developers and modders begin to submit their games, mods, applications, etc. to Impulse directly.

GT: What’s your perfect-world scenario for what Impulse will ultimately be capable of?

BW: My dream for Impulse works something like this:

I get a new computer, I type in my Impulse account and it retrieves all the programs I have associated with my account – freeware, registered shareware, games, applications, anti-virus, etc. and begins installing them while I go out to lunch.

Then, I come back and look for a game to play, Impulse looks through my entire library of games and displays what games have available openings in them with ones with friends or kindreds (friends of friends) in them.  I also take a peek at my overall ranking as well as my ranking in say Total Annihilation 2 or whatever I’m playing at the time.

When done playing games, I’ll load up Corel Photopaint and load up a skin I was working on that’s stored on my free virtual drive from within Corel. I won’t care where my files are physically located, just that I always have access to them and that they’re safe and secure.

Then, I will be able to go and check out what games my friends are using, see what postings are going on and know if my hardware is adequate for any particular game I want to buy. And if I do have some problem with something I buy, I can quickly and easily get a refund with no hassles.

–

I just want to think Brad for taking the time to talk to us. We’ll have more coverage on Impulse in the coming weeks and months, particularly as Phase 2 nears its release.

Coming this Fall to a PC near you is Akella’s newest RPG/strategy title Disciples III: Renaissance. This is the third installment in the popular Disciples series and builds on the successes of the first two games by introducing a host of new features as well as the same style of gameplay that made the previous titles popular. This will be the first time in the series that the gloomy world of Disciples will be rendered in full 3D by using the Virtual Dream engine which will in turn allow players to experience this realm as it should be.

As a Lord of one of the fantastical races of Nevendaar, players must fight to restore their deity’s rule over the world by choosing one of three playable races: the Empire, the Elven Alliance and the notorious Legion of the Damned – each with its own unique units and city design. Advances have also been made in the gameplay which will allow increased fluidity in multiplayer games and less downtime when playing alone, while a new upgrade system allows the player to assign attributes to their leaders. The RPG inventory system in Disciples III has been tweaked and now includes player stats and abilities along with visual representation of character’s equipped armor, weapons and artifacts.

Recently, we were given the opportunity to ask Marina Vashurina from .dat, the developers behind Disciples III, to tell our readers a bit more about the third installment in this popular RPG franchise, and explain to us what makes Disciples III different from the other RPGs that seem to have oversaturatting the market lately.

Gaming Today: Please introduce yourself to our readers and tell them a little bit about Disciples III: Renaissance.

Marina Vashurina: Hi there! I’m Marina Vashurina, PR-manager with .dat. I’m really excited to work on this legendary world and make it even more influential and breath-taking. The third installment in the prominent series returns us to Nevendaar torn apart with repetitive wars and ongoing unrest arisen from the factions’ inability to accept former foes as partners or at least neutral races. The game will feature three playable races: the Empire, the Legions of the Damned, and the Elven Alliance. As a Lord of a race you’ll choose you’ll need to fight hard to restore your deity’s rule over the world. You’ll see many twists and surprises in the mainline campaigns, though.

GT: How is Disciples III different from the previous installment? Is this a direct sequel or a completely new adventure?

MV: I can’t actually say that you’ll refer to the previous parts with every step you take. However you can find some roots and backdrop elements that come over from the previous installments. Besides some obvious refresh of the game artwork, what distinguishes this sequel from the previous ones is a focus on individual characters. Our story will be personal experience-driven with main characters playing a key role. They will travel the world of Nevendaar and we’ll be able to feel what they feel. There’ll be several characters of this type in Disciples III: Renaissance – available in either of the game campaigns. And the main, core character is Angel Innoel. But no more details can be unveiled now.

GT: The Disciples franchise is highly popular with RPG fans and we have heard that while there will be a host of new features – the same style of gameplay that made the previous titles popular will not have changed. What steps did you take to maintain the same level of familiarity while still developing a new gaming experience?

MV: As new features are concerned, the most obvious ones relate to the game’s transition to full 3D. It’s important to note though that battles still keep their dynamics and simplicity of perception. Also, the gamer will be able to make use of what used to be Rodplanters (they are called Land Guardian now) not only as a tool to expand the territory of the race’s influence on the map but also as individual units with their own peculiarities and upgrade system. Land Guardians are a kind of forts that can be used in tactical and strategic planning.

The Hero’s level-up system has also been changed. We’ve introduced static parameters that are pending the gamer’s action and affect the character’s capabilities.

Role-play system has also been upgraded. As for battles, we are striving to make them look more like tactical strategy, not card duels. Tactical strategy in which thinking is highly appreciated. We’ve also added some new resources – stones and miro (god favor). We’ve balanced economics and want to avoid cases when some resources are obviously abundant while others are missing. Magic plays a big role in Disciples III: Renaissance. Besides some magic effects on the global map, potions, race differences and other features Disciples fans are so much fond of, we’ve introduced cards and runes. Cards are unique spells on the global map that are impossible to learn while you’re in the Capital; however you can find them while traveling the land (on the map) or gain them (as a victory award). Runes are objects meant to help you during the combat. Just like cards, they can be found on the global map; they can also be obtained through magic spells, though. We try to be more RPG-oriented once you’re out of arena and even more strategy-oriented once you’re inside.

There will also be some special zones introduced in the game. While inside, a character receives some additional combat bonuses.

These and many other innovations introduced in the game provide a wide platform to experiment with the character’s development options.

GT: Thanks to the Virtual Dream Engine, this will be the first time a Disciples game will be rendered in 3D. Could you please tell us a little bit about working with the Virtual Dream Engine?

MV: The Virtual Dream Engine was originally created for general purposes, and it’s a module system that is expandable which is its obvious merit. The engine supports all modern technologies that are necessary to develop new-gen games.

GT: As a Lord of one of the fantastical races of Nevendaar, players must fight to restore their deity’s rule over the world by choosing one of three playable races: the Empire, the Elven Alliance and the notorious Legion of the Damned. What sort of interesting plot twists or surprises have the writers come up with for this?

MV: To go into detail here is to spoil the effect these very twists will make on the gamer once Disciples III is released. This installment is more individual-oriented. What people worry about, which objectives they have and the way they solve issues…their path to self-identification. As the game ships we’ll see whether we succeeded or not.

GT: What can you tell us about the multiplayer aspect of Disciples III?

MV: I must say we’ll try to keep all the great achievements of the multiplayer made in the previous parts. To build upon these features we are introducing huge maps which will house a wide variety of buildings, artifacts, monster dungeons and other assets.

GT: Multiplayer is extremely popular with gamers in this day and age. Will the single player, who is uninterested in the multiplayer area of Disciples III, still be interested in the game?

MV: For sure! Multiplayer differs from single-player in, actually, a direct foe the gamer has to face off with. In multiplayer he/she fights real people while single campaigns offer you to fight your PC. The single-player mode has a thoroughly developed storyline. We are proud of the storyline made so far that retains and builds upon the Disciples style.

The final version will have three campaigns, one per each race. Every campaign is the race’s view of the situation with its own tasks and main goals. Every following campaign continues the told and untold story described in the previous one, though. However, we’re not that cold-hearted to make you play through all the campaigns in pursuit of your favorite race’s campaign. However, we’ll make sure the player knows whether he “reads the game book” from the very beginning or whether he/she is closer to the end.

GT: The inventory system has been changed around a bit and will include player stats and abilities this time around. What else has been changed with the inventory system?

MV: The inventory system has been enlarged to be able to include more items (to be put in inventory slots). The number of slots has also increased. We’ve introduced a new possibility (which is more characteristic of RPGs) – the leader’s outfits affect the hero’s look on the map or arena. All units will be able to use a common inventory system. There’ll be some restrictions though. For example, you’ve got to gain enough intellect to make use of a magical artifact or rune.

GT: RPGs are one of the most popular forms of video games on the market. What will make Disciples III stand out amongst the vast selection of role-playing games?

MV: Firstly, that’s the unique setting of the Disciples world – traditions, compelling gameplay and modern standards of quality. I would say that Disciples III stands out among other strategies because of this obvious focus on RPG elements. The key difference is the character’s level-up system. The player can’t actually afford to lose any squad he/she invested much time and energy in. All the battles follow a “we can’t lose a unit” principle and that’s what makes Disciples quite different from the others in the row. That’s why it affects the gameplay so much.

GT: What can you tell us about the artistic process? Where did your artists and developers draw their inspiration from?

MV: Our designers worked really hard. They made over 150 character models and about 170 models of buildings and other objects. Inspiration source…well, first of all, these are works by Patrick Lambert, previous parts of the Disciples series, good artists’ works that fit the definition “gothic” and “somber”. Gloomy and spine-chilling music is something that definitely contributes to and builds upon this atmosphere.

As for graphics, the designers we have to commend first. These are not only artists but also scriptwriters, guys who make textures, animations – those elements that are actually viewed by consumers as the final version ships. So that’s the whole team that’s involved.

GT: How long has Disciples III been in production, and when can we expect it to be ready for retail?

MV: Our team has been developing Disciples III: Renaissance for about 2.5 years. The wait is almost over. The game is scheduled for Q3 this year.

GT: Mariana, thank you very much for your time. It is always a pleasure speaking with anyone involved with Akella. Before we close, is there anything else you would like for our readers to know about Disciples III: Renaissance?

MV: Thanks a lot for your patience as the game has being cooking for quite a while already. The wait is almost over and we really appreciate all the support we receive from the game fans.

Sounds like Disciples III is going to be everything fans have come to expect from the franchise and more. We here at Gaming Today look forward to watching the progression of the game and once again interacting with the folks over at Akella in the future. They really are good people.

As a lovely parting gift, Marina sent us over some new screenshots of the game, which I have posted below. I must say that the more I look at them, the more impatient I become for Disciples III to arrive. If you would like to find out more about Akella and Disciples III, Akella has totally revamped their English website and it is pretty snazzy and full of cool content. You can view it here, and as always, you can also look over our previous posts for more information.

GT: About the game, first and foremost, how are you pushing the limits and covered territory of the “shooter” genre?

There are several things that set The Club apart from typical shooters:

• We’ve got eight varied characters to choose from. Normally, you’d have one single character to play with, so this is kind of cool. It’s like Street Fighter or Virtua Fighter in that sense.
• The combo system is a key game mechanic, and it means that there’s potential for increasing your best scores every single play through. It’s a tough one to explain on paper, so make sure you check out the demo, but imagine a shooter that gives you the replayability of the crash mode in Burnout or trying to find the perfect skating line in Tony Hawk.
• It’s easy to jump to your favorite sections of the game. We didn’t want people to be forced to play for ages to get to their favorite bits, so we’ve designed it with this in mind. Each section of gameplay lasts for about 2 or 3 minutes, but it’s the most intense, fun and breathless 3 minutes of gameplay you’ll have experienced!
• It’s not about hiding behind blocks or cover, but is fully about sprinting through levels and taking out enemies in stylish and cool ways. This is true run and gun gameplay; there’s no stealth or need to be cautious. We want players to feel like they’re Rambo as they charge through levels!

Those are the four main pillars of the game which really set The Club apart from other 3rd person shooters. The more you play the more you’ll find what sets it apart.

GT: What would you say are the biggest influences that went into The Club?

People have tried to label The Club and they always try to say what it’s like. At some recent presentations of the game I heard comparisons to all sorts of games – all of which were completely different when put down next to each other! Prime examples are Tony Hawk, Doom (speed runs in particular), Project Gotham Racing, and Virtua Cop! It’s crazy! I would say that our main influences came from wanting to create a game which people found accessible, but also one that was driven by gameplay.

We had a game mechanic that was fun to play from a very early stage and it was through working with SEGA that we have been able to build The Club into what it is today. Originally the game was based around shooting pop-up targets, but since then it’s evolved greatly. However, what this does show was that we had the gameplay right from the very beginning and that has remained at the forefront ever since then.

GT: Are there any environments around the world which really inspired your team to create terrain or areas of gameplay?

The members of The Club are rich, powerful, elite people who have access to all kinds of places to hold the tournaments. So, with this in mind we racked our brains to come up with locations that we thought they might have access to: a disused island prison similar to Alcatraz? Yup, we’ll have that. A massive English manor-house? Yup, got one of those. How about a beautiful old cruise ship that’s run aground? Sure thing, this is The Club after all.

Obviously, we had some inspirations for where to base these on, (eg Alcatraz), but we also had the brilliant John Wallin to work with and he came up with some fantastic concept art for the environments. Look him up, he’s a man of many talents and as been involved in some amazing projects.

GT: How did you go about developing the characters for the game?

We were eager to keep the characters interesting and unique right off the bat. We used quite an unusual design process for this, in that we drafted in an author to come up with several character bios first. These were just simple paragraphs of text which described the character idea and motivations in a bite-size snippet.

Then our in-house concept artists went to work! We had some “personality concepts” made up from the original bios. These were aimed to really show what was unique/likable about this particular character… for example Dragov was originally shown swinging a giant wrecking ball above his head! The second concept art we made up was the in-game placement… i.e. the character drawn in the style of The Club using the correct proportions. This was what was going to be our final design.

