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We talk with Epic Games vice president Mark Rein and lead designer Cliff Blezinski about plans for the new Gears of War PC content.
July 13, 2007 | 2:58 AM PSTby: Ray Almeda
AMN was able to talk with Epic Games' vice president Mark Rein and lead designer Cliff "Cliffy B" Blezinski about their specific plans for new Gears of War PC content.
The full audio interview can he heard below or downloaded here, presented exclusively by AMN Podcasts:
FULL TRANSCRIPTION:
AMN: Just in terms of the PS3 version, since we're a console site, what's always appealed to us about Unreal versus the Quakes is the speed of the gameplay. How do you think that's going to work with the PS3 controller?
Mark Rein: Have you played it?
AMN: I played it at GDC.
Rein: Have you played it here? On PS3?
AMN: No, they showed it to us they wouldn't let us get our hands on it.
Rein: Why not?
AMN: I don't know. We looked at Stranglehold and Unreal Tournament.
Rein: Dude, you could play it at the PlayStation press conference. Anyone could walk up and play it. If they're not letting you play it here it’s probably just because of time constraints. But we had it open all afternoon yesterday.
AMN: Oh really? I was at meetings.
Rein: It's okay.
AMN: Anyway, do you think it's going to work well on a controller?
Rein: It's awesome. It works really well.
AMN: It does?
Rein: Yeah I mean in the same way that other first-person shooters, Halo and things like that, have worked really well, the same way Gears of War works well. We took what we learned from there, and we haven't fully finished all the optimizations on the controller and on things like how speeds ramp as you turn, but it's gonna be awesome. I've been playing it a lot on the PlayStation 3, plays fantastically. I mean it definitely takes some getting used to when you're a keyboard and mouse guy, but when you're a console guy it just seems like second nature.
AMN: Another big thing about the Unreal franchise, for me, on the PC, as a fan, was the user-created content. The mods, the mutators, the levels, the skins, and models. Are PS3 owners going to have the tools to do those kind of things and upload them on PS3 or are they going to have to do it on PC.
Rein: The creation is all done on PC using Unreal Engine 3. You have the Unreal Editor which has, obviously, our shader system, it has Kismet, it has Unreal script, it has matinee, and it has all the various tools that we use to create the games. Those come with the PC version, you create it on PC and then just copy it over to PlayStation 3. It's gonna be great.
There'll be, I'm hoping, and you can never predict how many mods there's gonna be, but we have thousands of mods on Unreal Tournament 2004 and our mod contest we had over 1800 entries in that alone, and so I'm guessing most of those (UT3 PC mods) will be able to run. Obviously PlayStation 3 has a certain amount of memory compared to PC so you have to make sure that your mod fits in the PlayStation 3. But I mean, you see the game fits in the PlayStation 3, and it's pretty elaborate, so I think there's gonna be some pretty amazing stuff.
AMN: That's great. Why PS3?
Rein: 'Cause you can do mods! It's an open system and we can take mods to it, and I mean that, to us, that's the DNA - plus, you know also, let's not forget that we chose that path a long time ago. It was the first game ever shown on PlayStation 3 and we've been working on it for a while so, you know we're also doing Xbox 360. It's just that this is the order we're doing 'em in. I kinda found it funny that everyone was surprised, it's like, you know we announced this game on PlayStation 3 two years ago. We only announced that we were even doing Xbox 360 in January. Did you somehow think we were gonna reverse the order of two years of progress
AMN: I think the thing is that it's been kind of the way we've been seeing a lot of developers go. A lot of stuff was announced for PS3 and then it was 'Well we better get it on Xbox 360 because of the userbase'.
Rein: Well not us. We had Gears of War to show off our ability on Xbox 360, and that was our Xbox 360 title and it's 100% exclusive console-wise and now it's coming to PC and UT was always like 'Hey, we've gotta be good on PlayStation 3'. This is our game where we really flex our muscles on PlayStation 3 and nothing's really changed. It'll still be great on 360. [laughs]
AMN: Since you brought up Gears of Wars, it's an interesting segue into another related point. The latest download pack for Gears of War, it was reported that there was a conflict between Microsoft and Epic over how much to charge.
Rein: Oh. [laughs]
AMN: Because Epic is loved by PC gamers, like ourselves, for constantly offering free content and giving us more of a reason to play. And I assume Epic is going to keep up with that strategy of giving us more content after the release on PS3.
Rein: Absolutely.
AMN: And has Sony been…
Rein: Sony's an open network.
AMN: So they're not even gonna try and make you charge anything for it to get a piece of the pie?
Rein: Well, for content that we want to sell on PlayStation 3 we'll sell it through the PlayStation Store. And there will be content sold, there's no question. I mean, if we really bend over backwards and go, like we've done in the past, and hire some modmakers to do really amazing stuff, some of those modmakers are gonna want to make some money. There will be, hopefully there will be content to be sold. That's not a bad thing. But in terms of stuff we're giving away for free...that's free. And in terms of user-created content...that's free.
AMN: So Sony's going to be very hands-off in terms of telling what to charge or not to charge?
Rein: The content comes from the users, it's not going through that process.
