September 21, 2009

Dead Space: Extraction Conference Call

"There are times when we want to knock you on the ground and give you a view in the world that you never get in the game."

Last year's Dead Space was an unexpected gem for many gamers, presenting a refreshingly fun and intense take on the survival horror genre and the sci-fi action genre as well. Now, EA and developer Visceral Games are getting ready to move the series in a new direction with the first Wii entry to the Dead Space franchise, Dead Space Extraction. Not a straight port, Extraction is a whole new entry to the franchise, functioning as a prequel to the original game. The game also features completely different gameplay from the original Dead Space, capitalizing on the Wii's motion controller to create a rail shooting experience with quite a bit more depth than other entries to the franchise.

Last week, the team at Visceral hosted a conference call between members of the development crew and members of the press. GameZone was allowed to sit in on this call and partake in some questioning for the team, as they fielded a variety of questions concerning the game's creation. The questions were submitted by media members before the event and read off to the team members to be answered. The members of the development team that fielded our questions were: Steve Papoutsis (Executive Producer), Wright Bagwell (Creative Director), John Calhoun (Senior Designer), Jonathan Hackett (Art Lead/Direction), and Shereif Fattouh (Associate Producer).

The call began with a question about the game's storyline, namely how it tied together with the characters, including Isaac and Nicole, from the original game. The team tried to avoid being too specific with the story elements so as not to spoil anything, and instead spoke about how the game would tie into the original game in the broader sense. "This game takes place three weeks before Dead Space and dovetails the event that took place in the animated feature [Dead Space: Downfall] and the comic books," said Calhoun. "But the main character that appears in both Dead Space Extraction is Nicole. We don't get to see what happens to her, because of the way our timeline intersects with the first Dead Space, but we do get to see what she was like as a person before the infection broke out." As far as the other main characters in the original game, Calhoun did not want to mention any outright spoilers, but he did say that the three leads (Isaac, Kendra and Hammond) would have something to do with a surprise for Dead Space fans.

Next, Shereif Fattouh answered a question about the challenges of bringing the Dead Space experience to the Wii. "The obvious thing with that question is the hardware limitations in some ways of the Wii versus the 360 and PS3, but on the flipside you have a lot of unique mechanics that were important for us to design from the ground up for the Wii," Fattouh said. "We were happy with the graphical fidelity we got out of the Wii; if you look at other Wii titles, I think we were pretty proud of what we were able to put out there."

Fattouh stated that the important core mechanics, including the strategic dismemberment system from the original game, were the biggest things to make sure to bring over to the Wii, but the system added for both some unique challenges and opportunities. "There were challenges, obviously, from our standpoint, but there were a lot of bonuses too that we got from working on the Wii and having the motion controls, taking advantage of the hardware that was there."

The team also fielded a question about the game's rail shooting mechanics and FPS elements, and why they opted to create a rail shooter as opposed to a full-blown FPS experience. "We decided to go with the on-rail shooter approach, or what we call a 'guided first-person' experience, because we had some very core focal points when we kicked off the project," said Papoutsis. "Those included creating a very deep and rich feeling experience that resonated with Dead Space fans. We found the big key things to making Dead Space originally were having great atmosphere, great visuals, great sound and of course, strategic dismemberment."

Papoutsis went on to state that creating the game on-rails allowed the team some control when it came to showing the player exactly what they wanted them to see, maximizing the visual element of the game. "It also helped make strategic dismemberment feel really satisfying," said Papoutsis. "It connected the players greatly with their controls, so that was the motivation there."

On the topic of controls, Wright Bagwell stated that the team had considered several different possibilities when creating the game's control scheme, including a more traditional original Dead Space feel. "We did talk a little bit early on about trying to bring over the controls directly from Dead Space 1, or make it FPS," said Bagwell. "We realized that one of the great things about being on the Wii is that it can do things that the other platforms can't, and that's really what we wanted to focus on."

As the game is on the Wii, a console that is oft-maligned (arguably unfairly) as a "kiddie platform", the Dead Space Extraction team were asked whether or not they had to dial back the blood and gore. However, regardless of the console's status in the public eye, Jonathan Hackett stated that they absolutely did not have to. "The short answer to that question is no, we did not have to dial back any blood and gore," said Hackett. "You're going to find that Dead Space Extraction is just as bloody and violent as Dead Space 1 was. For people that really like that visceral experience of seeing things ripped apart, this is definitely going to satisfy you."

The team was also asked about the amount of freedom that they had to explore the Dead Space universe, as well as how much freedom they had with the IP to tell their side of it. "One of the things about working on an original IP is that we had all the freedom in the world, and even better one of the cool things about working on Dead Space is that it has a story bible that dates back two-hundred years," said Calhoun. "So, the real challenge was just figuring out in the timeline where we wanted to be. In Dead Space 1 we kind of teased the fact that the whole Necromorph invasion started at the extraction hole, so we decided to tell that story."

The team also talked about horror films that they derived inspiration for when developing the project. While many of the same films that inspired the first Dead Space played a part in the development in the Wii game, there were some new sources of inspiration that helped define the game's atmosphere and visual aesthetic. "We started thinking about films like The Blair Witch Project and Cloverfield, where I thought they did some nice clever things with the first-person camera," said Bagwell. "We wanted to try to imitate some of the things that they did. For example, we wanted to make the camera feel like you were scared, so when your player's in a situation where he's feeling paranoid the camera's a little bit more twitchy, a little bit more nervous. There are times when we want to knock you on the ground and give you a view in the world that you never get in the game."

Given the Wii's lack of horsepower when compared with competing consoles, the team were asked if they had to make any compromises when approximating the visuals for the Wii version. "The Wii is certainly a different beast, especially when it comes to developing on the 360 or PS3," Hackett said. "Were there concessions that had to be made? Yeah, in the sense that you can't have the same amount of polys, same shaders, things like that. That being said, I think that the Wii is graphically a much stronger machine than people give it credit for. I think the graphics are going to surprise a lot of people; I don't think anyone is going to have any complaints about this game not looking like Dead Space."

When asked about the game's weapons and how this dynamic of the gameplay switched between the survival-horror genre to the shooter genre, Bagwell noted some of the most key differences. "We brought over a lot of the weapons from Dead Space 1 and we added a few weapons that I think do some pretty cool new stuff," Bagwell said. "We've given you probably a bit more ammo than in Dead Space 1, since you can't turn and run when you run out of ammo in this game, so we had to make sure that the players weren't frustrated in this situation. But we had to make sure that you felt pressure to conserve ammunition and you felt pressure to scour the world to find ammunition. I think part of the gameplay is keeping an eye out in the world for things that will be helpful for you."

The team spoke on some of the gameplay connections that players of the first game will experience while playing through the prequel. "It is a brand new story and we're really excited to add all of these new characters to the Dead Space franchise. But that being said, there's a lot of homages to the first Dead Space, particularly in the puzzles and actions that you do in the Ishimura that will have a direct impact on Isaac Clarke," Calhoun said. "You get this experience of coming before Isaac, and when you play both games, it gives you a real satisfying connection, kind of like 'Oh yeah, I did that! Sorry, Isaac, but I kind of screwed you over.'"

The team also addressed the branching path mechanic in the game. "You're going to come to points in the world where you're going to be able to decide which path you want to choose, and choosing any one of those paths takes you to a completely different environment," Fattouh said. "It's pretty fun, because each one will be a different thing and it ups the replay as well, since once you choose to go down a certain path, you're going to be locked down to that path for the remainder of the playthrough, so there are benefits to going back and seeing what you may have missed before."

Thanks to the team at Visceral Games for setting up the call and having us along!

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