The problem was that we had 15 characters at the start, but we needed to get down to 8. We solved this by having a huge vote between Bizarre and SEGA… each staffer got to pick one character they liked the most, and one they liked the least. At that point we actually did something else unusual… we cut out the middle votes and kept both the strongly liked and strongly disliked characters. Our intention was to get opinions polarized on which characters were best – we didn’t want any boring designs in there.

GT: Were there any cliché characters or traits that you wanted to avoid, or did you really want to work with and push the different types of people that are in “The Club?”

We wanted to push different character types and not just have your stereotypical characters that we’ve seen in a million video games before.

GT: Are there any moments which you just had everything come together for creating any elements of the game?

There were definitely a few moments, like when you see people “get” the combo system for the first time and they’re like “oh, so you could do a death roll and combo it with a head shot on that enemy and then look for a ricochet to take out the next enemy, but should I go for the multi-kill on the next two bad guys by shooting the gas tank, or will I get more points for taking them out individually?” Their eyes light up and all of a sudden they are possibilities everywhere in levels.
Man, when we first gave the SEGA QA team the code to test we were confident that they wouldn’t even come close to touching our high scores – we’d designed the game after all! – but then all of a sudden they were posting mad scores and doing stuff that we hadn’t even contemplated. That really upped the competitiveness in the studio I can tell you.

Other moments included when we had finalized the big show stopper moment on the prison environment on a level called ‘Escape from New Haven’ – when we first showed it to SEGA they were like “oooooooooh, that’s really good!”.

GT: Were there any ideas that you came across, alternate storylines or ways of playing the game, for example, that you just had to scrap because it went in a completely different direction?

You’ll find that in any game development there comes a time when you have to stop adding stuff to the game and get it finished. We’re very happy with everything that we’ve achieved with The Club, but if you gave us more time of course we’d find something else to put in! Ask any developer and they’ll tell you the same story!

GT: Has there been anything that has not been possible because of constraints or limitations on time or budget?

Absolutely not. We’ve had the right support and the right relationship with SEGA.

GT: Was violence a factor in creating the game? Were there any bloody moments which, in the wake of quite a bit of anti-violent-video-game sentiments, you decided against?

We never set out to make a gratuitous violent game and when you play it you will see that for yourselves. I would point out that the violence in The Club stems from the story and not the gameplay. Like I said earlier we had fun originally shooting cardboard targets, but you just can’t include that in a triple A game and keep it intense!

GT: What has worked the best for heightening the shooter experience in The Club?

The combo system without a doubt. When you’re on a 20+ combo and the combo meter is racing down, you’re under enormous pressure to sprint to find the next bad guy in time to stop your combo from bleeding out. It’s an intense, yet rewarding experience that’ll have your heart racing.

GT: Anything you want to add about the game that blows your mind?

The sheer competitiveness of the game still amazes me. We get SEGA emailing us with their new high scores and that prompts everyone in the studio to jump back on the game to prove who’s the daddy. Played in the right way, The Club is pure gaming magic.

These days, great music and video games seem to go hand in hand. There are of course the more obvious examples like the soundtracks for the Guitar Hero games and Rock Band, but in recent years it seems many sports titles have provided an opportunity for lesser-known bands to gain a fresh audience. One such band is Jupiter One.

If you’ve played an EA sports title in the past few months, odds are you’ve heard at least one of their songs. Named after a supposedly ill-fated spaceship from the Lost in Space TV show, this New York-based band has made a name for themselves with their energetic indie style. Their tracks appeared in a hat trick of popular games in the past few months, including Madden 08, FIFA 08, and NHL 08. Now that Burnout Paradise will also be including one of their songs, we thought we’d ask them a few questions about what it’s like to have their music served up with video games.

GT: Your bio says you used to play instrumental shows with kung fu flicks playing behind you. How did you come up with that idea? Is there a different sort of energy at your shows now that you’ve incorporated lyrics?

There were, I think, three visual artists that synced up images to tracks that we created and played behind us. This was so the images and music would match. Kung fu stuff was just one of the ideas that played on the screen. Grandaddy, Flaming Lips and many more have done interesting films to play along with. Now that we have lyrics, I think it might take more thought to create the films to play. Or less. Who knows. Maybe we should call up those girls who made them in the first place!

GT: How did Jupiter One end up getting tapped for the Burnout Paradise soundtrack?

Steve Schnur is an avid listener, always searching for new music, and heard our album a few months ago. Lucky for us, he’s also the head Music Supervisor at EA responsible for placing music. Steve loved the album and really gets behind us as songwriters.

GT: For that matter, how did you get tapped for Fifa 08, Madden 08, and NHL 08?

Again, all Steve. He’s a big fan of what we’re doing in music and wanted to bring that to EA. He feels that FIFA, NHL, and Madden are all high quality games that deserve high art. We’re just happy to be one of the bands he feels so strongly about. When you think about it, Steve really took a chance with us. HE would never say that, but these games are widely popular and played by the harshest and most honest critics the world has ever known. TEENAGERS! If you ever want an honest opinion about something, ask a kid. They only say what they feel….it’s great! So take Madden Football, for example. Here’s a game played by millions of people (adults included) and the soundtrack is a huge part. Most of the bands are on Billboard charts or something, but here’s Jupiter One. A new band from New York City that JUST released it’s first album. A LOT of people have no idea who we are, but Steve loved the music and wanted us included. We’ve gotten really great feedback from the gamers, so were happy with the way it all turned out.

GT: Did you have any say in which songs were included in the games? If so, what made you choose those songs?

No. EA has a really great team of music supervisors that, after meeting us, seeing us live, and hearing the album, really handle the exclusive selection of all music for the games on their own. We got a chance to meet the whole team after our last L.A. show and it’s cool to see how passionate they are about music. They put a lot of care into what the EA gamers would like to hear.

GT: Do you think having your music in games exposes many more people to your music that might not otherwise learn about you?

Absolutely. Just go to our “Countdown” Music Video on YouTube! You’ll see that most every comment on there is from a Madden ‘08 fan….haha. It’s crazy!

GT: Other than extra exposure, are there any added perks to having your music in games?

Yes. Now our friends from back home FINALLY think we’re cool…haha. We could’ve sold out Madison Square Garden for a week straight, but that wouldn’t matter to them. Now that our songs are in Madden and FIFA??? NOW they’re impressed….

GT: Are you guys big gamers yourselves? What do you play during your downtime?

We do like to play on occasion, but an 8 year old could humiliate us. We just mess around on FIFA and Madden…and yes…just because we’re on those

GT: Any future projects in the works already?

With EA, we have this Burnout Paradise game coming out, but as far as the band is concerned…We’re about to play our first show of of the year in NYC at Bowery Ballroom and then head out on the road again in February. We’ve got A LOT more music to record so we’ll be doing that in between touring. We love the road and playing for new faces, so that’s what 2008 is gonna be about.

If you’d like to hear a little something from Jupiter One, you should check out Fire Away, their track from the Burnout Paradise soundtrack. You can download it from FileFront right here.

GT: First off, can you explain to me what sort of changes you’ll be putting into X-Play with the overall format?

The biggest change is that we’re going to be far more topical, going to a show that tapes every single day and that airs every single night of the week. In the past, we’ve kind of been hampered by the fact that we pre-tape stuff, but now we’re going to be able to get to things in a much more timely manner. which also gives us the opportunity to have a lot more hands-on demos which we’re really excited about, We’re getting people to show off their games far in advance of anything we’ve done in the past.

The other thing is we’re expanding. We’ve always done funny reviews and previews, but we’re going to be covering pretty much everything that goes on in the world of video game. We want to be there to cover that, so we’re going to be getting out there, traveling a lot more to the developers to bring people coverage beyond just reviews.

GT: So it’s kind of going to be more like the recent specials you’ve done with games like Mass Effect and Call of Duty 4?

Exactly, that’s a great example of the direction we’re going — lots more one-on-one stuff. We’re going to be able to take viewers out there and get out in the field a lot more.

GT: Are there going to be any basic changes to the look of the show? Is the set going to be revamped?

Absolutely. We’re going to unveil a brand new set which is really awesome and brand new graphics for the show. We’re really ramping up the re-launch. It’s going to be great!

I don’t know if you saw the press release, but Kristin Holt is also going to be folded in. We’re going to feature her every single week with new strategy guides that you’ve seen in the form of “Cheat!” these past years on G4. We’re really excited to have Kristin be a part of the show now.

GT: The press release said segments like “Cheat!,”"The MMO Report,” and such were going to be included now. How often are you planning to run those segments?

We will definitely have new content every single day. Once you get into a rhythm, a couple days a week you’ll have your “Cheat!” day; a couple days a week you’ll have an “MMO Report” day. On certain days of the week, you’ll get those new pieces that will now be a part of the show.

GT: Is all that still going to leave room for the usual game reviews?

Absolutely. Fans have come to enjoy the brutally honest video game reviews, and that’s still the heart of the show. We’ve talked to a few fans out there who asked, “Is X-Play still going to be fun?” We’re absolutely still going to be fun. Humor and comedy are still a big part of the show. I don’t know if you saw the Super Mario one hour special, with the trailer for “Super Mario Massacre” — we’re going to have comedy pieces, but they’ll be much bigger-budget and highly-produced comedy packages.

GT: Are you going to continue to do the occasional special episode, like another musical perhaps [pictured left]?

We will definitely still be doing special episodes. Absolutely.

GT: Well, anything else you’d like to add?

We’re pretty excited. We’re going to be making some more announcements soon. We’re getting really excited about being able to bring new stuff every day. If they have screenshots, if they have trailers, if they have new stuff to unveil, we’re going to be available to react to things in a far more timely manner now. Then we can give it to the fans on a daily basis instead of them having to wonder, “When was this episode taped?” So we’re really excited about that.

GT: Well, good luck with all those changes and everything. I’m looking forward to seeing what you guys come up with.

We all know Team Awesome, or at the very least, of their work. And if you don’t, shame on you. Team Awesome is the group behind the excellent Contra and Punch-Out!! trailers which you’ve undoubtedly seen around the ‘net. I recently had a chance to speak with Team Awesome about everything from what inspired them to Big League Chew.

Seriously.

First off, there’s a question on the mind of every Team Awesome fan out there: How many years of grueling acting school did the entirety of Team Awesome attend before becoming so awesome?

We’d like to take the time to thank our teachers, Uta Hagen, Stella Adler and Constantin Stanislavski…ok, so those aren’t our teachers, but they’re the most famous ones we know. All of us have done some acting in the past, but Natasha is the only bona fide actor. Oddly enough, she gets the least amount of screen time. That’s just how we roll.

Schooling was an important aspect for the videos, however. Steve (The Vaj) studied music composition and sound technology, and Andy and Nathan went to school to study filmmaking.

What inspired the ideas for these videos?

Long hours in a dark room, escaping the trappings of an eight year old life, illuminated by the glare of the TV screen.

While video games now are amazingly detailed and graphically superior, there’s something heartwarming and special about those early 8-bit games.

How long did the videos take to produce?

On “Punch-Out!!” we were limited to a month from start to finish, which meant a lot of all-nighters to get what we wanted to get accomplished. We learned how to greenscreen and composite via a crash course that month. For Contra, it took a lot longer, since all of us had trips/lives planned. It did mean that we could shoot actual Tahitian islands to use, though. Generally, the videos shoot over the course of a weekend or two and then take two or three weeks to edit with another week for removing the green screen and compositing shots.

Did Team Awesome form as a result of the Nintendo Short Cuts Showcase Contest? If not, were these ideas brewing before the contest came about?

Yes and no. Team Awesome had formed as a result of us wanting to creatively attack the internet, but until the Short Cut Contest, we didn’t have a focus. Nate had been dying to do a trailer for “Punch-Out!!” since high school, but we never had the time or means or equipment to do it right. When those two elements combined, Team Awesome truly took it current form.

Why Contra and Punch-Out?

When looking at which video games to make trailers for, we looked at a variety of components. The popularity of the game was the first thing to evaluate. How familiar are people with the game? In the 8-bit world though, popular games never relied on novel gameplay or how great the graphics were; these games were based on great characters and great stories. And great characters and great stories are the key in any type of storytelling whether feature films or internet videos. People love “Punch-Out!!” for the same reason that they love Rocky: underdog stories are fun to watch. Contra didn’t have the most well-known characters, but the world of ‘80s action movies was something people were familiar with and we could have fun with that.

Have you been approached to do anything commercially, or do you see this remaining a hobby?

We would love to continue to make these video game trailers. Whether we can quit our jobs to do it commercially is a different story. People all know the potential of the internet, but with no revenue model, it is difficult to figure out how. We created high5city.com to showcase and try to sell something that nobody else has – our particular brand of humor and creative skills. While we have been trying to shop the concept to Nintendo and other game companies, we haven’t had any bites yet. One of the difficult aspects is that we’re using previously developed ideas, characters and stories. With high5city.com we will be doing video game trailers, but we’ll also be creating videos that are completely original ideas.

Is that Big League Chew that the General is chewing during the Contra trailer?

Absolutely. Original flavor. Just like you used to chew in Little League. Big League Chew is one of those things that brings you right back to that childhood time and place, which is basically the goal of the video game trailers too. The overwhelming response to both videos is something along the lines of “Oh my God, I remember playing this when I was ____ years old!” People love reflecting on those precious childhood memories. If we can rejuvenate that feeling of being a kid, then we’re doing what we set out to.

What’s next for Team Awesome?