AMN: Finally, one more thought on Gears of War. I know the entire AMN crew every night we're playing it.
Rein: Cool.
AMN: And we have arguments over which is better Gears or Halo, I vote Gears. So does he.
Rein: I vote Gears too!
AMN: There we go.
Rein: [laughs] Halo's good.
AMN: And a lot of us were blown away and super-jazzed about the announcement of five new chapters in the PC version.
Rein: Oh here comes the question. [laughs]
AMN: Yeah, million dollar question.
Rein: I can't give you the answer to that question! You know, I've got 5000 people on my forum asking me that, and I haven't even given them the answer. This answer is embargoed until June 1, 2008. No I'm kidding.
AMN: Is it out of the question? Is this something that Microsoft wanted specifically to sell Windows Live and that it's gonna stay for Vista.
Rein: Ask that guy! [points to Cliff Blezinski] Ask him that question! [laughs] He won't answer the question but you can ask him.
Cliff Blezinski: What was the question? You can ask me.
AMN: We saw the PC stuff. Blown away, we wanna play it on 360. When are we playing it on 360?
Cliff: Well if we didn't have any sort of exclusive on the PC, why would people buy the PC version?
AMN: I can understand that. Is it gonna be a timed exclusive?
Cliff: TBD (to be determined).
AMN: But it's not completely out of the question?
Rein: Let me tell you now it is unlikely we will bring that content to 360.
Cliff: There's other stuff we could be working on.
Rein: Yeah you know we have Unreal Tournament that we need to bring to 360, that's a big project.
Cliff: Maybe something else.
Rein: Could you be quieter Cliff? We have Unreal Tournament we're working on now. It's very unlikely. I don't want to get fans' hopes up that that content's gonna come to 360. Is it impossible? Nothing's impossible. But in terms of, does Epic have the manpower to do it? No way.
Unfortunately the version it’s built on is not really compatible with the 360 and so it would involve a massive patch, a patch larger than all five we've done so far, to Gears of War to do that. And as Cliff said, we've got UT and other stuff, we've gotta keep moving forward.
AMN: Speaking of moving forward, you got UT, Gears is a huge hit. What's down the line after this?
Rein: We haven't even shipped the Windows version yet!
Cliff: I know, I mean come on! [laughs]
Rein: Down the road for Gears is the Windows version, hope fully in the November timeframe. And down the road for UT is UT! UT is coming on PC and PlayStation 3 in November, and then we'll have the 360 version next year. Trust me, if we had 300 people maybe we'd be looking further down the road but we just don't.
AMN: Alright, well thank you very much for your honest answers. It was a pleasure talking to you.
Rein: My pleasure, thanks guys.
Be sure to stay tuned right here on AMN for the latest on Epic Games' future projects and news.
The full audio interview can he heard below or downloaded here, presented exclusively by AMN Podcasts:
FULL TRANSCRIPTION:
AMN: Just in terms of the PS3 version, since we're a console site, what's always appealed to us about Unreal versus the Quakes is the speed of the gameplay. How do you think that's going to work with the PS3 controller?
Mark Rein: Have you played it?
AMN: I played it at GDC.
Rein: Have you played it here? On PS3?
AMN: No, they showed it to us they wouldn't let us get our hands on it.
Rein: Why not?
AMN: I don't know. We looked at Stranglehold and Unreal Tournament.
Rein: Dude, you could play it at the PlayStation press conference. Anyone could walk up and play it. If they're not letting you play it here it’s probably just because of time constraints. But we had it open all afternoon yesterday.
AMN: Oh really? I was at meetings.
Rein: It's okay.
AMN: Anyway, do you think it's going to work well on a controller?
Rein: It's awesome. It works really well.
AMN: It does?
Rein: Yeah I mean in the same way that other first-person shooters, Halo and things like that, have worked really well, the same way Gears of War works well. We took what we learned from there, and we haven't fully finished all the optimizations on the controller and on things like how speeds ramp as you turn, but it's gonna be awesome. I've been playing it a lot on the PlayStation 3, plays fantastically. I mean it definitely takes some getting used to when you're a keyboard and mouse guy, but when you're a console guy it just seems like second nature.
AMN: Another big thing about the Unreal franchise, for me, on the PC, as a fan, was the user-created content. The mods, the mutators, the levels, the skins, and models. Are PS3 owners going to have the tools to do those kind of things and upload them on PS3 or are they going to have to do it on PC.
Rein: The creation is all done on PC using Unreal Engine 3. You have the Unreal Editor which has, obviously, our shader system, it has Kismet, it has Unreal script, it has matinee, and it has all the various tools that we use to create the games. Those come with the PC version, you create it on PC and then just copy it over to PlayStation 3. It's gonna be great.
There'll be, I'm hoping, and you can never predict how many mods there's gonna be, but we have thousands of mods on Unreal Tournament 2004 and our mod contest we had over 1800 entries in that alone, and so I'm guessing most of those (UT3 PC mods) will be able to run. Obviously PlayStation 3 has a certain amount of memory compared to PC so you have to make sure that your mod fits in the PlayStation 3. But I mean, you see the game fits in the PlayStation 3, and it's pretty elaborate, so I think there's gonna be some pretty amazing stuff.
