ONM: Red Steel 2 has been rumoured for a long time - how long has it been in the works?
Jason Vandenberghe
JV: The Red Steel team has existed since Red Steel 1, but for most of the years in between there was a long pre-production process where we were looking for something new. We were looking for the right way to really cross over and make a really great game, and the moment we got MotionPlus that was when we knew we had it. Production began in earnest last summer when we first got our MotionPlus dev kits.
ONM: How much has the arrival of MotionPlus transformed the game?
JV: Oh utterly. MotionPlus is the beating heart of Red Steel 2. It's what we needed to make the gameplay we wanted. When we got hold of the technology it became clear that we had something really cool and that it was enough to build the game around and shift the game away from the shooting side of things. Obviously we'll have guns in it but swordfighting will be the main thing.
ONM: Isn't it easier to just go through the game shooting people?
JV: I don't want to make people play any certain way - if you want to go through the game relying heavily on the gun you can do that, but you can't shoot through certain armour so you have to use the sword. We have a variety of different ways to head into combat. What we're trying to do is encourage the player to work out cool solutions using both weapons. What we've found is that you don't really have to convince people to use the sword - it's fun. You'll also find that our arena sizes range from medium to smaller sized areas so it's a lot harder to use the gun as the primary weapon. There's also the fact you can't defend yourself with the gun. If you have two or three enemies attacking you, you must use the sword to protect yourself and keep moving.
ONM: What about the missions themselves? How will the player progress?
JV: What we have are hub maps. We have linear stages which are challenge-based and you follow a brief, and then there are these more open hub areas which you open up as you bring your enemies to justice. Those will branch out into different maps, and once you progress you move hub worlds. Our ambition is to create a non-linear story, but it's not open world. Missions vary from level to level - if we were talking more about the setting then I could tell you more. Each of the objectives will be connected to the player and being the hero. You have a degree of latitude there in terms of the kind of hero you want to be.
ONM: Will you use MotionPlus to introduce non-combat uses of the technology?
JV: Oh yeah, as many as we can get into the game. It's very, very interesting what the Wii MotionPlus can do. We want people to manipulate a lot of things. We call them 'game breakers' - the chance to do something cool that's outside the core gameplay. We'll definitely make it worth you investing in that little magic cube.
ONM: What can you tell us about the additional abilities as the game progresses?
JV: For now let's just say that the player will advance in terms of power and there will be stuff like different levels of blocking and accessing areas that you haven't been able to before. But we can't talk about that just yet.
ONM: What about multiplayer? No mention of that so far...
JV: We would love to create a multiplayer engine but not right now. It's single player because we want to really focus on the core mechanic and as much as we all want to kill each other with swords, it's not going to happen this time.
ONM: What about releasing a multiplayer mode later on through WiiWare?
JV: That would be cool. The world has changed and we can do that sort of thing. I certainly think that that would be cool. I'd buy it. But we need to be careful in bringing something out that people think should be in the box with the main game.
ONM: What's it like working with MotionPlus?
JV: It's incredibly satisfying - really exciting. I've been working in games for 12 years and this is the first time that I feel we're going to give the fans something really cool that they've never seen before. And I genuinely mean that. It's not just marketing bullshit - this is something new that you've never done before and it's really fun. It's a great feeling to be able to say that.
Und spielen konnte man das auch schon auf der E³ 