Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

The CEO of game development studio Monte Cristo, Jérome Gastaldi, recently took some time to sit down with Ten Ton Hammer to answer a slew of questions about their upcoming game, Cities XL. For all the gamers out there that have spent countless hours designing their cities, amusement parks, and more, this game is right up your alley. The project looks to be a massive endeavor, but the results so far speak for themselves. Monte Cristo is one of the reigning champions in the city building genre and they're looking to set the bar higher again once more..

Thanks again to Jérome for the great answers provided!

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The view is amazing!

Ten Ton Hammer: For those that may not be familiar with CITIES XL, can you give us a brief description of the game and what it's all about?

Jérome Gastaldi: CITIES XL is a true next generation City Builder. We added many features to the genre that allows us to say this with confidence! For example, we created a unique 3D engine that lets you see and manage your city from regular top down views, but with which you can also zoom to street level and roam around freely in your city and explore like a regular pedestrian. The fantastic graphics enhance the immersion even more!

We also expanded upon the gameplay of the genre by adding what we call GEMs (Gameplay Extension Modules) which will see full Tycoon games added to CITIES XL. Our first GEMs are the Ski resort and Beach, and we have another dozen, such as Airport, Theme Park or Transport tycoons being worked on for future releases.

But our biggest innovation lies in the Planet Offer, which is our online mode, where players can build cities on large planets and interact with each other through exchanges and project creation. The social aspect that this brings to the game is enormous and very motivating.

Ten Ton Hammer: The size and scope of this project appear quite daunting from the outside. When was the concept initially envisioned and at what point in time did you think the technology had caught up to your vision?

Jérome Gastaldi: We started working on the project back in 2006, after the release of City Life. We had so many ideas that we just couldn’t integrate into City Life because of the existing technology and the development cycle of the product. So we kept them aside and asked ourselves, “Do we want to make a sequel like we are used to, or do we want to make our ideas work and launch this big innovative project?” We chose the latter and started working on the concept of what a next gen city builder should be. Things have been shaping up nicely since! The technology and market maturity in terms of online and social aspects also help us develop the project to its full potential.

Ten Ton Hammer: For those that choose the Planet Option (the online aspect of the game), what kind of schedule do you envision for getting new content updates out to the players?

Jérome Gastaldi: Big updates every quarter, smaller updates each month, or something else entirely?  We have always been very honest with our community in terms of planning and updates on our content. We’ve said so far that for release we will have a full and solid city builder game, with over 500 buildings and gigantic maps, and the Ski and Beach resorts GEM should be available. For the content that will come afterwards, we plan to release for free some buildings and features, and have others released for a certain price. But nothing is fixed yet in terms of dates and pricing. We want to take the right time to finish an item, test its gameplay and time value and determine what’s the best way to deliver it to players. So saying that we will have free updates every quarter and payable updates every year is just not possible. We might be able to release two GEMs in three months, and then wait a bit more to release one massive GEM with new building packs. We will see how our community responds!

Your inner architect will love you.

Ten Ton Hammer: Will those players that stick with the single player version of the game have access to any of the new content updates? Will it be offered for free, or will they need to pay for some (or all) of it?

Jérome Gastaldi: Yes, if you play only the solo version of the game, you will have access to most of the content available for the Planet Offer. For both versions, some content will be free and some will be purchasable, it will be totally up to you to decide how you want to keep playing CITIES XL and expand your experience. 
 
Ten Ton Hammer: The potential of the GEMs planned for the game looks impressive. Can you briefly describe this system for our readers? Will there be a limitation to the number of GEMs a player can purchase?

Jérome Gastaldi: There will be no limitation to the numbers of GEMs players can have. How these work is actually pretty simple. You purchase a GEM like you would buy a “Tycoon” game, and you can then launch CITIES XL, switch to the GEM mode and start playing with it right away! If you want to play the Ski GEM, you simply have to choose a location with mountains nearby. Other GEMs/Tycoons can be integrated to your city (Zoo or Airports, for ex.), so you can use these in your existing cities. You can think of it as add-ons, but they are so much more than that because it’s a new game within the same CITIES XL framework, and the possibilities it adds to both the solo and online mode are huge.

Ten Ton Hammer: Two particular GEMs planned for the game (and highlighted here on the CitiesXL.com website) are the Ski and Seaside Resorts. Can you reveal any others that are being planned for release, or ones that you'd like to see offered later in the game's lifetime?

Jérome Gastaldi: We plan to release Tycoons that are people’s favorites, such as Theme Park, Airport or Transportation. We also have in mind others such as the automobile industries, but we want to keep the rest a bit secret for now!

Time to hit the slopes!

Ten Ton Hammer: When players give up that coveted CEO belt in one GEM to hop into another, is there a method in place to keep the other GEMs (and general city content) running smoothly, or will players need to do a lot of micromanaging to avoid any disasters? If disasters are possible in other section of CITIES XL while the player is busy with one aspect, will the game notify them in some way?

Jérome Gastaldi: If you decide to play another GEM and ‘forget’ about the previous one, it will not stop from running smoothly instantly. We really don’t want to force players to be overwhelmed with too many things to deal with. Nevertheless it will still be better to manage your GEMs and your city as much as you can, but disasters won’t occur if you don’t play for a few days. The economic activity will slow down a bit over time, but penalizing players too brutally just wouldn’t be fair. If anything goes wrong with your city, you will be notified.

Ten Ton Hammer: Everything we've seen so far takes place on planets with architecture taken from various cultures in the world. Have there been any talks or ideas about eventually expanding the game into space, with colonies or space stations? 

Jérome Gastaldi: Yes, actually it’s an idea that has come up several times from our internal teams and community. Right now it is not planned to have these at release, but we could have a Lunar or Martian landscape in the future. If we think its fun and that it really adds something to the game, why not!

Continue on to Part II here!