Pacing
Even with this focus on exploration and puzzle-solving, Joe
and the CME team really want to keep the pacing of the game relatively
high. While the modern combat system lends for a relatively high-energy
style of gameplay, that quick pacing is necessary in the rest of the
game for the players to remain engaged and not want to simply shoot bad
guys all day.
“That’s why the users are constantly
moving through things and finding answers to problems, because we have
to keep the pace of the game constantly at that high-level,”
Joe said. “There are really two strategic reasons why this is
important to us. First, if I’m going to build all this
content, I want the customers to see it.”
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Pacing is important to Ybarra. It needs to remain as
fast as the combat.
“The other thing is – staying with the
economics of building this thing – my live team
doesn’t need to be focused on just expanding one section of
the gameplay,” Joe continued. “Players are going to
be playing at various levels, so the live team can drop content in at
whatever level they feel needs the most work.”
With a background as rich and diverse as the Stargate series,
it’s no wonder that the game developers would want to have
players experience all that the game has to offer. They’ve
put in time and energy into seeing the game succeed, and the fans will
want to see the world just as much as the developers want them to see
it.
Tying Back Into the Series
Speaking of the fans, while he was talking Joe brought up a
very intriguing point about the future of the game. Although much of
their game is based on actual selections from the TV series, some of
what Joe and the CME team are working on is original content within the
Stargate universe. Since the game is backward looking, the producers of
the TV series are actually interested in having the CME team put
particular items from the upcoming series and Stargate Atlantis into
the Stargate Worlds game.
On an even more exciting note, there may be some original
Stargate Worlds
content being integrated into the new series.
“They’ve actually requested some content from our
game to be used in their shows,” Joe said. “In
exchange for that, they want to put something really solid and
recognizable from our game into the pilot of the new show.”
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The Stargate folks want to the series and the game
together to make a cohesive world.
And post-launch, this tieback into the show is going to be
even more reinforced. “Players will be able to see certain
items, races, or locations and know they came straight out of the
game,” Joe said. “We want to reinforce to the
players that we’re releasing two products at once: A game and
a new show.”
“Even farther out of launch, we’d really
like to translate content between the game and the show in
real-time,” Joe added. “When something new is
opened up in the series, we’ll put it into the game and vice
versa.”
Updates on the Game
According to Joe, there may be some new content going out soon
on one of the storyline progressions in the game. This particular
storyline focuses on the eventual destruction of Tolana and how this
looks from the development standpoint. Developing Tolana was important
because it helped refine the development of the worlds through each
Stargate coordinate and it really emphasized the storylines from the
show.
“Tolana is actually visited in three different
stages during play,” Joe said. “You start off in
Tolana and it looks great. Everything is very advanced and new; nothing
is wrong with the world. You come back to Tolana later and
it’s being assaulted by the Goa’uld.
There’s all this stuff going on, explosions and fire-fighting
are rampant. Lots of action.”
“Finally, the third time you visit Tolana, it is
destroyed. There’s nothing left but rubble,” Joe
finished. Hopefully we’ll be getting some screenshots from
this progression soon, because it sounds amazing!
Final Comments
That’s all folks! We finished up our interview with
Joe and I would just like to thank him again for a spectacular
interview experience. With all this new information, Stargate fans
should be drooling with anticipation.
I know I am.
Click OGDC
here to read the Stargate World Interview - Part One.
Make sure you check out the
rest of our OGDC
'07 coverage!
To read the latest guides, news, and features you can visit our Stargate Worlds Game Page.