We’re trying to do so much it’s ridiculous. We’ll be creating more content by making videos that don’t take quite so long to shoot and edit, more along the viral videos you see from other comedy troupes. We can’t give up fake video game trailers though. People are very informative about what they think our next video should be. If you look at the classic games that have great characters and stories, the list gets smaller.

I hate to make this a hard-hitting interview, but I have to ask – how awesome is Team Awesome?

A bunch of people who spend tremendous amounts of time and money working on a trailer for the internet to us is pretty awesome. What we think is really awesome, however, is the tremendous support we’ve gotten from the video game community. Without that audience and their “awesomeness,” who knows if we would’ve continued on.

Thanks so much for your time.

We’ve all been watching as Clive Barker’s Jericho hit stores recently (It’s on Gametap as well). After all, there’s never anything wrong with a quality, horror-based shooter, especially one that bears the legendary name of Clive Barker. But what makes a horror story great? It’s the monsters, of course!

Now, courtesy of the folks over at Codemasters, we’re going to bring you some exclusive artwork showing off the monsters you’ll encounter in Jericho. Not only that, but we’ve included a short Q&A session with Lead Designer Joe Falke. Find out what it’s like working with the visions of Clive Barker firsthand.

You can find more images, and the complete interview after the break.

Gaming Today: What was the aim with the art direction in Jericho?

Joe Falke: First it was really to take inspiration from Clive’s previous body of work, incorporate his specific ideas and sketches, and then work those up. Clive wanted all the monsters in the game to have a self altered look. The environments needed to reflect a parallel dimension and to avoid all the typical time travelling clichés.

But obviously on a project of this size, it goes much further. Visuals are vital in creating a truly atmospheric next-generation horror game. We aimed to create a dark, almost surreal atmosphere in the game. We used desaturated and subtle colours to give a sense of bleakness to the environment and enhance the supernatural and gore elements in the game. We wanted Al-Khali to have a harsh, hyper-realistic and ethereal feel to it, so it would be an oppressive, and of course evil, other world.

GT: Can you describe what is what like working with Clive barker’s visions?

JF: Disturbing at first, but then they grow on you as they take on a life of their own. He invests a lot of stock not only in the heroes, but in the villains. Each one must have a motivation and impetus besides just being “bad” after all, they were once people too!
There are very different time-periods in Al-Khali – how did you go about picking the theme for the art style for each one?

On a practical level we did a lot of research into the architecture of Middle-Eastern cities and how that architecture has changed over time, so we could take the most interesting aspects of those buildings to give our locations a sense of exaggerated realism. With the WW2 time slice, we took a ruined beauty approach, in that it shares an architecture style with our modern Al-Khali, but with even much more destruction. The destruction comes from the war itself and also because of the Nazi occupation and excavations. During the Crusader time slice, we included many domes and Arabic towers, and reflected the industry of the warped crusaders who inhabit this place – we have a lot of big, aggressive structures built directly on old walls and buildings. The Roman period takes on many of the features of classic architecture, like the pillars, vaults and arches but it’s unrefined, and edgier. Governor Vicus ran Al-Khali as a temple to his perverse personal vision of pleasure so the time slice represents a grotesque grandeur – helped by the sinister blood-soaked halls! The Sumerians time slice features the most pristine sections of the game, as this is where it all began.

GT: How do you go about creating some of the monsters you come across? How do you start? What sort of influences go into them?

JF: The monsters really sprang from Clive’s Mind. He passed us a lot of sketches with background information on each monster and boss which we worked to. We really wanted a realistic, visceral feel to our enemies, and with the power of next-generation consoles and PC technology, we were able to invest heavily in the visuals. So while we’re confident you won’t have seen any of the monsters before, many of them fuse ‘real life’ aspects into their bodies and many of the bodily details and textures came from a range of (often extremely gory) source material. We used a lot of photos of some pretty sick (but legal!) stuff and used a lot of horror films too. The project is very close to Clive, and he had ultimate sign off on the project, so if our realised monsters didn’t live up to his expectations, they wouldn’t go in the game. The results, we think, are spectacular and unique, and help make Jericho a unique looking shooter.

First off, thanks to the folks at Codemasters for these…disturbing…images, and thanks to Joe for taking the time to chat with us. Don’t forget to peek at the concept art at the bottom of this post.

If you still haven’t tried out Jericho, you can pick up the demo right here.

Generally speaking, you could say that in the US, the adventure genre is pretty lifeless. Good games in the genre are few and far between, and more and more developers are focusing on RPGs, FPSs, and other genres. On the other hand, Europe is home to many solid adventure games, where series like Runaway thrive.

It’s refreshing to see that, for a change, a developer is making an effort to revive the adventure market in the US. Runaway: The Dream of the Turtle for the Nintendo DS is an attempt to do just that – with an established following in Europe, I was interested in seeing what this PC game could do to reinvigorate adventure games.

Speaking with Cédric Lagarrigue, CEO of Focus Home Interactive – publisher of the game – I learned that Europe went through a similar phase of a dead adventure genre, why the DS was the chosen platform for the game, and discover that a Wii version of the game is in development.

Read the interview after the break.

Gaming Today: Why bring Runaway: The Dream of the Turtle to the DS? If an install base was what you were looking for, PS2 could have been a suitable platform, or if it was a unique way to play that you wanted, the Wii seems like a possibility.

Cédric Lagarrigue: Nintendo’s handheld console fits perfectly to a point & click game thanks to the use of the stylus which is very close to the mouse on PC, whereas controls are much less accurate with a console gamepad. The Nintendo DS is having great success with women, who are an important part of the overall adventure games’ audience. This is why it seemed quite relevant to adapt Runaway on this console rather than on another one. Regarding Wii, we share your point of view and it is indeed very fun to play to a point & click with the Wiimote. While the Wii version of the game hasn’t been officially announced yet, you should know that it is close to the end of development and it will be released simultaneously with the DS version in 2008.

GT: Was it difficult bringing a game designed for PC to the DS in terms of how the game is played? Certainly technology-wise, it must have been difficult.

CL: It wasn’t too difficult considering the fact that, as I previously said, the stylus ideally replaces the mouse. The hardest thing was mostly figuring out how to best optimize the game.

From the start, Runaway wasn’t planned to work on a console with 10 times less memory and a much slower processor. It was a true challenge to have all the original game’s data fitting on a cartridge and make it run at the same speed on DS.

GT: Was there anything in the game that needed to be “dumbed-down” in order to work on the DS hardware?

CL: Unfortunately yes, due to technical constraints we couldn’t integrate any sound when the player is in the inventory window, the music stops and starts again as soon as you close the window. First, you notice it, but in the end you just get used to it. It was the price to pay to have the capacity to integrate over 40 different songs in the game.

We also had to reduce Brian’s animations a little. For example, on DS you will never see him scratching his head, but I think it is a minor sacrifice considering the fact that we could integrate the rest of the game’s animations, sounds and music.

GT: Why port Runaway 2 to the DS as opposed to the original Runaway?

CL: It is quite simple: Runaway, The Dream of the Turtle is not the direct sequel to the first Runaway. It is a brand new adventure and the only thing they have in common is the couple of heroes – Brian and Gina, and a few other secondary characters. You don’t need to know the first title to play and enjoy this game. As Runaway, A Road Adventure was released five years ago in Europe; we thought it would be better to bring to DS the latest adventure of Brian and Gina, which was released earlier this year. The overall quality of this version is much better than the previous one.

GT: Many consider the adventure genre as essentially dead, at least in North America. Conversely, adventures games – including Runaway – are huge in Europe. Why do you think this is?

CL: We have faced the same situation in Europe a few years ago. Adventure games fell victim of the advent of 3D in videogames. Publishers were only talking about 3D, and adventure games were quickly regarded as outdated despite the huge successes they were still having. There were a few 3D adventure game attempts but the audience wasn’t really convinced, which brought publishers to mistakenly think that players were not interested in adventure games anymore. Fortunately, a few studios have survived and are still offering quality productions; titles such as Runaway have relaunched the genre in 2003 in Europe by becoming very successful. The United States is still missing that one key adventure game which would be critically as well as commercially acclaimed to relaunch the genre, and as consoles Nintendo DS and Wii are a perfect fit for adventure games, it is highly probable that, according to their current success, they tend to favour the renewal of adventure games in the United States. However, it’s worth noting that while the adventure game genre is not as prominent as other genres in the United States today, it still has a large audience and some titles recently launched have had very good sales and reviews, though they don’t get talked about much.

GT: Runaway is known for its gorgeous cartoon-like visuals. Can you tell us a little about how this is accomplished?

CL: It is a style that Pendulo Studios creators particularly like and it is surely one of the main keys to their success. The key lies in knowing how to mix 2D with 3D. A large number of tools are used to achieve the final finish. The characters are animated in 3D, as are many of the backdrops, but then it is all put in place in a 2D format to give a cohesive appearance in the end.

GT: Thank you so much for your time.

A Stroke of Fate is the upcoming adventure game from Akella, where you’ll play a spy infiltrating Hitler’s regime near the end of World War II. The game will have you joining the Gestapo and working on a plot to assassinate Hitler himself. Personally, I’ve been interested in this title since I learned about its intriguing and somewhat controversial setup. Luckily, I got a chance recently to ask some questions of Boris Chuprin, the project leader of the SPLine development studio, about what gamers can expect to explore in the game and how the team has kept everything historically accurate. From the sound of it, they’ve put a lot of effort into making this one deep and compelling game.

GT: How much has the main character been developed?

Boris Chuprin: The main character has been developed over half a year – during a pre-production period – however some elements are still being added on to his portrayal. Well, let me introduce our main character to you, here is his profile:

Name: Mayer Gerhard Adolf

Date of birth: 18 August 1899

Place of birth: Metz

Title: SS-Standartenführer

Awards:
Iron Cross 1st Class (Eisernes Kreuz 1. Klasse) (for brevity during World War I)

Family status:
Single

Children: No

Brief history:

1905 – 1912 – studied at school

1913 – 1917 – studied at Cadet Corps. Achieved considerable success

1917-1918 – dropping his study, volunteered to join the Army. Fought as a lieutenant at the Western front

1919 – 1926 – Tried a number of jobs. Worked at the sports school, in the port, as a police officer

1926 – got permanent employment at a fruit wholesale company

1930 – started running his own business – a tobacco shop

1931 – joined NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers Party)

1936 – entered Steering Committee of the XIth Olympic Games in Garmesh-Partenkirchen and Berlin

1937 – joined SS. Assigned to serve in Hannover

1939 – transferred to Gestapo (secret police) in Berlin

1940 – advanced in rank to SS- Standartenführer

1942 – drastically changed his view of politics and joined the Red Orchestra, however left it since its operation was not very efficient.

Faithful catholic. Resisted Hitler’s policy from the very beginning. Voted for Theodor Duesterberg in 1932. After Hitler’s stunning success, just like many others, believed that he was the one. Feels that joining the SS was his biggest mistake. Dreams of liquidating Hitler and giving Germany a beam of hope.

Phlegmatic. Self-possessed in any situations. Has a sense of humor. Gets along with people. Intelligent, erudite. Man of iron.
Good football player.

GT: Will his personal feelings affect the story?

BC: I would rather say that the gamer’s personal feelings will affect the story. Some problems and tasks can be solved in various ways – and that’s up to the player to decide which to choose. For instance, the gamer can wear the Gestapo outfits and intimidate a target person thus obtaining necessary data. However he can dress up as a civilian and negotiate for the results.

GT: What steps have you taken to ensure the historical authenticity of the setting and the story?

BC: We pay a lot of attention to the historical authenticity in the project. We involved a historical consultant to keep an eye on the authenticity of events and various features of the game. Thus we’re specific to many interesting facts relevant to that epoch: Hitler’s security system that applied multiple gadgets – sensitive microphones to detect timing devices and a great number of impersonators, as well as schemes and layouts of Hitler’s private bunker. (Ed. Note — The above photo shows an actual photo of Hitler’s cabinet on the left and an in-game screenshot on the right.)

GT: Since your goal in the game is to pass yourself off as a true supporter of Hitler’s regime, will that make for some unnerving moments in the game?

BC: Well, he works for Gestapo, however he manages to avoid all the pending unpleasant situations.

GT: Will the main character work alone or will he get help from allies?

BC: It’s close to impossible to incubate a plot or arrange an assassination if you’re on your own. The main character will have to find like-minded people out of the German officers and complete a mission with their help and assistance.

GT: Will the Holocaust be part of the story, and if so, how will it be presented?

BC: No, the Holocaust will not be presented in the game. However it will not prevent us from showing off the beast-looking face of the fascism.

GT: In a press release, you said the setting would depict 1941-45 environments, which would mean the main character would have had to start his infiltration either before the U.S. entered the war or immediately after Pearl Harbor. Does this mean that the pseudo-historical story will imply U.S. planning an attack on Germany well before its declaration of war? Will the main character’s actions affect actual historical events?

BC: Well, we don’t really think that the USA were planning to be first to attack Germany, however the World War II threshold was a very tense period for all the nations. Intelligence officers and spies of all the countries were trying to penetrate the walls of the government, ministries of the alleged enemy (or ally – who knows?). It implies being politically wise rather than aggressive.

