PALGN: It is quite a claim that M2TW may be the biggest selling PC game to have come from Australia. Why do you think this may happen?
Dan Toose: Quite simply from the orders and response from retail, the unprecedented critical acclaim for an Australian developed game, internet polls rating us as one of the most anticipated PC games of the year. Also we know what the previous Total War games sold and the fact we keep surpassing our previous sales figures with each title. Rome: Total War has shipped well over a million units to date.
PALGN: Being a studio developing its first game must be hard, what are the advantages and disadvantages?
Dan: Fortunately for us, we kept all our experienced staff from when the Australian studio was essentially playing a support role, and some of the new faces that helped flesh us out into a stand-alone studio came with experience of their own.
The main disadvantage was that growing so quickly comes with growing pains – any business that tries to triple or quadruple its staff numbers swiftly discovers that there are new management and organizational systems and challenges that have to be addressed with it.
The main advantage is that lots of new faces bring lots of new perspectives, something that is arguably even more important for a studio that is continuing work on an established series. New ideas and creative solutions appear that the old stalwarts just won’t think of, purely from established ‘good habits’.
PALGN: Your emphasis on historical accuracy is interesting. What is some of the more bizarre research the team have had to do to make sure the game is right?
Dan: The most bizarre thing I personally researched was in the significance of codpieces, as I was looking for possible objects to grant diplomats that might affect their negotiations. However I ultimately decided that simulating the cultural thinking behind groin attire fell into the realms of “unhealthy fixations”, and I left codpieces out.
Frankly, our research wasn’t bizarre… It was our findings. There were a lot of very strange perceptions and beliefs in the Medieval period.
PALGN: We are impressed you organised advice and motion capture sessions with a local medieval re-enactment and martial arts group called Knight Fight. Tell us a bit about them?
The Black Knight (from Knight Fight): “All of Knight Fight's activities are based around the martial art of medieval knights. Our activities include martial arts classes and workshops, demonstrations/performances, consultation, battle games (like paintball or laser games, but with swords), parties, team building functions, fete/fair amusements and more. Most of the activities conducted use specially designed padded equipment so that participants can fight full speed and full contact with (almost) unrestricted target zones. The origins of the Knight Fight style though are in historical reenactment metal weapons fighting and the curriculum it remains valid for that type of combat too.”
PALGN: What role did they play in the game’s development?
Prasant Moorthy (Producer): We contacted Knight Fight very early in the development of the game, both as a source of information regarding medieval weapons and their usage and to demonstrate various combat techniques to us. The design team used this information to help design the units and balance their abilities, the artists got to examine the various weapons from various angles to help model them, whilst the animation team got a lot of source footage to use for their 'mocap' shoots.
PALGN: What are the key improvements of this latest iteration in the series?
Dan: On the battlefield our key improvements have been in ensuring our large armies that once looked clone-like are now packed full of individuals that act intelligently on an individual basis. That includes having men turn to face the guy that’s attacking them, raise their shield or weapon in defense, and have the entire thing animate so that men actually trade blows and react accordingly.
We have multi-ring castles, which provide sieges on a grand scale not before seen in Total War, and naturally we’ve made use of new physics effects to improve the way you can tear such structures down.
There are other improvements that aren’t so obvious, but make a big difference, such as ensuring there are more vertical drops on the battlefields so there are more points of strategic importance, or revamping all our AI routines to produce opponents that feel both more real, and capable.
PALGN: Why do you think the game has the power to appeal to more casual gamers as well as the ‘grognards’?
Dan: Because I was standing there at E3 where plenty of folks who were clearly casual console gamers approached to ask “What’s this? I have to have it!” It was very apparent that our appeal is broadening. That stands to reason to us as well. Entry level gamers want entry level games, but gaming has been mainstream for long enough now that people who got into simplistic console games a few years ago are now after something deeper and meatier to sink their spare hours into. Total War is just such a game.
PALGN: What do you think are the advantages of working in QLD and why do you think so many games developers are successful there?
Dan: Having moved up from Sydney myself to take the job here, it’s quite simple – cost. Look at the US and the UK, only a handful of studios set up in London or New York… The overheads are just that much higher. Currently, Brisbane is a much more affordable city to build up a studio in than Sydney or Melbourne. There is also the added bonus of quite a few educational institutions that offer game development qualifications here as well.
PALGN: Is it stressful knowing you are making a game with such high expectations from fans who already love the series? What is your greatest fear regarding the reception of the game?
Dan: Not really, because you learn very early on as a developer that there are MANY types of customer out there, all with different concerns and priorities – you can NEVER make everyone happy. That’s why we have a commitment to keep listening to the community after release, and to continue to address their concerns. To be honest, the greatest fear is that we expect to have lots of newcomers to Total War, and the scope of the game might be a little intimidating for some. It’s not really a fear though, but rather just a part of the challenge of trying to reach new audiences.
PALGN: Tell us about your fan base, in particular I’d like you to elaborate on your comment that they ‘want you to release the game so they can fix it?’
