Next-Gen spoke with Grand Theft Auto creator Dave Jones about his upcoming Xbox 360 game Crackdown, his adoration of Xbox Live, out-doing GTA and a new $31 million
investment that will let his firm make lots of cool stuff
For a game designer that has created the Grand Theft Auto and Lemmings franchises, what else is there left to do?
Jones answer: Snag a cool $31 million investment for your company and keep plugging away at two pieces of fresh IP.
Jones in fact is the person who created 1991s meandering Lemmings and the decidedly more mature GTA, which debuted in 1997.
Now hes the founder, CEO and creative director of Scotland-based Real Time Worlds, established in 2002. The next frontier for Jones and his crew is online-focused next-gen games development, initially in the form of its first title, the Microsoft-published Crackdown for the Xbox 360, and then Webzens All Points Bulletin (APB) for PC and Xbox 360.
Nearly three years into development, Crackdown almost seems like the anti-GTA: Its still a go-anywhere-do-anything sandbox-style game, but in Crackdown the main character is not the criminal sort. Instead, the game puts gamers on the other side of the law, playing the role of a super-powerful cop that has been commissioned to rid the fictional Pacific City of crime. Dont be mistakenthe protagonist is an authority figure, but as justices last resort, he can cleanse the town by whatever means necessary, so gamers shouldn't expect to be giving thugs a fair trial.
Jones told Next-Gen that the game, due out next year, is shaping up nicely. [Crackdown] is coming along really well, he said. Basically, were in the final, final stages of just bug-fixing now. We hope to have that all wrapped up over the holidays, and then launch in spring. Its not far away at all, as far as were concerned.