The main character’s actions will not affect actual historical events but we’re doing our best to make the storyline as close to them as possible. That’s the way we see the pseudo-historical story. For instance, if we know for sure from authentic documents that a specific person was supposed to meet Hitler on a specific day we’ll reflect that in the game. The events will be constructed in such a way that no actions of the gamer will actually be able to affect that.

GT: Exactly what settings will players be able to explore? Will the protagonist remain in Germany?

BC: Key events will take place in Berlin, however on of the chapters will take the main character to a castle near Hitler’s secret lair. The game’s final chapter will unfold in Hitler’s secret bunker, re-constructed in a detailed way, where he actually committed suicide.

GT: Aside from the story and setting, what sets this game apart from other detective games out there?

BC: As a rule, games of the detective genre provide for conducting investigations or preventing crimes. What we offer is to view a detective story from a different aspect – you’ll need to prep and commit a crime. It’s a crime but for the sake of saving many lives of innocent people.

To get more details on the game, check out the official game website here.

Prototype, the upcoming game from Radical Entertainment introduces a new world and a new hero in the form of Alex Mercer, an amnesiac man looking to uncover the secrets of his forgotten past. Radical, creators of last year’s Scarface:The World is Yours and the excellent non-movie tie in Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction are bringing this new world rife with conspiracy and a gritty real world feel to life.

Recently Gaming Today had an opportunity to question lead designer Eric Holmes about the world setting of his new game. Eric talks about the game’s protagonist, the story and just what makes Prototype different from every other superhuman sandbox game on the market today.

Gaming Today: Prototype centers around a person with superhuman abilities, but the main character is not your typical spandex clad paragon of good. Can you talk a little bit about Alex Mercer, the game’s lead character. What makes Alex different from other super powered protagonists?

Eric Holmes: Alex is a shapeshifter, released into an intense version of contemporary New York. Then something goes wrong, and Manhattan starts changing for the worse. Alex’s powers are what the core of this game is, and the deadly, deceptive way that they can be employed is what makes it different. Alex can adopt a perfect disguise or change his body into a deadly killing machine. The way we realize that is like something you haven’t seen before.

GT: There also seem to be elements of military conspiracy and survival horror melded into the game, who do you think Prototype is most likely to appeal to in today’s crowded market?

EH: I hesitate to say it in this era of “casual” friendly focus, but this one is unashamedly focused at gamers. We wanted to make agamer’s game, but make something people hadn’t seen before. This is a gamer’s game. Controls are a strength of this team – it will be easy to pick up and play, but there will be lots of depth to sit down and master what you can do and how you can combine abilities and strategies. You can use Alex’s shapeshifting powers in a lot of ways…we’re still plumbing the depths of that as I write this; there’s no roadmap when you’re doing something different. Prototoype is guilty pleasure for gamers – this is a game that as you’re playing it, your girlfriend might get angry at seeing what you do – but you’ll be cackling all the way.

GT: Dealing with super powers in a realistic world opens up a whole can of worms. Is Alex the only character with abilities? Does the game’s setting have a “real world” feel or is it more like a side story in a universe populated by super folks?

EH: Grounded. That’s the watchword here. We do fantastic things in this game – but everything must be grounded. We have a realistic location in a contemporary Manhattan. We have realistic clothing style. We have real brands on many of our signs. It’s all about immersion, reality, feeling like it could happen. That means we have a lot of work to do in the story to make you feel that, to make you believe – but that’s our goal.

So no, there’s no random group of mutants running around created by lightning storms or coming from other planets. There’s one idea – ONE – that differentiates the world of Prototype from the world you and I live in. The main thrust of the game is about chasing after what that idea is…

GT: Talk a little bit for us about how the player is meant to discover the world Alex lives in. If he’s amnesiac how much will Alex learn about his situation and how he gained his abilities?

EH: Well, to be honest an amnesiac is not an entirely new idea. It has been seen before in other media – but it has never been realized in the way that Prototype is pulling it off. Yes, there are stories where people remember things – The Bourne Identity, Memento and so on. However, in Prototype your character consumes those that represent a part of the conspiracy, and through consuming them Alex gains the memories, the skills, the abilities of that individual. He relives their experiences, he sees what they saw and learns what they knew. He is a product of all this knowledge, gaining years and then decades of experience; he surpasses what a typical human can experience and becomes something more. This is the principle mechanic that makes Alex different as a property and as a game character, and it’s quite the sight when you first see what he does to “consume” a foe…

GT: Superhero’s are becoming more and more popular in light of recent movies and TV shows like Heroes, what drew you to this game concept? Why tell this story now and could you have created the same game say a few years back before this latest hardware evolution?

EH: You know, we have never thought of this a super hero property. In fact, when anyone brings it up I reject that. Yes, we have fantastic powers, but this is not a morality play. It’s not about pulling kittens from trees or saving people from towering infernos – this is a bloody revenge story with player abilities of the like you haven’t seen before.

Why tell this story now? Whenever developers look at a game concept they are looking into a crystal ball and guessing what they think will be fun, what will connect with consumers, what will be something new and exciting several years down the way.

I guess the best answer is “the planets aligned” – with the industry, with consumers on next-gen consoles, our technology and consumer hardware. We wanted to do something new, something exciting, something that sounded “next gen” to us, something that scared us a little. Next-Gen consoles were shifting from PR to reality when we were concepting our next game; this allowed if not demanded something new. Internally Radical’s technology was undergoing a huge overhaul to our new Titanium engine and tools allowed us to push open world further than we ever could have. We had a lot of lessons learned about how to make fantastic abilities from our previous game, yet hungered to push that further, make it more multidimensional.

So here we are.

GT: One of the abilities you’ve revealed that Alex uses in the game is a form of absorption. With this ability he seems to take on the memories and appearance of another person. What gameplay implications did this ability present and what storytelling techniques are you using to utilize to realize this power?

EH: Absorption is for towels. Alex CONSUMES.

GT: Alex’s movements have been compared to the art of Parkour, an interesting combination of daredevil jumps and acrobatic street dancing. Why Parkour? What does it add to the character or the game? Does this mean the environments of the game will be crowded urban landscapes to take better advantage of this artform or have you taken a different approach?

EH: Alex’s movement is pretty unique. We have studied parkour and there are certainly elements of it in his style, but I think it is beyond parkour, it’s a superhuman acrobatic movement style that’s just not possible with human reflexes or abilities. The spirit of parkour is what got us excited – it’s free flowing, and it simply doesn’t stop – just like a player wants when he’s sprinting across a game world.

Game worlds have become increasingly more complex with each generation of hardware; more props, more characters, more vehicles; they’re generally busier. For a player this can actually be a bit of a drag as he’s moving around bumping into things, slowing down, clipping bits of detail in the geometry. We wanted all of the looks of next gen with none of the control pain – Alex moves seamlessly over objects, be they static or in motion. We’re talking about hundreds of pedestrians, hundreds of cars moving through New York’s streets all at once; our locomotion takes care of that, whether it’s Alex pushing people out of his way at low speed or bashing through them at high speed. That’s a lot to take in. Since the player spends a lot of his time moving, it should feel good – right?

Running to any surface, static or in motion Alex will find a way across it. It could be a cop car swerving to running you over and Alex will smoothly flip over it and keep going. It could be a city bus that has been flipped from an artillery shell – and it’s tumbling onto you! In either example, Alex will just move over that object with the smooth motion of a butter covered ninja. A lot of work has been done to make this happen, but from the consumer’s perspective “it just works” – and it feels great.

GT: Radical Entertainment has had recent experience dealing with sandbox styled games – especially highlighted by the excellent Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction a few years ago, how do you plan to use the open world feel to best tell the story of Prototype and still allow players freedom of action in your game? Did you take anything players would recognize from Hulk to enhance the concept for Prototype?

EH: There are certainly principles we lifted from our Hulk experience – and some of the other Radical titles. We’re a pretty humble studio and are always trying to learn, we challenge our ideas and preconceptions a lot. I think that’s healthy. One example from Hulk would be that everything needs to be interactive – everything! That’s a goal in Prototype too, although the character works in a different way, in a different scale from the likes of the Hulk. Alex allows us to do a lot of things we wished we could hve done in our last game – Alex can use firearms and drive vehicles – he can also be just as brutal as we wish since we’re creating the character. This has really allowed us to find a stylized and cinematic form of action for our character that I think will set us apart. I can’t wait until the first gameplay videos go out – you’ll see what I mean.

I guess another aspect of Hulk we’re pushing into a new dimension was weaponization. This was where Hulk would take objects and use them to create new weapons, for example ripping a car in two to make giant boxing gloves, or flattening a bus into a shield. Alex takes that to the next level; he weaponizes himself, creating new weapons and forms on the fly according to what powers you activate. It’s not about props or weaponry with him; it’s about biomass.

GT: Prototype is an original setting, have you found it easier to work in your own sandbox? How is it different for you as a designer to adapting a known property like Hulk? Are there plans for the prototype universe outside of this game? A lot of developers seem to be framing their worlds in trilogies these days.

EH: New IP is definitely harder; all your ideas are often challenged, and there are no guarantees. Someone like Hulk or Tony Montana are already cool; people “get” them. It’s easy to see why they’re cool, what they do and what they don’t. New IP doesn’t give you any of that foundation, so that core is something you have to find, you have to prove – to the entire team. That’s undoubtedly the hardest creative challenge with a new IP, but is also the most exciting and fun thing it too.

GT: Thanks for your answers Eric. We’ll look forward to more information on Prototype as it gets closer to release.

For those of you who are unfamiliar with Albatross18, it is an MMO/casual golf simulation game that is free to play, although certain items can only be purchased with actual money. However, all characters are free, and an effort has been made to minimize the differences between monetary users and ‘free’ users. The game awards players with Pang Points, a currency that can be used to upgrade your character and your items which in turn will give you the upper hand as you play the game and its many number of courses.

I was lucky enough to have a chat with Jack Liu recently, who is the Co-Founder and Chief Creative Officer from OGPlanet and I asked him a few questions regarding his latest endeavor Albatross 18 Season 3 Revolution. Readers will remember Jack from the previous interview we had with him back in August regarding Rumble Fighter.

Check out the interview after the break!

Gaming Today: Please introduce yourself and tell our readers a little about your latest project, Albatross18 Season 3.

Jack Liu: Hello Gaming Today, it’s Jack Liu, resident creative guru…ahem…from OGPlanet. Actually, by title, I’m the Chief Creative Officer, but doesn’t guru have a better ring to it? I digress. Let’s talk about Albatross18 Season 3. Our full title is actually Albatross18 S3 Revolution – a little wordy, but all those little words actually tell quite a lot about the newest installment of our game. The original game in its native Korea is called Pangya, a wildly successful multiplayer golf game that has long been known for its anime aesthetic, cute characters, and candyland environments. From the get-go, our relationship with the game’s developer, Ntreevsoft, has been mired in discussions about how to give the game a little more “edge” for Western audiences. We wanted to reveal the darker elements behind the story of Albatross18/Pangya to inject a little evil into the game, which stays consistent to the world but rocks it enough to be known as a “revolution.” Ntreev has always been open to improving their game (which is rather courageous considering the success their original title had already garnered – why fix what ain’t broke, right?), but were pleasantly surprised by the overwhelming response they received with the newer, darker, and badder Season 3. In a nutshell, we are ripping at the seams right now with excitement to finally release our version of Season 3 to players in the West – an audience that we believe this game was always intended for.

GT: Please tell us your inspiration for creating an online golf game?

JL: Even as a young child with no desire or knowledge about the real game of golf, I recall the pure fun I had playing the NES classic, Golf. There was just something mesmerizing about the video game of golf. Picking your tool of choice, judging wind and distance, and then timing the buttons to hit the perfect shot towards the green. And nothing felt more gratifying than hearing the 8-bit NSF sound byte of sinking the ball into the cup. I was hooked then and remain hooked today. When first working with Ntreev, I discovered that Kwanhee Seo, Ntreev’s Executive Director and “Godfather of Pangya”, was also a huge fan of video game golf, but more from the PC side. His vision with Pangya was to create a golf game that catered to groups beyond the typical demographic of male and over 25, and to mix it with MMORPG game elements that he was familiar with from gaming on the PC. He also drew inspiration from the popular South Korean female golfers that were quickly achieving stardom on the pro tour, like Se Ri Pak and Grace Park. And out of all of this, the love of video games, golf, female golfers, and MMORPG’s, came the unique game we know today as Albatross18.

GT: Like Rumble Fighter, Albatross18 is free to play, with premium items costing real money instead of pang points. What sort of new premium items can players expect?

JL: Well, I can’t really reveal too much into all the new goodies, but there are lots. From new clubs and equipment, to all new clothing and rare goods for every character, players can expect hundreds of premium items to be eventually released in Season 3. One new premium item that we are extremely excited about is purchasable scratch cards for our new Scratch Card Lottery system. In brief, scratch cards can be purchased in game for a chance to win new rare items that can never be obtained elsewhere. It’s really like a mini-game within a game, where players can try their luck at acquiring some extremely valuable goodies at a small cost.

GT: Have there been any new items added, and if so, will the characters be able to carry more than eight this time around?

