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- Resident Evil Outbreak
Resident Evil Outbreak Developer Interview
- June 19, 2006 14:08 PM PST
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We sit down and talk with Capcom about their upcoming Resident Evil mulitplayer game.
We recently had the opportunity to speak with Eiichiro Sasaki, director of Resident Evil Outbreak about the upcoming online Resident Evil game. Sasaki outlines the highlights of the game, and claims that the game experience will be the closest to the first Resident Evil game.[Overview]
With this Resident Evil game we wanted to create a new type of fear, a fear that cannot be experienced by playing with by yourself. For example how the friends you fight with get killed one by one, becoming the only one left, or getting separated from the rest of the group. Normally if you're in a group it's less scary, but there's a new kind of fear and loneliness to be experienced if a large group of people you're playing with starts dying. The thinking was not to make a certain type of network game, but rather to apply network play to present a new type of fear to the new Resident Evil genre.
There's many things different, like not having chat ...but we're not necessarily criticizing network games as a whole. We know that cooperative play is very fun, and of course with this game we wanted to bring out the fun of cooperative play even more than previous games in the series. But the essence of this game is not that you can cooperative play, but that you can cooperatively play, and situations will arise where you can't do that anymore.
Q: Can you tell us anything specifics on single play? Is the single player game different from the previous series?
A: Gameplay and controls are the same [as previous games], however concept wise it's same to the multiplayer.
As far as the difference between single play and network play, there's not much difference in the story or plot, but in online play humans are controlling the players, so you'll never get the same situation twice, with people doing own thing or occassionally cooperating. However in the single player game, there's a set plan, and it's a matter how well you can carry out that plan, devising your own strategies.
Q: Will it be a worldwide server, or will there be servers for each region, like U.S. servers and Japanese servers?
A: There will be a server for North America.
Q: Does the game connect to the Resident Evil storyline?
A: Yes, it connects.
Q: Which game does it connect to?
A: It connects with 2 and 3. The story for resident evil is that 10 days after the virus is introduced into Racoon City, the town is wiped out, so the game focuses on that 10-day span - different from Resident Evil 2 which focuses on 2-3 days, or Resident Evil 3 which focuses on the last day.
Q: Will you run into characters from previous games, like Jill Valentine?
A: They don't appear. But there will be nuances and a sense that the characters from the series are present. You will see items that certain characters carried or familiar files.
While the story for Leon and other characters from Resident Evil 2 is progressing, a different story is being unfold in this game, the story of others who tried escaping, some successful, some who died along the way.
They might encounter [characters from the other Resident Evil games], but that is not portrayed in this game.
Q: What was Mr. Mikami's involvement in this project?
A: He was not involved in this project.
[Regarding the mechanics of the game]
This game, compared to previous games of the series requires you to think the most to progress through the game. Of course, there were events and mysterious in other games, but this time, there's very few hints revealed in the game, and the player will have to make a lot of decisions based on the environment they're in. For example, you probably saw it at the game show, but you're in a bar, and zombies start flooding in. There's no hint of what to do in the game. Will you run? Will you fight? You're free to do what you want to survive. One of the key characteristics of this game is that for one event or riddle there are many ways to solve it.
You will see situations in the game where there's a locked door, and you could shoot it, kick it down or find a key and unlock it. But if zombies are chasing you maybe you won't have time to find a key, so you can waste bullets to open the door. So depending on the situation, there's no one right answer. In one game sometimes using the gun will be the most effective way, in other games you can waste all of your bullets on a door and find the next room full of zombies. So in this game nothing is set in stone, requiring to really use your head and think.
There's many ways to play, so even though you can pass the game in 15 or 16 hours there's a lot of replay value, with different events, strategies depending on the character you use.
You can also unlock NPCs as playable characters, items, different costumes and special items, which all affect your result points. Playing a network game you can see the worldwide ranking so you can compare yourself to others.
[PR Spokesperson] The result points can be used to unlock different items and movies.
There will also be certain items and things you cannot unlock unless you play a specific character.
Q: Have you given any thought to allowing players to be zombies online?
A: Yes, we have thought of that.
Q: When you play together online, is it one large world, or is it limited to groups of say 8 or 10 people at a time?
A: For one room there's only 4 players allowed, and there are other parallel games going on.
Q: When developing this game were there any movies that were an inspiration?
A: I watched a whole lot of horror and suspense films to prepare for this game. There are a lot of people on the team that don't like horror films so I had to watch many films on their part. (laughs)
Q: What did you think of the Resident Evil movie?
A: I think they did a good job. But, I'm a Milla Jonovich fan, so my views may be a lot higher than others. (laughs)
Q: What was your favorite Resident Evil game?
A: Resident Evil one. In terms of gameplay I feel this is the closest to the first one, how it requires you to think based on each situation.
[Regarding the controls of the game]
You can use the d-pad like the original games, or use the analog stick, resembling games like Devil May Cry. We wanted to give players different options to appeal to different gamers. There were a lot of Japanese who wanted to only use the analog stick, but I thought "hey why not have more ways to play the game?" So people who've had difficulty with the controls until now will have an easier time to play the game.
