Game Development Giant

The news of World of Warcraft swept across the entire gaming industry like a strong wind.

Everyone was surprised that Jester leaked the news in a very ordinary interview, because for such important news, one should choose a prudent day, then announce it, and invite some media to hype the news. .

However, some people thought about it and realized that this was actually Jester's style. Moreover, Jester's new game was already attracting much attention and did not need much publicity at all, at least not at the beginning. Later publicity must be done, just like the future GTA series, which is already famous enough, but their GTA5 still has to spend close to 100 million US dollars in publicity expenses.

Many people wonder if it is worth it?

The realistic answer is, it's worth it.

There will be a more formal interview later, a press conference to be precise. After the carnival, Jester will answer some topics of interest to the outside world. Of course, there are the physical sensations they are hyping up during this period, as well as Super Balotelli's Galaxy, Jester's just-announced next game, World of Warcraft, and, of course, a few other issues.

For example, this is something that many people are concerned about.

That is, since Sega has announced without any concealment that their next-generation console will be released soon, and the game Shenmue specially developed for the next-generation console has also entered the final sprint stage. Doesn't Mars Entertainment have the slightest confidence? Coping with testing? Doesn’t Mars Entertainment have a new super-large sandbox game under development?

No one believes this.

So, I took this opportunity to ask Jester.

Facing this expected question, Jester was not surprised. He smiled and glanced at the reporter who just asked, then looked around at the people present and found that most people were very interested in this question.

So, he cleared his throat first.

Then he said: How should I put it? Sandbox games, especially very large-scale sandbox games like this, are a very huge project. Perhaps the largest project in the entire industry so far is on such a game. When I developed When it came to the groundbreaking work The Hero, it required a lot of attempts, so the number of people needed at that time was very large.

This situation has been alleviated a lot now. After all, the current team does not need to constantly try and explore like explorers, but this is still a large team. As far as I know, Mr. Suzuki Yu's Shenmue 》The development team has reached 150 people. For a game of this scale, it may take three months just to discuss the project.”

And I have my new plan, which has been running for two years. When Super Balotelli Galaxy started to be developed, World of Warcraft began the preliminary design, my next game It will take up a lot of my time, and it will also be the largest game in the history of PC games. I can even assert that for a long time, there may not be a PC game project as big as this game. Appear.

When Jester said this, everyone present looked surprised.

Is it a PC exclusive?

Someone asked this question. And Jester nodded without hesitation: Yes, this game is exclusive to PC. I already said it at GDC a few years ago, Super Balotelli Galaxy will be mine. The last console game.

Hearing Jester talk about the time he talked about at GDC a few years ago, many reporters also recalled it.

Many people originally thought that after so many years, Jester has rediscovered the passion and motivation for game development, but it seems that this is not the case.

It seems that Jester has already had his own plan, and now things are developing according to his plan. He still has not changed what he said at GDC, that is to say. It is very likely that this legendary developer in the gaming industry will officially retire after World of Warcraft. When thinking of this, everyone present was a little moved.

Yes. My plan has not changed. World of Warcraft will basically be my last game. Jester admitted this again.

After he finished speaking, he continued where he left off.

So, if such a big project, a large-scale sandbox game, is really going to be done within the company, it will definitely take a long time to consider. I don't think you have received any news about this. ? When Jester said this, many people also laughed. Indeed, reporters like them in the industry must have many acquaintances in Mars Entertainment.

Although some particularly confidential things are unlikely to be revealed, it is impossible to hide things such as whether there is a big project in progress from those who are interested.

And all these reporters now know that, except for the World of Warcraft game that Jester is about to start, which may be a very large-scale project, there is indeed no one in the headquarters of Mars Entertainment that can compete with Shenmue. Comparable projects are ongoing.

Even famous studios that are not headquartered.

As for whether all Mars Entertainment studios have them, it’s hard to say, because there are still so many studios under Mars Entertainment that it’s impossible to cover everything. But for such a big project, even if it is handed over to a studio If you do it, then it will definitely be handed over to some well-known development teams, not to those unknown development teams.

Coupled with Mars Entertainment's shark policy towards its development teams.

Only the outstanding ones can survive. Therefore, generally those who are not famous are likely to disappear after a while. Under such circumstances, they will not have the ability to take on such a large project.

Just as the reporters were drawing conclusions for their speculations, Jester changed his tone: We do not have a huge project like Shenmue in progress, at least for now, but I can What is revealing is that we do have a tentative sandbox game under development, and the scale of this game is not large, at least it will not be larger than the scale of Shenmue described by Mr. Suzuki Yu.