JL: Since Albatross18 relies heavily on the sheer volume and selection of items contained in its Item Shop, we have planned out several hundred items to add to the game in the upcoming months. These items range from purely cosmetic, to functional items that enhance character attributes. For instance, there will be a whole new Mascot system introduced with Season 3. Mascots, much like our current caddies, can be purchased to accompany players and give them added benefits. Each mascot brings something different to the table and to answer your question, Hugo (one of our four starting Mascots to choose from) allows players to carry an extra item. This can be a huge benefit, since it allows players to use that one extra potion or magic item, right at that critical juncture, for an added edge against the competition.

GT: Albatross18 has RPG elements to gameplay. What sorts of storylines, guilds, battle, or gaming modes have been added for Season 3?

JL: With regards to the story, Season 3 finally introduces the darker elements on Pangya Island. The story revisits the Demon King, who was defeated in the backstory of Season 1, but never had any kind of presence in the game. With Season 3, we finally have a chance to bring his story back. This edgier and darker side of our game really adds a new dimension, adding a balance to the otherwise uber-cute nature of Seasons 1 and 2. It’s really cool stuff that we can’t wait for our players to see.

We’ve also added a new feature called the PSquare (“P” for Personal, People, Player) that allows users to roam freely in a 3D virtual lobby to explore, chat, trade, and meet new people within our game. It’s a whole new way for our community to interact within Albatross18 – allowing players to show off their avatars, their rare items acquired, and even to set up personal shops to sell items of their choice at prices they determine. This feature alone will probably be just as popular as the individual game modes that are available inside Albatross18.

And speaking of game modes, we will have a new “closest to pin” mode called Approach Battle Mode for players looking to test their pin-seeking skills outside of the typical golf match setup. It’s a fun way to stay engaged even when you only have just a few minutes to play Albatross18. With this new mode, you can get in, get close, and get on with whatever else you’re doing.

GT: How many new characters can players expect, and what kind of surprises do they have in store?

JL: For launch, we will only be introducing one new playable character, Kaz, the successor to the infamous Demon King. Kaz veers away from the fun-loving characters that have been rather typical of our game, and ushers in the darker elements I have alluded to so far. A master of the sword, Kaz utilizes a unique club set that is comprised of battle swords. And even for our players who might not particularly like Kaz, but want the sword golf set, we’ve made it possible to equip these clubs on any other character in our game. Kaz also comes with a surprise in his character animations. Players who score an outstanding hole, will get a glimpse of Karin, Kaz’s past love who now embraces him in spirit form.

GT: Can you tell us anything about some of the new courses?

JL: We will be introducing several new courses in Season 3, but the first will be called Deep Inferno. Unlike any of our current courses, Deep Inferno continues the dark motif of S3, and is comprised of volcanoes, barren wastelands, and flowing rivers of lava. Deep Inferno was the hiding spot for many of the Demon King’s minion, and what better place to play a round of golf than off the cliff of a giant magma crater? Observant players will also catch the powerful Black Dragon flying overhead all throughout Deep Inferno.

GT: What can players expect as far as enhancements, specifically the graphics?

JL: The main area where players will notice a huge upgrade in terms of the game’s graphics is with the new UI of the game. The entire process of logging in and finding key buttons has been heavily retooled to make the Albatross18 experience as simple and pleasurable as possible. From finding tutorials, game modes, or keystroke shortcuts, our UI has been redeveloped from the ground up to be more user-friendly and intuitive. Our past user interfaces have never been heavily criticized, and to the contrary, have been often times lauded for their ease-of-use. However, something that we push extremely hard for at OGPlanet is to constantly focus on making the end-user experience better. To give people more features and options, while making everything simpler. We think we’ve accomplished this with the new UI of Season 3.

GT: The AI in Albatross18 shows the best angle of your shot and also shows replays from different angles. Has anything new been added to this or has anything changed?

JL: Although we’ve always liked the camera AI in Albatross18, it was sometimes buggy and didn’t always choose the best angle for replays. With the version upgrade to Season 3, we had the chance to revisit this problem and adjust accordingly. On top of adding a few more variations to the replay camera angles, we have made the AI just a bit smarter to avoid obstructions to one’s beautiful hole-in-one replays.

GT: What has been your target market, and what are you doing to draw added interest for Season 3?

JL: Our target market has always been tech-savvy youth who are extremely familiar with the online space, but constantly searching for something new and more catered to their lifestyle. Our players are smart and social, and want to be regarded and respected in that way. We’ve said this before and maintain it now, but the one thing we’ve learned about gamers is that no gamer is exactly like the next. We aim to offer these individuals ways to express their unique style and to give them recognition for their differing accomplishments within all of our games. I think ultimately this is what makes us unique and gives us our appeal at OGPlanet. Having said that, we are doing several things to draw added interest for Season 3. Most of these have to do with our community in the form of community events. As of this interview, we are throwing a viral video event where we are encouraging our players to upload our Season 3 teaser movie to other communities in which they belong. Our community events always give our players the option to participate, and we aim to empower the individual community member to spread the word only if they enjoy the message. As a testament, we have a flourishing community that continues to grow and is still regarded by our company as the beacon of our business.

GT: Thank you for taking time out to speak with. Is there anything else you wish to add regarding Albatross18 Season 3?

JL: First, I’d like to give much thanks to Gaming Today and your readers for your interest in Albatross18 Season 3 Revolution. I’d also like to quickly inform all the readers that with the launch of Season 3, we will be throwing a big event called the Pangya Island Tour Event where we will be giving out cool prizes to all who participate. All you need to do is play 18 holes on all of our courses (a total of thirteen) and every player who does this will win a few Exp Candies (to level up faster), some free Phoenixes (Albatross18 golf balls), a few rare items and an Astro coupon (free game cash!). This event will last throughout the month of October, so come join us today and get some Albatross18 goodies on us!

Gaming Today would like to thank Jack for once again taking time out of his hectic schedule to speak with us. It is always a pleasure. Albatross18 Season 3 Revolution looks great and I am sure it will be an enjoyable experience for everyone who plays it. OGPlanet has had the teaser site up for Season 3 for a while now, and I am sure that fans of the series are getting a bit impatient – but guess what…. your long wait is over!

That’s right… Season 3 launches today, and OGPlanet was kind enough to pass along some cool new screenshots for the game, and if the three I have posted aren’t enough to curb your appetite – there are plenty more right here.

You can grab the full client at FileFront here.

Upon hearing about this game, I jumped at the chance to conduct an interview with Bill to learn more about A Vampyre Story, the inspiration that went behind creating this game, and to get his thoughts on the current lack of adventure games.

GT: First off, thank you for taking the time to do this interview. For those readers who may not know who Bill Tiller is and why we should be throwing fresh roses down at your feet anywhere you go, please introduce yourself.

Bill Tiller: Hi, all. I’m Bill Tiller and I am the founder of Autumn Moon Entertainment and I worked 9 years at LucasArts on a bunch of games as a background artist and art director, and occasionally doing some game design. The big games were The Dig, Rebel Assault, Curse of Monkey Island, and Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine. I also did a short stint at Arena Net as art director on Guild Wars, and was one of the two art directors on EA’s The Two Towers. I grew up near Chicago, and then Orange County, and I attend the California Institute of the Arts where I graduated from the famous Character Animation program. Same place Tim Burton, Brad Bird and John Lasseter went to school.

GT: Word is on the street that you are working on A Vampyre Story. What role do you play in the development of A Vampyre Story?

Bill Tiller: The street would be correct. AVS is my baby, so to speak. I doodled up some characters one day back in 1995; one a female vampire and the other a bat I dubbed, “Froderick”. I liked the idea of a naive vampire who didn’t want to be one and did her best to ignore her condition. So I started thinking of a story that went along with the character and that is how I came up with the idea for A Vampyre Story. I was thinking about doing an animated movie about her, but then I thought it might make a good game too. I was tempted to pitch it to LucasArts but decided not to because they would then own the idea. So I held on to it till I quit and started working on it then.

GT: What is A Vampyre Story about?

Bill Tiller: Back in 1895, at the Parisian Institute for the Operatic Arts, a lonely and psychotic vampire named Shrowdy Von Kiefer was looking for a companion. He had recently lost his mother, under mysterious circumstances, and was sort of looking for a replacement. He suffered from a serious Oedipus Complex. He went to see the young students sing at a public performance and fell in love with the heroine of A Vampyre Story, Mona De Lafitte. He tried to seduce her and entice her with gifts in order to convince her to run away with him and live in his dreary castle in Draxsylvania. But Mona was not interested. Her heart’s desire was to become a famous opera starlet and live the high life in the city of light. Being impatient and a vampire, Shrowdy kidnapped her, bit her neck and drained her of blood, thus transforming her into a vampire. He spirited her back to his castle and kept her locked up, unable to escape, feeding her a special salty-tasting merlot every night to sustain her. To keep control over her, Shrowdy kept Mona in the dark about her newly undead condition, thus Mona has almost no idea about being a vampire. While Shrowdy went out every night hunti…er… looking for a wine shop open after sunset, Mona was left alone in the spooky, enchanted castle. To help ease her loneliness, she befriends a cantankerous and wise-cracking bat named Froderick. One night Shrowdy is hunted down and killed by two professional vampire hunters, thus inadvertently freeing Mona of Shrowdy’s control. The game begins with Mona attempting to escape the castle so she can travel back to Paris and the life she always wanted.

GT: A long time ago, you worked on the legendary Monkey Island series where players took the role of Guybrush Threepwood, a wannabe pirate. In A Vampyre Story, players take the role of Mona, who is an opera starlet. That’s a huge departure from pirates. What was the influence behind going with an opera star that turns into a vampire?

Bill Tiller: I am a big fan of the late, great Edward Gorey. Go take a look at his stuff right here http://www.goreyography.com/west/west.htm He drew these humorous and macabre scenes with aristocratic people from the Edwardian era. I loved his morbid sense of humor and pen and ink art style. Being a huge consumer of scary movies and anything horror related, his subject matter was right up my alley. I was born the day after Halloween – missed it by an hour! When I started drawing the sketch of Mona I was trying to draw cartoon version of an Edward Gorey character. Don’t get me wrong, I like pirates, and hope to do a pirate game some day, but I like other genres too. So that is why I went with vampires.

GT: The art style reminds me of something out of an animated Tim Burton movie. Was that on purpose and why did you decide to go with that art style?

Bill Tiller: Nightmare Before Christmas was one of my influences, but not really a big one, if you can believe that. Like I said, I am a huge Edward Gorey fan. Coincidentally, so is Tim Burton. He and I are very much alike, except I like computers and games more than he does, I imagine. But I am also heavily influenced by the Hildebrandt Brothers too. So if you combine Edward Gorey, Universal and Hammer Studios horror movies, the Hildebrandt Brothers art, Monkey Island and Warner Brothers cartoons together, you get the cartoon style in A Vampyre Story. Let’s say I had a lot of influences, Tim Burton being just one of many. Plus he only uses black in his art. I almost never do. I am all about the color.

GT: There’s been a huge drought in point-n-click adventure games, is that one of the reasons why you decided to work on A Vampyre Story?

Bill Tiller: You betcha. I loved making them more than other type of game I have made. They are the most like an animated feature film. But they combine the two things I love, animated movies and games. So that is why. Plus, LucasArts wasn’t making them. So I saw a need and am trying to fill it. Hopefully it will be a win-win for all: developers, publishers and the game player. I’m crossing my fingers.

GT: If you could choose your absolute favorite adventure game, whether it be a game you worked on or not, which would it be?

Bill Tiller: It would be a toss up between The Secret of Monkey Island and Full Throttle, neither of which I worked on though I did work on both sequels. Let me clarify. I DID NOT work on Hell on Wheels. I worked on the little known previously cancelled sequel to Full Throttle called Full Throttle Payback. A much better looking sequel. It was a bummer that it was cancelled.

GT: LucasArts was very popular in the 90’s for their adventure games. Nowadays, it seems LucasArts has abandoned its roots and are focusing mostly on Star Wars games. Do you think they should try to dabble in the adventure games business once again, or are they doing the right thing by sticking to the cash cow that is Star Wars?

Bill Tiller: I think there’s room for both. Even if they lost money on adventure games I think they should still do them. Then they could do animated movies and an amusement park based on the game and make a ton of money off of Guybrush and Le Chuck plush toys, night lights, and pajamas. I wish them the best of luck, but I’m sad not to see Guybrush for another five years.

GT: What are your thoughts on the recent revival and popularity of Sam & Max, which originally was a game developed by LucasArts?

Bill Tiller: I think it is great! I am very happy for Steve Purcell and Dan Connors and the rest of the team at Tell Tale. If that game sells well, it is good news for me and other adventure game developers and publishers. Plus, I want to see the Sam N Max movie ASAP. Hear me Disney/Pixar?

GT: How far in production is A Vampyre Story and when is the expected release date?

Bill Tiller: Our production plan says that we have just a couple of more months of development time in front of us. So we are in the home stretch on AVS1. The game will be out in Early 2008 in most countries, so get ready!

GT: Will PC be the only platform you plan to release the game on?

LM: For the moment, we are focused on the PC build and related releases. However, we are also working on a surprise for gamers and this does have immediate possibilities as a source of Culpa Innata related games designed for other platforms. As for the future, we are always open to new avenues to bring challenging and provocative adventures to gamers.

GT: The game is advertised as having a constantly changing story line. Does this mean that the main story line is completely non-linear or is this a case where there are numerous side quests that change the story line?

