Microsoft did a good job of hyping me up for Crackdown 2 back at E3 without actually saying a damn thing about the game itself. Mostly they accomplished that with the following trailer.
Now Edge has swooped in and nabbed an interview with some of the guys at Ruffian, the team doing this sequel, in order to fill in some of the blanks. First off, I was surprised at exactly how many members of the Ruffian team came from Realtime Worlds, where they also worked on the first game.
How much of the original Crackdown team is working on the sequel?
BT Close to half of our team worked on the original game. We’ve got core members from every discipline who worked on it, the majority of the design team, and, depending on whom you speak to, some of the best coders and most talented artists.
So the sequel is probably in good hands. It will also have a refreshed urban environment for you to get all supersoldier in, according to this quote.
What’s the make-up of Crackdown 2? Is it a different game in the same city?
BT From an environmental point of view, you probably would look at it as being an entirely new map. It’s still Pacific City but further on in the timeline. We’ve altered a great deal, and think people who enjoyed the first game are going to be really pleased when they enter this one. And we’ve made sure the gameplay’s altered significantly.
Swell! I'm also stoked that Ruffian is addressing one of my biggest complaints about the first game: its lack of direction. Being able to tackle all those bosses in any order you wanted was cool and all, but there needs to be some kind of narrative meat filled in around the edges of the action. And it sounds like there may be.
Not everyone connected with the freeform nature of the original. Will the sequel feature more visible characters and interactions?
BT One thing we’re not getting caught up in is dialogue-driven cutscenes. It’s not what we do and we’ve no business going towards that kind of thing. If we got dragged into the fight that’s going on between other games in this genre, I think that’d be a bad move. We’ll definitely have variation with the objectives and push forward with the freeform structure; we don’t just want ‘find-the-boss, kill-the-boss’. We made the first game and we know what was lacking. We’ve listened a lot to the community and the reviews. Obviously, we can’t take every comment on board, but we’re doing our best to address the biggest issues.
JC A few of us found it difficult to deal with the fact that a lot of the freeform elements of the original were weak in certain areas. But we’ve learned from that. Billy won’t say this himself but he has an incredibly strong vision of what Crackdown 2 is. Moving the original on with that we believe was an incredibly powerful and important piece of DLC – that kind of evolution is something we’re keen to pursue.
OK. Yes, I'm onboard. These guys seem to know what needs to happen with this sequel. Who else is chomping at the bit to get back in there and start tearing it up in Pacific City again?
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