AMN: That's great. Why PS3?
Rein: 'Cause you can do mods! It's an open system and we can take mods to it, and I mean that, to us, that's the DNA - plus, you know also, let's not forget that we chose that path a long time ago. It was the first game ever shown on PlayStation 3 and we've been working on it for a while so, you know we're also doing Xbox 360. It's just that this is the order we're doing 'em in. I kinda found it funny that everyone was surprised, it's like, you know we announced this game on PlayStation 3 two years ago. We only announced that we were even doing Xbox 360 in January. Did you somehow think we were gonna reverse the order of two years of progress
AMN: I think the thing is that it's been kind of the way we've been seeing a lot of developers go. A lot of stuff was announced for PS3 and then it was 'Well we better get it on Xbox 360 because of the userbase'.
Rein: Well not us. We had Gears of War to show off our ability on Xbox 360, and that was our Xbox 360 title and it's 100% exclusive console-wise and now it's coming to PC and UT was always like 'Hey, we've gotta be good on PlayStation 3'. This is our game where we really flex our muscles on PlayStation 3 and nothing's really changed. It'll still be great on 360. [laughs]
AMN: Since you brought up Gears of Wars, it's an interesting segue into another related point. The latest download pack for Gears of War, it was reported that there was a conflict between Microsoft and Epic over how much to charge.
Rein: Oh. [laughs]
AMN: Because Epic is loved by PC gamers, like ourselves, for constantly offering free content and giving us more of a reason to play. And I assume Epic is going to keep up with that strategy of giving us more content after the release on PS3.
Rein: Absolutely.
AMN: And has Sony been…
Rein: Sony's an open network.
AMN: So they're not even gonna try and make you charge anything for it to get a piece of the pie?
Rein: Well, for content that we want to sell on PlayStation 3 we'll sell it through the PlayStation Store. And there will be content sold, there's no question. I mean, if we really bend over backwards and go, like we've done in the past, and hire some modmakers to do really amazing stuff, some of those modmakers are gonna want to make some money. There will be, hopefully there will be content to be sold. That's not a bad thing. But in terms of stuff we're giving away for free...that's free. And in terms of user-created content...that's free.
AMN: So Sony's going to be very hands-off in terms of telling what to charge or not to charge?
Rein: The content comes from the users, it's not going through that process.
AMN: Finally, one more thought on Gears of War. I know the entire AMN crew every night we're playing it.
Rein: Cool.
AMN: And we have arguments over which is better Gears or Halo, I vote Gears. So does he.
Rein: I vote Gears too!
AMN: There we go.
Rein: [laughs] Halo's good.
AMN: And a lot of us were blown away and super-jazzed about the announcement of five new chapters in the PC version.
Rein: Oh here comes the question. [laughs]
AMN: Yeah, million dollar question.
Rein: I can't give you the answer to that question! You know, I've got 5000 people on my forum asking me that, and I haven't even given them the answer. This answer is embargoed until June 1, 2008. No I'm kidding.
AMN: Is it out of the question? Is this something that Microsoft wanted specifically to sell Windows Live and that it's gonna stay for Vista.
Rein: Ask that guy! [points to Cliff Blezinski] Ask him that question! [laughs] He won't answer the question but you can ask him.
Cliff Blezinski: What was the question? You can ask me.
AMN: We saw the PC stuff. Blown away, we wanna play it on 360. When are we playing it on 360?
Cliff: Well if we didn't have any sort of exclusive on the PC, why would people buy the PC version?
AMN: I can understand that. Is it gonna be a timed exclusive?
Cliff: TBD (to be determined).
AMN: But it's not completely out of the question?
Rein: Let me tell you now it is unlikely we will bring that content to 360.
Cliff: There's other stuff we could be working on.
Rein: Yeah you know we have Unreal Tournament that we need to bring to 360, that's a big project.
Cliff: Maybe something else.
Rein: Could you be quieter Cliff? We have Unreal Tournament we're working on now. It's very unlikely. I don't want to get fans' hopes up that that content's gonna come to 360. Is it impossible? Nothing's impossible. But in terms of, does Epic have the manpower to do it? No way.
Unfortunately the version it’s built on is not really compatible with the 360 and so it would involve a massive patch, a patch larger than all five we've done so far, to Gears of War to do that. And as Cliff said, we've got UT and other stuff, we've gotta keep moving forward.
AMN: Speaking of moving forward, you got UT, Gears is a huge hit. What's down the line after this?
Rein: We haven't even shipped the Windows version yet!
Cliff: I know, I mean come on! [laughs]
Rein: Down the road for Gears is the Windows version, hope fully in the November timeframe. And down the road for UT is UT! UT is coming on PC and PlayStation 3 in November, and then we'll have the 360 version next year. Trust me, if we had 300 people maybe we'd be looking further down the road but we just don't.
AMN: Alright, well thank you very much for your honest answers. It was a pleasure talking to you.
Rein: My pleasure, thanks guys.
Be sure to stay tuned right here on AMN for the latest on Epic Games' future projects and news.
February 8, 2010