LM: Very interesting question. A little of both, really. It’s hard to dig deep and provide the best answer without spoiling things. First of all, any game that starts and ends is ultimately – linear. SO we have a stated purpose, a start and varied endings depending on choices made at certain critical points. There are also a number of side activities, characters seen or not depending on choices made at other moments. Although, nothing critical to getting “an” ending would be missed, the back-story, side events, and how you get through the game varies greatly between subsequent plays and individual players. The vast amount of detail at the player’s disposal, just waiting to be discovered, also helps making every gamer’s experience unique. There are a number of other specifics about the gameplay and game design that make it operate and even feel very non-linear. But we leave those for people to discover for themselves when Culpa Innata releases.

GT: In the game, what is the most important factor? (i.e.: story, characters, graphics)?

LM: I think a better answer is to explain what is important to us in designing and building a game. It is how all of the above work together in a tightly constructed, polished (to the best it is possible) way. And all these coordinated parts focused on one point. To create an interactive adventure, that immerses players in the places, people, and game world. A world that gamers will feel they built by their choices, their wits and their successes in beating diverse challenges. So there isn’t one factor. It is simply using everything available and needed to create a singular and hopefully credible game world and experience for gamers.

GT: What separates Culpa Innata from other adventure games currently in the market?

LM: The commitment to change, evolution and breaking the whole game if needed – to make it the best game it can be. Ego always took a big back seat to craft. The other thing is the adult themed, provocative story line. The thoughts and satiric eye it casts on the current worldview will likely cause some comment. And we are definitely looking forward to it. Last, this game has what we think is one of the deepest back-stories created behind every face, experience and challenge.

GT: Why was the initial production of this vast game kept at such a low profile?

LM: Great question. The initial reason is we didn’t want press, public pressure or scrutiny to distract the team. Admittedly it has the lowest initial profile of any PC based game, with this much time and resources committed to it. But, quiet allows a great deal of freedom to just focus on building a game. To be blunt, creating something from nothing is a hard some days. And this team had certain advantages that made it possible for this entire project to be initiated, designed and finished away from most of the typical pressures on developers to deliver their game without the time and freedom to make it the best it can be.

But now Culpa Innata (world wide) is ready and time to make some noise out there.

GT: We’d like to thank Laura MacDonald and Momentum for giving us a closer look at this exciting game.

Gaming Today had the opportunity to conduct an interview with the man behind the soundtrack, Garry Schyman. In the interview, you’ll learn Garry’s influences on creating the soundtrack, his thoughts on the media’s take on “The Little Sister”, and future projects (BioShock 2 maybe?)

GT: Now that the game has finally been released to critical acclaim, what are your thoughts on the public’s response to BioShock?

Garry Schyman: It is very gratifying to see this game not only getting the critical acclaim it has received but also appealing to the public/gamers. Of course it is always great to be associated with a successful project but it is particularly cool when a game like this, which took so many risks creatively, is embraced. It easily could have been a quirky niche game but instead seems to be slated to become an important milestone in the industry. My fondest hope is that it encourages game companies to take more risks and make really interesting games.

GT: Are there any tracks you composed that still gives you goosebumps by how well it came together?

Garry Schyman: I have received many emails from people who love “Cohen’s Masterpiece” a piano solo that I wrote in the style of the late romantic composers with a touch of modernism from the early 20^th century. Many pianists have asked me for the score so they could learn it. That has been very satisfying and frankly unexpected. It was a lot of work to compose and it’s just so gratifying to have people respond so positively to what is essentially a classical piano solo.

GT: 2K Boston recently made your work available as a free download so those who played BioShock can truly get a sense of how epic your work was on the game. Have you been getting more attention since the release of the soundtrack?

Garry Schyman: I have received many very kind calls and emails of appreciation for my score and that has been wonderful. So yes I have been getting a lot of very nice attention for my work on the game. Lots of good things have been flowing from my work on BioShock and I consider myself lucky to have been hired for the project. It was just such an amazing palette for a composer.

GT: What were some of the challenges in creating an original score for BioShock? Were there any tracks in particular you had difficulty in putting together?

Garry Schyman: The greatest challenge was figuring out how to approach the score in general. They wanted something very different and original and it took a while to find it. I had three or four different themes/approaches politely rejected. But once I found the approach I ended up taking it was fairly straightforward to compose the score. It may seem like a cliché but I really had an epiphany one day while working to find the right approache and I said to myself ‘Yes that’s it!’. When I played it for the audio director she said the same thing. It was a very satisfying moment because I knew the score would be very unique and would really work well with the game.

GT: You previously worked on the soundtrack to both Destroy All Humans games as well as Full Spectrum Warrior: Ten Hammers. Was it difficult to transition from writing soundtracks for those games to BioShock’s?

Garry Schyman: No not really, I love taking on different challenges and writing in different styles of music. Frankly I am experiencing the ideal situation in my career right now, each project has been quite different and that makes my work so much more interesting. I am a lucky composer indeed.

GT: What were some of your influences during the creation process for BioShock’s soundtrack?

Garry Schyman: Alban Berg’s violin concerto is one. I have always loved that piece and I listened to it a lot when I was coming up with ideas for the score. I ended up having a solo violin being central to the score. Additionally I used 12-tone rows (Berg was a serial composer) for some of the melodic material that the violin plays. Additionally, the music of Witold Lutoslawski was influential. He is one of my favorite 20^th century composers and he did it all from traditional tonal writing to aleatoric and avant-garde. He was awesome and I particularly love his Concerto For Orchestra. But I really used nearly everything I had learned about classical music in this game, which was amazing.

GT: The mainstream media recently has been negatively reporting on the characters known as the “Little Sisters” in the game and how the player interacts with them. What are your thoughts on BioShock’s testing of the player’s ethics when it comes to interacting with the Little Sister character and do you believe the media is blowing the interaction out of proportion?

Garry Schyman: I think that is one of the most interesting aspects of the game. Those in the media who are critical don’t really get it in my opinion, or more likely haven’t taken the time to play the game and really understand what this is about. It is actually challenging the player to be moral and make a positive moral choice. In so doing you have to delay gratification but in doing so there is a big reward in the end. That’s the whole point to moral choices they are not usually expedient in the moment to make. So if anything there may be a benefit to playing the game if it inculcates a sense that moral choice can have profound outcomes for good or bad.

GT: The City of Rapture really seemed like it was the place to be before all hell broke loose. Would you have wanted to visit Rapture during its hay day?

Garry Schyman: Absolutely! It was an artist’s paradise. It’s a gorgeous place that is endlessly fascinating and yet like all utopian dreams it crashes and burns. So if I really think about it perhaps a short visit when it was first built! Haha.

GT: Do you have any projects coming up? Maybe a sequel to BioShock?

Garry Schyman: I am just finishing Destroy All Humans 3 which is set in the 1970’s. It was a blast writing in the style of film composers of that period. I recorded the orchestra earlier this week and I had absolutely brilliant players.

No word yet on sequels to BioShock. If they do make a sequel and if it is anywhere near as amazing as this game is I would be honored to work on it.

Gaming Today would like to thank Garry Schyman for taking time out to answer our questions. We wish him the best in all of his future endeavors…especially if it’s BioShock 2. If you would like to listen to the BioShock soundtrack for free, make sure to check it out here!

Violence in gaming has become a really hot topic of debate over the last 5 years or so. The irony is that violence has been in games all the way back to the days of Doom and Wolfenstein 3D – perhaps even earlier (depending on your point of view). So why all the big hooplah these days concerning violence in video games? I’d like to think it’s because of the severe left turn games have taken, essentially hopping on to that freeway known as mainstream culture. Video games are no longer a niche genre delegated to the cartel of geeks and/or teenage boys. Games are now a social venue for all demographics, and as we have seen lately, an even more viable one at that.

Running With Scissors are certainly no stranger to irony. Since the release of Postal in 1997, RwS have been the whipping boy of the general gaming media, perhaps much undeservedly. In 2003, RwS released the sequel to Postal, Postal 2, which seem to best its predecessor more in controversy than the expected gameplay. Largely panned by the critics as being too violent and indulgent, RwS ended up on the defensive of its misunderstood title. It was no secret (to those who actually played it) that Postal 2’s gameplay allowed the player to choose a path of non-violence, one that ultimately allowed the player to finish the game in such manner. Choices be damned, this fact did not stop the “bull-ys“ from seeing red, so to speak. The temptation to focus on the “controversial issues” surrounding Postal 2 proved too much for most critics. It would seem Postal 2 that of victim of circumstance.

Since then, things seemed to have calmed down for the Arizona based company. RwS have been quietly developing a sequel to Postal 2 for some time now. Teaming up with the Russian publisher/developer Akella, Postal III is slated for a 2008 release on PC, Mac, and Xbox 360. Using the currently popular Valve Source engine, Postal III intends to bring the same sandbox gameplay found in Postal 2, with little to no compromise. And from little we’ve seen of the game so far, it looks like RwS are not holding back on any of its well established Postal themes.

Gaming Today found opportunity to submit a handful of questions to Running With Scissors’ CEO, Vince Desi. The questions cover topics such as the Postal movie, Uwe Boll, Postal III’s gameplay, the beaten to death topics of controversy, and of course our beloved Jack Thompson himself. So without further ado:

**WARNING**
The interview that follows contains some adult content.

GT: Ok, let’s get this one out of the way. Due to a scheduling conflict, Mr. Gary Coleman was not available for the Postal movie (boo!). It seems Uwe Boll really wanted to have him in the movie too. So now the Postal fans want to know: Will we be seeing the return of Gary Coleman in Postal 3?

Vince Desi: Thanks for the chance to clear this up. I’ve received a lot of inquiries from POSTAL fans. To begin with, Uwe Boll is notorious for casting his movies near the start of shooting. He does this to capitalize on what talent may be available at a reduced price. Anyway, while we all assumed that Gary would be in the movie, it turned out that his agent told Uwe he was unavailable, and so Uwe went ahead and cast Vern “Mini Me” Troyer instead. Since then, I’ve had minimal contact with Gary’s agent, and I was falsely accused of being behind the replacement move, which is total bullshit. Anyway, I’d love to have Gary be an active part of POSTAL III, but that’s up to him at this point. I never understand people who profess to be agents and, in effect, are only deal breakers not deal makers.

GT: Aside from beautiful playboy bunnies, what other “Hollywood” celebrities might appear in the upcoming Postal (game) sequel? Perhaps Mr. Boll himself?

Vince Desi: Well, we have several that we’ve yet to officially announce, but yeah, Uwe Boll will be in POSTAL III. With such a high target rate how could we not include him? Next year we will begin the real marketing campaign, and I will make many announcements about celebrities participating… It will be very surprising and a lot of fun.

GT: Making Uwe a killable character would certainly appeal to the “I hate Uwe Boll” crowd. With the Postal movie arriving next month, the hype generated from that is sure to garner further interest in the new Postal game. Will Postal 3 be borrowing ideas from the movie? How influential (or inspirational) has Mr. Boll been in the development of Postal 3 thus far?

Vince Desi: The latest I heard is that the release of the POSTAL movie will now be early November in America, and I believe the same for around the world. The movie is largely based on Postal 2, and has nothing to do with POSTAL III the game. Uwe is really a funny guy in person, and he’s ok with us ‘using’ him for target practice, but otherwise he hasn’t had any actual input in the game design.

GT: As far as video game standards were back then, Postal 2 wasn’t known for its graphics. With Postal 3 being built upon the very popular Valve Source engine, there are certainly possibilities for *gasp* artistic beauty to creep in. Will Running with Scissors be dedicating a fair bit of resources hiring artistic talent for Postal 3? Or will graphics take a back seat once again?

Vince Desi: POSTAL III is already taking advantage of the Source engine, and we intend to keep at it right up to final testing. The circumstances were very different when we made Postal 2. First of all, we were using an older version of the Unreal engine. Then we had to customize the hell out of it to do things we wanted, like mixing indoor and outdoor environments; and of course, the AI in Postal 2 is to this day surprisingly creative to anyone that plays it. Also, we had a very small team… something like 7 of us actually worked full time. Now on POSTAL III, we have around 30 people devoted full time, so there really is no comparison. I would like to emphasize that RWS still believes the most important component of a great game is gameplay. So for us that means super character AI. Add superb graphics via the Source engine… and I’m very confident the reviewers will be pleased with POSTAL III.

GT: Postal 2, at the time, had a sandbox theme going for it. Thus, it is not surprising to see Postal compared to the Grand Theft Auto games, which seems to have taken the whole sandbox theme mainstream. In fact, GTA: San Andreas (at the time) had one of the largest “seamless” explorable worlds in a video game. Will Postal 3 be going “large” in the exploration factor? Or will it be more or less a grid of smaller cells that make up the larger whole, ala Postal 2?

Vince Desi: We’ve purposely made some major design changes for POSTAL III. We learned that in Postal 2 many players, even hard core Postal fans that played hours and hours, really didn’t explore as much as we would have liked, and, in effect, missed lots of the small treats it offered. So this time in POSTAL III we are offering a combo approach. Let me explain. We are using linear missions as training exercises, basically, affording the player the chance to interact with a host of features so they can learn how to use them in the open world parts of the game. We believe this will provide players with a much easier and natural way to grasp all the potential POSTAL III offers, and in turn will allow them to have a lot more fun and replay-ability.