Of course, this game still has some interesting connections with Shenmue. For example, the background of this game is also modern. However, Shenmue according to Mr. Suzuki Yu was set in Japan and Hong Kong in the 1980s. And Country Z, and the background of our game is actually a certain city in the United States...I can even reveal that this city is Apple City. That is, New York.

Jester's answer can be said to have surprised everyone, even another Mars Entertainment executive sitting next to him.

Because he didn't know about this game.

This is not a game being developed by the headquarters, but one of our studios.

Jester smiled and continued to explain, and then someone immediately asked: Can you tell me what type of game this is?

This question made Jester hesitate for a moment. But after thinking for a while, Jester nodded: I can say that this game may be about crime or gangster themes - I can only say that it was like this in the original development plan, you guys I also know that we respect all developers’ rights to game development, and I will not interfere with their ideas, so it is still difficult to judge how this game will turn out.”

Can you reveal a little more information about this game?

Facing this question, Jester shook his head: This is not a project that I am responsible for. Although I am constantly paying attention to it, I feel that I still have no comment on more information, but I can guarantee that If so, this game will definitely be great, because I talked to their producers, and they have made great games before, and they are very talented and work very hard... They have what it takes to succeed. All conditions.

Jester was certain.

This immediately made the reporters present feel a little strange. Because according to what Jester said, the person currently responsible for the development of this game is definitely not an unknown studio or game company.

He must have been famous before.

But they had basically inquired about the famous studios under Mars Entertainment before, and had never heard of any such plans.

unless……

Yes, these reporters think very quickly. Unless it is a newly acquired game company in the past year or so, this game company may have made relatively famous games before, but after being acquired by Mars Entertainment, it has been developing new games, so it has not been taken seriously yet.

However, in their memory, there does not seem to be any company that has been acquired recently. Even if the time is pushed to more than two years, several well-known studios that were acquired have been disbanded due to their own reasons. There seems to be no rumors that they are working on any particularly important large-scale projects. This makes many The person suddenly fell into deep thought.

In this case, there is only one possibility.

Many people have thought of another possibility, that is, Mars Entertainment's acquisition of game studios is not just in the United States. In fact, they are acquiring them all over the world.

Although there are more in the United States, there are also many in Japan and Europe.

So speaking of which, is the studio that Jester mentioned that is developing a brand new sandbox game a European or Japanese one?

To sum up what Jester said, the background of this theme is the United States, so since it is not from the United States, it is very possible that it represents a European studio, and it should not be Japanese, because this Style games are obviously not what Japanese companies are good at, and in terms of PC game development, the Japanese are not as good as Europeans.

Thinking of this, basically all the mysteries will be solved.

I immediately thought of the game company that Jester acquired about a year ago that was previously headquartered in Northern Ireland. However, this game company had moved to the United States after being acquired by Jester, and it seemed to be in New York.

Rockstar!

Soon, someone thought of the name of this studio. This was a name that was extremely unfamiliar to them, because no game had yet been developed as a studio with this name, but it was also a name that was very unfamiliar to them. As Jester said, indeed, the predecessor of this game company is indeed somewhat famous, and their GTA series is also somewhat famous in the American market.

Moreover, this game also happens to be a gangster and crime-themed game.

However, one problem is that the reputation of this game series is not very good. Because the content of the game is too violent, it is often criticized by mainstream game media.

When Jester acquired this company and changed its name, they, the game media, thought that this was a plan to make this game company change its ways and stop making such games. Unexpectedly, combined with the game Jester mentioned just now, A general game type of the game turns out to be exactly what this game company, which has been renamed Rock Star, is good at.

Is this game you are talking about intended to compete with Sega's Shenmue?

A reporter asked immediately after figuring it all out.

No.

Jester denied this at first.

First of all, I want to emphasize that there has never been any competition between games, because players will not play one game. We have never developed games to compete with our opponents, but this game is indeed It's fun, we should develop it for players to play, this is a crucial point, so I don't understand what you mean, what is this game? We are trying to compete with Shenmue.

When Jester said this, the reporter was immediately speechless.

But soon, he reorganized his language: What I mean is, the same sandbox game, the same modern background, it is even very likely that it will be released at about the same time...

But before he could finish speaking, Jester interrupted him.

I think sir, you have some assumptions. We developed this game just because we saw the project and thought it was a great project and we can give it a try. It's that simple. You can imagine that we will use this game for sniping. Shenmue written by Mr. Yu Suzuki, with all due respect, you underestimate Mr. Suzuki Yu too much, right?

Hearing what Jester said, many people nodded.

You said that this game was developed by Jester. It is almost enough to snipe Shenmue. It is just developed by a small company that is not yet famous. How can he snipe Yu Suzuki? This game can be compared with Shigeru Miyamoto in the game industry. The great god? (~^~)