Blacksite: Area 51 Interview (con't)

FiringSquad: What will the enemies be like in BlackSite?

Harvey Smith: I love providing each enemy with its own suite of game mechanics, but I also prefer to give each enemy mult-stage effects. The Reborn are the primary enemy in the game...a soldier of one program, created by the US military outside ethical norms. We also have a "Xeno Ecology" providing us with a set of unique creatures. In the Xbox Live gameplay teaser we just polished up for release, the Reborn Scout takes cover (until the cover is beaten up too much), summons additional types of Reborn, and the torso separates when the Scout finally goes down, crawling toward the player in an attempt to suicide bomb. So ideally each enemy will feature some interesting set of behaviors, and those behaviors will change the tactical situation dynamically. Very similar to the enemy design philosophy we used for Deus Ex.

FiringSquad: What can you tell us about the multiplayer support in the game?

Harvey Smith: The main thing I find interesting is two-player co-op through the missions. But Tom Bonner is our multiplayer lead and we're constantly working on a couple of traditional competitive modes as well as two modes that are unique to Blacksite, including Abduction, which involves game mechanics of changing team sizes.

FiringSquad: What other unique features will the game have?

Harvey Smith: To sum up, Blacksite is a fast-paced first-person-shooter with squad command, vehicles, and lots of destructible objects. It's got a subversive storyline, it's set in unusually grounded/realistic locations, and I love our squad morale AI system. A lot of our effort has gone into atmospherics...we're very much committed to immersive environments.

FiringSquad: How has the Unreal Engine 3 been modified for the game?

Harvey Smith: Midway has done a lot of work, scattered across various studios. We're looking to ship with more aggressive streaming, the Stranglehold breakables system and a few other features. Unreal is amazing, though, so the bulk of it didn't need to change.

FiringSquad: Are there plans for a playable demo of the game and if so what will it contain?

Harvey Smith: The current demo is more a "gameplay teaser" because it's very short. It's essentially our vertical slice, polished up some. Later, we hope to release a full demo shortly before we ship. Even since we wrapped up the vertical slice, we've gotten a bunch of features polished up: Blind-firing by the squad (in low morale), more map sections that apply "multiple path" thinking, different environments and times-of-day, more breakables technology borrowed from the Stranglehold code base, two-player co-op, etc. The later demo will also include a cinematic story scene. But the first demo feels really polished and indicates the frenetic, tactical pace of the game.

FiringSquad: Finally is there anything else you want to say about Blacksite?

Harvey Smith: It's really exciting to be working on a pure shooter. I love it. But already I can feel my extreme passion for exploration-based games pulling at the edges. I think the next game will involve a lot more exploratory space.