GT: Postal 1 & 2 really pushed the envelope of what you could get away with in a video game. Since then, other games have come along, such at the Grand Theft Auto series, and themed themselves with similar controversy (Hot-Coffee anyone?). Games not necessarily centralizing themes of violence and gore (old games had that), but now mixing in language and sexual themes as well. Can this envelope really be pushed any further? Or is it [game development] now more about being “smarter” in handling such controversial content?

Vince Desi: It’s funny, but it seems I always get the questions about violence in video games and what’s controversial. The first thing you have to accept is that video games are an electronic medium, and hence, will be evolving technically for a long time to come. So I see no limitations on what will be possible in the future. That said, the issue of “handling controversial content” is more a financial marketing consideration than anything moral. This is why I’ve been so upset over the years. It’s a total bunch of bullshit and hypocrisy when you have games being pseudo-rated and banned. The whole process is flawed and misses the point. Major companies have millions invested and will do whatever it takes to protect their investments. Small independent companies like Running With Scissors don’t have the money muscle to ‘sway’ the political minds and corporate watchdogs, and actually we serve them just fine by being their scapegoat. I really think this is changing though. I just saw a TV commercial for the John Woo game, Stranglehold, and it point blank states you MUST engage in bloodshed.. blah.. blah.. Hey, I have no problem with it. But, it’s real hypocrisy when a game like POSTAL, which actually punishes you for violent behavior, is held up as the evil example of video games. The fact is today there are so many new games out and more to come that are nothing but violent, where as in POSTAL III it’s the humor that makes the violent content meaningful, and not so one-dimensional. Lets be honest here, if I had the backing of a major publisher years ago, I probably would never have been the go-to guy for journalist like you who want to know about violence and controversy in the video game industry. The sad thing is that the real story, the real controversy, should be the hypocrisy and ill politics that our industry is mired in.

GT: I guess what I’m getting at is: Do you think Postal 3 still needs controversy to sell copies?

Vince Desi: NO, and thanks for asking.

GT: Compared to its predecessors, Postal 3 seems a bit more ambitious. With ambition comes a bit of seriousness. Have Running with Scissors taken a more mature approach to the design of Postal 3? What lessons have RwS learned from Postal and Postal 2?

Vince Desi: As I said earlier, we are combining linear missions as training opportunities so that the big open sand box areas of the game will be more fun to play. We are also introducing several modes of play, all based on player choice. We see it as the Postal Dude can be played as the Good, the Bad, or the Insane.

GT: Do you feel Postal 3 will have some overall political statement? Or will it simply be a big “F-You” to the overzealous religious and political sects?

Vince Desi: I learned along time ago that in order to get respect you have to give it. So while we, as a company, and POSTAL, as a game, have been falsely misrepresented in the past, we strongly believe in doing our own thing, being who we are, and offering players a chance to have fun at everyone’s expense, including our own. That’s what it takes to be real. I can only control what we put in POSTAL III, not what people write about it. Let’s hope this time more reviewers will actually play it first before writing their review.

GT: Do you really think video games are the ultimate venue for emotional purging?

Vince Desi: Ultimate? That depends on the individual. For example, scoring a blow job is better than beating any boss for me. That may sound physical, but hey, the critics are always complaining that games are different. Games are an interactive experience. Well then, let’s keep it at apples to apples and balls to balls.

GT: In your own personal opinion, when is too far really taking it “too far” when it comes to games and gamers?

Vince Desi: For ten years I’ve been telling anyone that wants to listen that for RwS, kids are off limits. I see no need to incorporate children in anything we do; from game design to marketing, it’s not what we’re about. I am concerned that today as games become more and more sophisticated, and more dramatic in tone and style, that the worst is yet to come. This is why I’m so glad we make games that make people laugh. We never forget that games are something you PLAY for enjoyment. It’s not a holy experience.

GT: If there were anyone in the U.S. that anticipates the return of Postal (to the media) more than anyone, it is Florida’s very own Jack Thompson. Do you have any insightful words for the beloved self-googler?

Vince Desi: Is he still around? I thought Take 2 paid him off to go away. Oh, I guess they only paid him to stop bitching about their titles.

[Don't we all wish Wacky Jack would go away, Vince.]

We at Gaming Today sincerely thank Vince Desi for taking time to answer our questions. We will certainly be providing our readers with zesty Postal III information in the coming months. Here’s hoping that Running With Scissors gets the much deserved fair treatment come 2008. Best of luck, guys.

Recently, FileFront got a chance to ask some questions to the development team behind Scorpion, and Andrew Beletsky of B-Cool Interactive was nice enough to answer them. Check out how development is going in this exciting first-person shooter, and a bit about the roots of inspiration as well.

GT: First off, could you tell us a little bit about yourself and your role in the production of Scorpion?

AB: Hey! Sure thing. My name is Andrew Beletsky, and I’m working as game-designer and PR manager in B-Cool Interactive. I’ve started my career on news TV, later worked with several CIS game developing and publishing companies as game designer, producer and PR. Not so long ago I joined Scorpion team. Currently I’m working on hero’s abilities and psychic powers of his main enemies, ‘Hounds’.

GT: What sort of influences would you say went into the development of the game?

AB: The idea of the project and the basis of the game world were designed by our project-leader, Eugene Duranin. Hard to list everything that has influenced both concept and the development of Scorpion, but sure can name thing or two – great games like F.E.A.R, The Chronicles of Riddick and Deus Ex, some books and movies (more on them later).

We are constantly reviewing various related media to further improve our feeling of the world the game takes place, Scorpion’s characters and the game in general. And I’m trying to spare a minute now and then to write a piece of fiction set in the game world too (some recent updates on Scorpion’s homepage are based on it, and we’ll post more; check http://www.scorpionthegame.com/blog for details).

GT: Were there any particular films or books that you drew from for the “cyber-punk” futuristic experience you are going for?

AB: Yes, of course. William Gibson’s Mona Liza Overdrive and Bruce Sterling’s Schismatrix novels were keys for our understanding of cyberpunk setting. I can’t skip Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash too, as this novel is very important for the project. Films? Johny Mnemonic and Bladerunner jump into my mind immediately for their atmosphere and picture, but this is just a head of the iceberg.

But using so classy sources we deviated from canonical cyberpunk as we made player’s character much more heroic as is customary in the genre. He is not positive teddy-bear of course, but we also can’t say that he’s anti-social or fight with society on any level, at least not from the start.

Same time, main cyberpunk idea, formulated by Gibson, kept intact: ‘Anything that can be done to a rat can be done to a human being. And we can do most anything to rats. This is hard thing to think about, but it’s the truth. It won’t go away because we cover our eyes. That is cyberpunk’. This citation can be considered some sort of motto for Scorpion.

GT: The music on the site is very eerie, and I like it. What sort of stuff is the composer into?

AB: Accessing profile: Composer… Listing…
Andrew Mishin, also known as Esolate.
Preferenses:
Alcohol – cognac, whiskey;
Drugs – nicotine, caffeine;
Food – rice, vegetables, seafood.
Movies – drama, science fiction, anime.
!!!ERROR: Access to additional data denied!
Connection to remote host terminated!

Well, on more serious note, Andrew is professional composer and DJ who is well known here in Ukraine for his work with several popular local bands, and as sound producer and arranger. He’s working as composer and FX engineer for Scorpion now, and we like what he’s doing.

GT: It looks like there are a lot of similarities to Doom in the use of lighting, or in the least the flashlight with the zombie-like creatures. Was there anything during development that you specifically strayed away from where you said, “No, can’t do it. Too much like Doom?”

AB: To be honest, Resident Evil series played much bigger role then Doom as an orienteer. Surely we all played Doom, so I can’t completely negate its influence, but I never heard sentence ‘Too much like Doom’ from our team members. So, similarities with Doom in scene’s lightning or flashlight usage are more accident then a rule.

Mutants who are indeed zombie-like are not playing the role of leading, or even common, enemies in the game. They can be found here and there, mostly in desolated and polluted areas of Slums (you can read more on that on our web site). Corporate guards of several types, robots etc are much more common then mutants throughout the game.

On other hand making most in-game scenes dim and poorly lit we tried to reproduce the atmosphere of dark future where Scorpion is set, give the player the feel of danger and suspense. Even luxurious Zenith (corporation-antagonist) bosses’ estates share the same approach to lightning, making them look decadent and depraved.

GT: How have you pushed the First Person Shooter experience?

AB: The main focus of the Scorpion is a compilation of several well-known elements into one whole thing. They are: main character with special abilities; stealth action elements; and intelligent, FEAR-like AI with minimal plot scripting. Let’s take a look on them.

Player’s special abilities are aimed to enhance gameplay experience, give to the player more tools and toys for every in-game situation. It’s like second arsenal, filled more with tricks rather than raw firepower. Abilities in Scorpion are divided into two large sections – based on hero psy-powers and powered by his armor. You’ll find quite familiar abilities, like time compression or shields, alongside with brand-new things for the genre, like Mind Control (allows you to make temporary allies from enemies) or Heightened Senses (allows you to ‘feel’ enemies in space and know are they aware of you or not). As hero’s abilities are most important element in the gameplay, I’ll tell more on them later.

As Scorpion represents the situation where you are fighting against powerful organization in and around its own headquarters, you can expect very heavy resistance. In many cases brute force is not an option – and here comes stealth. Like in many stealth action titles you can hide in shaded or dark places and silently sneak past enemies. Of course as this is not only focus of the game, system is simplified. Stealth is another tool we are offering to the player, powerful but not ultimate. And no, one can’t expect to stealth-run through whole content

And last but not least – AI. Your enemies can use objects, both static and dynamic, for cover, and retreat when wounded. Many types of the enemies know how to work in groups and support each other; know when to use fragmentation and smoke grenades and how to avoid yours. They all have individual senses so they hear and spot you fairly when you are hiding. Every combat decision is AI decision. This means that you’ll never face same challenge like in heavily-scripted titles, and every single encounter will have very different dynamics on consecutive tries.

In conclusion, we are not bringing to the market many unique gameplay elements, but we offering unique mix of well known elements instead, as well as some distinctive gameplays.

GT: Are the supernatural abilities of the players going to really enhance the gameplay above and beyond what has already been done before?

AB: We see the player’s supernatural abilities as one of the most important aspects of the Scorpion. Thus, the game is designed so that player must use his entire supernatural arsenal to survive. Of course at first, when his Psy is weak, he must rely on normal weapons, gadgets and medi-kits more then on his abilities. Further in the game the relative weight of abilities grows, they become more and more important, and near the final roles change – player must rely on his powers, supporting them with other resources.

There are 9 abilities character will get access to during the game. They cover all basic needs as direct damage, support and healing abilities are present. While player progresses through the game, his Psy-energy pool grows, allowing him to use more abilities in combat or create combinations to further enhance his gameplay experience. The usage of psy-powers becomes truly crucial when player encounters his main enemies – ‘Hounds’, special forces of Zenith, who possess their own supernatural arsenal.

By the way, the whole idea of supernatural abilities is perfectly adjusted with cyberpunk ideology. In classic cyberpunk we can see opposition of the personality and corporations-ruled society. In the game player’s supernatural abilities, their development, are underlining main character’s personality, bringing him aside and above the mass of his enemies. They are result of the conflict with Zenith and they are main tools of resolving this conflict at the same time.

GT: What did you do to ramp up the AI in the game?

AB: Answer is pretty simple: we combined Kynapse Kynogon and creativity of our programming team.

From the early stages of development we were aimed on creating intelligent, dangerous opposition to the player. At the moment, we have three generalized types of enemies present – low-intelligent monsters (guard dogs, mutants of all kinds, unfinished clones etc) whose actions are based on primitive instincts; moderately-intelligent combat robots, who act in quite predictable manner; and Zenith troops. The last are representing the most dangerous enemies in the game.

As I’ve said earlier, bots can use static and dynamic objects for cover, support each other with fire and grenades (and later in the game with psy-powers), flank and encircle player to drive him out of safe positions and so on. AI can adapt to players actions in combat, changing its battle-plans on-the-flight, so you’ll never see two similar battles even on same spot. As a result, our combat AI is as good if not better then famous FEAR AI is.

On the other side of the coin are enemies’ stealth-detection capabilities. Each enemy character has individual senses that depend on his type and equipment (as various characters can have various gear – noctorovisors, flashlights, movement scanners and noise detectors etc that you actually can see on their models). They react on noises and spotted movement differently, so prowling to the trooper who is watching TV and sneaking past patrol on alert will be very different experience.

GT: Can we expect any interesting add-ons or multiplayer features which might present players with a completely different experience to the game?

AB: In the Scorpion there is no multiplayer at this moment, and we are not going to include it to release version either. We are thinking about the add-on already but it’s too early to speak about it yet. Only one thing that I can tell for sure – if we will add multiplayer, it will be added in the add-on.

GT: Have there been any moments in development where things really came together for you?

AB: Well, I think our team had many ‘Eureka!’ moments. They are always spontaneous, can happen in any situation. Think anyone knew that feeling when you are doing something and giving to the task everything you can and then it comes, like flash of light – bang! This is it! Gotcha!

And after each situation like that we’re feeling that Scorpion becomes better and better.

GT: Are there any parts of your team that have been working far in excess of expectations?

AB: I’m glad that you asked this question, and I want to use this opportunity to thank our programmer’s squad in public for their diligence and hard work. We are proud to have them in our team.