Dan: There is a certain sector of our fan base that have extremely strong opinions about game mechanics and historical accuracy, and they see the TW game engine as the best launch pad to realize their ideas. Some for example care about realism or historical accuracy and see that as far more important than having the game balanced.
As much as we love and value those fans, they are a somewhat uncommon breed of enthusiasts, and we make games for a larger audience than just their niche – and they’re smart enough to know that. Thus, there’s an assumption that we’ve already made it ‘mainstream compatible’, and they’ll look to take that factor out themselves if necessary. All power to them for their diligence and conviction!
PALGN: What is the most enjoyable aspect for you when playing the game?
Dan: I’d say the battles, which is a side effect of working on the campaign for 18 months solid. I find I get to enjoy the work my co-workers have produced like any other punter, but I see my own work as something I continually want to tinker with and improve. Sure enough, the folks who have worked on the battles all project have recently come over and told me they’re really enjoying the campaign.
PALGN: What have you added to multiplayer that you think helps the game to stand out?
Dan: Primarily streamlining and allowing the players to take away the ‘sensible’ limits so they can put some crazily high-powered forces onto a battlefield for some fun, and handicapped matches.
The streamlining is very important for Total War. We found that the largest annoyance for players with our games was that sometimes they’d wait as long as 20 minutes for the other player to choose their forces, and deploy them onto the battlefield. Now we let players save their army load outs, so they can instantly recall them.
PALGN: How has the turn based strategy mode evolved?
Dan: In an absolute myriad of ways, but the main areas are with settlements, recruitment and new agents. We let people develop their settlements as either cities or castles, which in turn lets them gear certain areas of their empire for different tasks – money making, or military pursuits. As settlements grow, they can recruit more than one unit at a time, and this means it is possible to create large armies much quicker than in previous Total War games, and thus, more large-scale battles.
The new agents bring with them a means to influence the religion and trade within your lands, and abroad. You can send merchants to bring in vast wealth from exotic goods not found within your borders, or order priests to spread your faith in the lands that you intend to conquer. In short, we give the player a lot more scope to control non-military aspects of their realm, without actually forcing them to micro-manage things in a fiddly manner. We’ve added depth without adding complexity.
PALGN: Have you included any feature-set elements specifically aimed at Vista and its new abilities?
Dan: No - We may look to in updates, but that remains to be seen. We’re not trying to champion new platforms, we’re making a game for the world we live in today. There’s already enough scope for scaling detail in our game that people will keep seeing better results in the future with better hardware.
PALGN: Have you developed or are developing a DX 10 patch? Or will the game come out with DX 10 support already? Or (finally) will DX 10 not be an issue for you guys?
Dan: No, it shouldn’t be an issue.
PALGN: Do you think a game like this could ever come to console (Microsoft are doing a Halo game developed by Ensemble, so all things are possible eh?)
Dan: Quite possibly, but it would have to be in a different manner to how we handle it on PC. Some people might rate Battle for Middle Earth 2 on Xbox 360, but frankly, we just find it to be a less-clunky port than other attempts in the past… It still feels like a port of a game that would work better with a mouse and keyboard. No console game should ever make the player wish they had a different controller. There is also the question of pacing and depth. Do console gamers want a time-consuming PC campaign in the lounge room? It’s all possible, but. . . .
PALGN: Do you have any advice for people wanting to nick your job (or more specifically start working in the game development field)?
Dan: Unless you have a rich history of working in creative industries with a strong portfolio of work, go get some technical qualifications. The reality is that there are students graduating with qualifications very specific to the industry now, and hiring someone who doesn’t need to be technically trained up is much more attractive for a developer.
PALGN: What games are you most excited about seeing released soon and what are you playing now?
Dan: Assassin’s Creed looks more exciting than anything else I can see on the schedule at the moment, simply because I find stealth games that are about sneaking around in the dark to be both ludicrous and formulaic. As for what I’m playing now, Pro Evolution Soccer 6 on Xbox 360, and funnily enough Medieval II – It’s a good sign when you want to spend time on the game you’ve been unable to get away from for a year and a half!
PALGN: What do you think are the most likely innovations we are going to see in terms of the evolution of the strategy genre and PC games in general?
Dan: I’m not sure about where all the innovations in strategy will come from (except ours that we can’t reveal), but I think you’re going to keep seeing less and less resource management in them. Even recent games that have a traditional RTS perspective to the battlefield are moving away from a system where there’s a very specific order to build everything that will ensure victory.
As for PC games in general, I think it’s really hard to say. There are people who feel PC games need to become more mainstream to remain a viable competitor with the console market, but we’re also starting to see some console gamers turn to PC for more complexity in their games, and that’s a trend that can only grow.
Finally, look at World of Warcraft – a couple of years ago, MMORPGs were considered too complex and niche for the mainstream. However the mainstream have proven that this isn’t true when done right.
PALGN: What is the first thing you’d like to do now the game is completely finished?
Dan: Work on the expansion and updates. We really are committed to making this better and better, and we had too many good ideas to actually fit in the release version of the game. Any developer that is dying to see the back of their game should probably aim to make games they think more highly of in future.
PALGN: Keep on churning out the magic then as TW2 is amazing!
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