Published by EnragedGnome April 5th, 2007
in FASA and interviews.
GameSpot sits down with FASA Studio Manager Mitch Gitelman during a new Q&A session. It mostly looks back on the how the project has developed and what is in store for FASA next. Mitch throws a teaser out to the fans of a Shadowrun RPG:
GS: If the game does well, could we expect to see more Shadowrun-related products down the road? For instance, the longtime fans of the franchise would really love to see a Shadowrun role-playing game.
MG: Yeah, I heard somewhere on the Web that longtime fans might want an RPG. We’ll look into that.
He also talks about some of the abilities that were cut from the game.
GS: Is there a feature, weapon, power, or ability that was dropped in development that you wish you could bring back? If so, what was it?
MG: Oh sure, plenty of them. The one I loved the most was the ability to climb walls like Spider-Man. You could still use your weapon while wallcrawling, so we got plenty of spider snipers in places you’d never expect. When combined with glider and teleport, it was insane.
Take the jump to read the whole thing.
Tags: FASA, gamespot, mitch gitelman
Published by rapture March 16th, 2007
in FASA.
Raid, extraction, and attrition. Get used to those names. They are the modes of gameplay available in Shadowrun. To learn more about them, read what Bill Fulton said about them in a recent Gamespot interview:
The game types are raid, extraction, and attrition. Raid is one-flag capture the flag. The Lineage’s mission is to get the artifact (the flag) and escape with it. RNA Corp’s mission is to prevent that, hopefully by killing the Lineage. In extraction, both teams’ mission is to secure the artifact and escape with it. Attrition is team elimination. Both teams’ mission is to destroy the other. The team that survives, wins.
There is no respawn in any game type. You can get resurrected, but there are no respawns. We like the effect that the “you die, you sit” gameplay mechanic has on players; they try to avoid dying much more, which makes the game feel more serious.
All of the game types are multiround matches; you start with no magic, tech, or weapons, and a little money with which to buy them. You earn money during rounds, and at the beginning of the next round, you can buy more magic, tech, and weapons.
Note: There is no two-flag “capture the flag” type gametype. I think this will be sorely missed by gamers. Again using HALO 2 as an example, single-flag capture the flag gametypes were very unpopular. Dual-flag CTF matches rule the CTF landscape. That said, these single-flag gametypes will probably be fun. I enjoyed playing “assault” in HALO and HALO 2.
I’m guessing there’s a storyline reason as to why there isn’t two artifacts in one map.
Tags: attrition, bill fulton, extraction, gamespot, interview, raid
Published by rapture March 16th, 2007
in FASA and interviews.
Bill Fulton of FASA said in an Gamespot interview that there will be no custom gametypes in Shadowrun.
“As for custom game types, we decided not to support those. There’s nothing to stop players from agreeing to play by “house rules” in private matches with friends (in fact, that’s the origin of attrition–a group of FASA artists played by house rules), but we don’t support playing public multiplayer games with custom modes. It often just leads to awkward situations where you join a game playing something weird that you don’t want to play.”
Bill also jumped in on the official Shadowrun forums to say:
“Sorry if I was unclear–Shadowrun doesn’t support customization of game types at all. I was attempting (and failing) to make it clear that, in private matches with your friends, players can agree to custom rules (house rules), but that there’s no code support for this. Enforcement will have to be done by the players themselves.”
The custom gametypes in HALO 2 were one of the things that made that game so popular. In fact, Bungie took direct feedback from the gamers and actually implemented custom gametypes in their official matchmaking playlists. Custom gametypes are also the heart of any LAN party or competitive league or tournament. Custom gametypes were at the heart of my buddylist. Being heavily embedded into the Bungie/HALO community, most of my friends list is made up of HALO gamers. On my list, custom gametypes were more popular than matchmaking (perhaps because of cheating issues on HALO 2 on XBOX LIVE). Even Gears of Wars, which has limited customization, allows the host to edit some gametypes and map rotations. GoW isn’t really a social game. I think there’s more to a game being social than being able to keep your party together.
Unfortunately, Shadowrun will not have custom gametypes. I think this is a serious blow to the average gamer all the way up to the competitive gamer. I think this greatly reduces the replay value of this game. After all, this is a multiplayer-only game! No doubt what FASA has provided will be fun. But, it looks like the gamers will have little control over how WE play this game.
I do not see a premiere gaming league like MLG being able to adopt Shadowrun as a tournament game (assuming the Shadowrun rights would be lent to those organizations). MLG and other leagues like CAL and CPL all run on custom game settings.
Tags: bill fulton, gamespot, gametypes, interview
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