GT: Have there been any huge obstacles that you didn’t expect come up?

AB: Unfortunately, the answer is yes. When Scorpion team was formed, we’ve hired many veterans of Ukrainian game industry. To our huge disappointment soon we have found that brilliant looking portfolio and rich CV not always means fast and high-quality work for some people. It has forced our management to discharge those people and start to look for replacement. Can’t say it was positive for the game production. But now it’s in the past.

GT: When can we expect a demo?

AB: This looks more like a question to our publishers. But if it will be decided to make public demo, its release date will be announced.

GT: Anything else you’d like to add?

AB: I want to thank you for the interview; it was a pleasure to answer your questions. But despite we have covered many topics, there are many still untouched – and I’ll be glad to further extend our conversation. Hope to see you again soon!

Me, I’m not much into MMOs. But I have been saying for awhile that Tabula Rasa looks like it could be the one to break me into the genre. After sitting down with April Burba, the community manager for the game, for a few minutes at PAX last week, I’m even more convinced that this game will change the traditional formula for MMOs. I also got a chance to get some hand-on time with the game, which only confirmed this even more. The game plays like a fusion of so many genres in one that calling it an MMORPG only covers part of the gameplay. You can read the full interview after the break.

GT: So what can you tell you tell me about Tabula Rasa?

Well, it’s a near-future, science fiction, massively multiplayer, online action role-playing game. The general backstory is that an evil alien race known as the Bane has attacked the Earth, and I’m sorry to say that we didn’t get to keep the Earth. So some of us who are lucky have escaped onto other planets, and we have joined with other races in an effort to try and keep the Bane from taking over the entire galaxy.

GT: So how did your team approach this project? Did you start with the story and then work on gameplay or the other way around?

The name “Tabula Rasa” actually means “blank slate” in latin and that was kind of the approach that the initial development team really took: Richard [Garriot], Starr [Long], and these guys were like, “Let’s start over.” The genre has kind of been building on certain principles since the UO [Ultima Online] era. UO, Everquest: they kind of built on really the same ideas. Let’s start over; let’s think about what we like from those games and what we don’t like from those games and let’s try to build something new. So the original idea was less about fiction and more about gameplay dynamics and design and picking out unique features to talk about. What do we hate about these games? We hate all the travel time; we hate running everywhere. We hate the fact that you just click on a bad guy and then you’re actually clicking on your UI [user interface] the entire time; we hate that. And so it was all about how can we change that? And once those decisions were made, there were some systems that were designed and then it was like, “Okay, now let’s go for the story and build up the rest.”

GT: Now, me personally, I’ve never played an MMO. But having said that, I am looking forward to breaking into them with this one. So would this be one for people new to the genre to approach?

I think this is a great game for people that are new to the genre, and the reason I say that is because — just what I said — the things we hate about other MMOs are things that we’re really trying to improve here. This game has such a faster pace of action; if you are a fan of shooter type games, you are really going to be a fan of Tabula Rasa. It is really that fast-paced: run and gun, going out and shooting a bunch of bad guys and blowing stuff up and having a good time that you’re actually doing. It’s not dwarves, it’s not elves. It’s humans and aliens; bad guys and shooting stuff.

GT: You mentioned the travel time, so how did you cut that down?

One of the ways we tried to cut down the travel time is we have a waypoint teleporting system. We wanted people to explore the world. We think that’s important, especially for people who like to explore a lot; we want to reward that. And so throughout the entire world, we’ve placed these teleporters. So as you’re exploring the world, you’ll find one, you’ll walk across it, and you’ll add it to your list. Then every time you find one of those, you can go onto a teleporter and go to any of the destinations you’ve already been at any time. No cost, instant travel, fast fast fast. So you hit a couple places, you pick up a bunch of missions, you can go out and run all the missions. Then you need to turn them all back in, so you hit one spot with a teleporter and then boom boom boom, turn all your missions in, grab all your stuff, and then get back out into the action.

GT: Speaking of action, what sort of changes did you make to the combat model as opposed to other MMOs?

Well, a traditional MMO combat model is that I’m going use my mouse pointer to click on the bad guy to target him or maybe use TAB or something. And then I’m going to click the icons in my icon tray that represent powers or abilities or weapons, and I’m going to watch those as I click. And we’re going to do that until one of us dies. in Tabula Rasa, we actually built the UI so you’re looking through your weapon reticle, and you’re moving the camera with your mouse; so your head is up and looking at the game. You’re left mouse fires your weapon, your right mouse fires your abilities; so you’re not even looking at the icons on the screen, you’re looking at the action, and its a much faster pace. It’s none of this standing there and clicking buttons. You’re moving around, trying to get a tactical advantage. You can use cover, you can crouch, and it’s a much more traditional shooter model than it is an MMO model.

GT: What sort of elements did you put in to have people work together?

We do have a squad-based system with voice chat built into the game. So it makes it easy to hook up with people and talk while you’re looking around and all that stuff. The classes can really work together to do certain things. You’ve got some of your traditional flavors of classes; like there’s a medic-type class, and there’s more of the tank type, and stuff like that. They work together really well as a team. And we kind of designed some of the spaces as our giant storytelling area that play more like a single-person console game — with the story elements and how interactive you are with your environment. It’s a more descriptive kind of a situation inside those spaces, and those spaces are a lot of fun to go into with other people. We kind of built the difficulty around a group-based situation. Now if you wanted to solo that you could, but you just want to be a couple levels higher. We also have Clan vs. Clan PVP, so we do have a clan system for that larger social aspect. And we’re working on building some pretty cool community tools for people; not only for us to use in-game for events and that kind of thing, but also for players to use to make their own events

GT: I know the game’s not out yet, but do you already have plans to expand this universe?

We do. There’s a lot of ways we could go for expansion-type content. We haven’t really announced anything yet, but there have been a lot of different things that people have asked for that we’re like, “In an expansion, in an expansion.” People want to drive the mechs — there are giant mechs in the game that have jet packs on them. People are like, “Ooh!” and we’re like, “In an expansion.” We can add planets, we can add levels, we can add classes, we can add new races; there are no bounds. And that’s the great thing about an MMO is it’s just going to get better; there’s just going to be more stuff. I mean, I look at city of heroes three years after it launched, and the difference between the day it launched and now? Night and day.

GT: So is there anything else you think people should know?

Well, I will say that our pre-order box is out on store shelves, so you can pick that up. It actually does get you into the beta so if you’re interested in getting into the beta that’s a way you can get in. We’re in closed beta right now, but you can get in by getting a pre-order if you’re over 18. And we just announced the Collector’s Edition and all the stuff that’s in that box, so you can pre-order that as well. So yeah, we’re getting pretty close. We’re going to release in the fall.

TellTale Games showed up at PAX this year with a new demo and some info regarding the next season of their popular Sam and Max adventure series. I got a chance to talk with Emily Morganti, the Marketing and Public Relations at TellTale, about what’s new with Sam and Max: Season Two. First she showed me a demo for Season Two, which included some familiar faces (Bosco, Sybil, Abe Lincoln’s head) as well as some new ones, like Stinky, the eccentric waitress in the new diner area (shown above). She also showed me a couple of new gameplay features, like Sam’s ability to run now, and the inclusion of some new mini-games; one of which involves a Punch Out-style boxing match between a rat and a creepy robot doll. All this was dripping with the trademark Sam and Max humor and had some genuine laugh-out-loud moments. After that, we sat down to discuss lessons learned from Season One and what fans can expect to see in Season Two. Full interview after the jump and be sure to check out some new screens that Chris wrote about.

GT: So tell me what you guys have done different this season as opposed to last season.

Well, on a technical level, there’s basically some of the stuff I showed you: you can run now, we’ve tried to work on some better controls in the driving to make it work better for people. We really listened to the feedback about Sybil and Bosco being plot devices as opposed to being just characters. So rather than them just having a shtick that’s kind of the same every episode, we’re trying to give them more of a storyline of their own. Sybil gets out of the office; Bosco gets out of the store. You’ll find they’re more like living creatures with their own things going on.

We’ve got a hint system that we’ve implemented, and we’re kind of hesitant to call it a “hint system,” because a lot of adventure gamers are like, “I don’t want a hint system.” The way that you got hints in Season One would be just to ask Max, and he’d tell you. It might be kind of a riddle, but he would still tell you what to do; and we felt like that took the player out of the experience of playing the game. So what we’ve done in Season Two is a bit more organic. If you have the hint system turned on — and it’s got different levels of how much it helps you — and you’ve spent a long time in a place and you haven’t really done anything, Max will offer a little nudge. And he just says it, so we’re trying to make it more like the game is just pointing you in the right direction without being too obvious and without having the player ask for it. But you can turn it off too. So you can have it in stages, or you can just turn it off completely. That’s one thing that I’m really interested to see how people react too.

GT: You guys were the first to really pull off the episodic gaming model really well, so are you going to make any tweaks to that model or keep it pretty much the same?

It’s pretty much the same; our development schedule is the same. We kind of work on multiple episodes at a time at different stages, so that’s something that we’re continuing. The episodes are still going to be coming out roughly a month apart, with the exception of [episodes] one and two. There might be a longer gap between those two just because it helps us ramp up. There’s more work that goes into making episode one than making the rest. We definitely learned from the experience of doing Season One, and I think we’re just in a position now where we’ve done it once so we kind of know what we’re doing. I don’t know if I’d say it makes everything go more smoothly, but at least it’s a known. I think we’re all pretty comfortable that we know how to do this now, and it seems to be working, so we’re going to keep doing it.

GT: Are the episodes going to be any longer?

I think they’re going to be about the same length. It’s interesting, we found that when they were coming out individually, that was usually the complete experience that most people would have. Especially in reviews too: ‘It’s great; it was just too short.’ [Season One] has been collected now into a retail product, and people are now reviewing the retail product; and I haven’t seen anyone complain about that. It’s just interesting to see what people expect and how they react to the game based on what those expectations are. We always planned to make games that took about four hours to play. If you’ve got a game coming out every month, it’s kind of hard to make it longer than that because people don’t finish [the first one] before the next one comes. So that was always our intention, and we did definitely see people say ‘I wish it was longer’; but we didn’t actually set out to make a longer game.

GT: I actually kind of liked it that way, because when I sat down and played an episode, I kind of knew what I was getting into. It was like watching a TV show.

Exactly, and you have some hope of finishing it in the time frame you set out for.

GT: Rather than just devoting hours and hours to it.

Exactly, and maybe never getting to the end because you don’t have time or you lose interest or whatever. That doesn’t happen with these games.

GT: So I guess you have plans to make a retail version of this season already in the works?

I think it’s definitely something we want to do again. It makes sense if you think of the game kind of like a TV show. A TV show comes out on DVD at the end [of a season] and people buy it. So far the retail is working great, because it’s reaching a different audience. You can buy this game at Wal-Mart, and those same people who are buying it at Wal-Mart are not the same people who subscribe to GameTap or look up Telltale’s website. So it reaches a different audience, and I think it kind of helps. Every time an episode comes out, we get a boost in sales for the previous episodes. It raises awareness, and the retail product is just an exception to that. It comes out and raises awareness about all of Season One and also Season Two. Now people who didn’t know there was a Sam and Max game at all know to look for Season Two.

GT: You mentioned when you were showing me the demo that the writer from episode four is doing the whole season now?

Well, he’s working working with Telltale full time now. He’s probably our one full-time writer; the rest of our writers divide their time up between writing and game design. So he’s not the only person writing Season Two, but he’s kind of a main player in writing the scripts. That’s Chuck Jordan. He wrote “Abe Lincoln Must Die,” and he also was very involved in writing The Curse of Monkey Island, so he’s been around.

GT: Those are definitely some good titles to have in your background. Now I grew up with Sam and Max, so I have to ask: how closely has Steve Purcell been working with Season Two? I know he was fairly involved with Season One.

Like with Season One, his main involvement is at the beginning, where he helps us establish the story in broad strokes and also the recurring characters; what they’re going to look like. He does a lot of concept art for us. Stinky, the waitress in the diner, was completely Steve’s design. So yeah, he’s pretty involved. He kind of does the damage control to make sure that what we come up with is going to work in Sam and Max’s world. Then he unleashes us and lets us take that where we want to take it. One of the many nice things about Steve is that he has a job at Pixar, he lives in northern California, and our office is between them. So basically he drives home from work and our office is on the way. As many times as we can get him to just stop by and bounce ideas off of him, we do that. He’s very busy with his job, and he has a wife and kids; but he’s also really involved, which has been nice. I’ve heard Dave Grossman, our design director, say that Steve is one of the most accessible license-holders he’s ever worked with; which is saying a lot because Dave’s worked with some big licenses.

GT: It sounds like you guys have a lot of fun working on these games.

(laughs) Yeah, I think we do.

GT: Do you have any ideas when you’re going to start releasing the first episodes for Season Two?

We have ideas, but we haven’t announced anything yet. We’re kind of nailing down a release date.

GT: This year? Next year?

It’ll be this year. We’re nailing down with GameTap exactly when its going to be. We’re probably going to make an announcement next month about that. Something we’re doing different is that — last season GameTap had a 15-day exclusivity on new episodes — this year it’s a one-day exclusivity. So it’s going to be getting out to people who don’t have GameTap a lot faster than it used to. So it’s coming soon.