Computer Games Online presents an interview with Casey Hudson, BioWare Project Director of Mass Effect. The role-playing game is currently being developed for the Xbox 360 and will comprise features from other BioWare favorites such as Knights of the Old Republic and Jade Empire. The first part of this interview series will focus on game design and story elements.
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What is the meaning behind the title Mass Effect? Where did you come up with it?

With Mass Effect, we’re building an adventure of tremendous scope, with locations and story elements of the largest possible proportions. So massive scale was something we wanted to be able to get across in the title.

At the same time, within the universe of Mass Effect, the driving force of the most advanced technologies is ripped from the latest headlines in real-life science. Presently, concepts like dark energy and dark matter are being used to explain unexpected astronomical observations regarding mass and gravity in the universe. The same sorts of ideas provide an excellent basis for some of the things in the game.

What features and improvements have you incorporated into Mass Effect from games like KOTOR and Jade Empire?

One of the most obvious differences is the combat system, which is a fully real-time, 3rd person tactical shooter format. You’ll be able to fight as a squad of 3, either allowing your squad members to fight alongside you using their own AI, or by giving specific orders. You’ll be able to have extremely satisfying control over your squad in the battlefield, cooperating in really interesting ways.

Another major area of innovation is in the story experience. Because we’ve placed such a strong emphasis on advanced digital actors, you’ll be able to interact with other characters in ways that were never before possible. In particular, we have a new interface for conversations that allows you to react instantly to other characters, maintaining the pace of a real-life conversation. And since the player now has full voice along with all the other characters, for the first time you can have a real-time conversations (and arguments!) with people in the game.

Mass Effect is a squad-based action RPG; what game mechanics make it different from other action RPGs?

Mass Effect takes an interesting approach, by providing the depth of a complex RPG, while doing so in new ways and cleaner interfaces. Whereas some action RPGs make things simpler by providing fewer options for the player, Mass Effect provides the level of options found in the more hardcore RPGs but does it in ways that are much more accessible.

For example, our philosophy for the combat system is “complex behavior through simple controls”. So instead of having a complicated series of buttons and menus to give orders to your squad, we provide one simple interface (Squad Control) which can be made to do an amazing variety of things.

So generally we’ve designed it from the ground up to provide all the depth of a complex RPG, through an interface that uses much more intuitive ways for players to access all that variety.

What are some of the challenges of making real time combat a reality in an RPG game? How have you overcome them?

Generally the first time we see a working version of the combat we’ve designed, it’s not the end of the process, it’s the beginning. It takes many full iterations of improvements to a combat system to get it really “right”. So we’ve applied that lesson to designing the real-time combat in Mass Effect.

The combat system was designed to be as accessible as the most popular first person shooters, involve cooperation of varying talents in your squad like in KOTOR, and to provide a simple way for the player to set up complex attack plans on the battlefield. By implementing our best answers to these goals, then improving them over and over again, we’ve been able to close in on a combat system that has the rare qualities of being both easy to use, and tactically complex.

What is the storyline of Mass Effect? What types of characters will players run across?

The storyline for Mass Effect sets up a spectacular situation for the player to jump into:

Among those who study ancient alien ruins, a horrific legend is told: that every 50,000 years a gate opens in space, and a race of machines pours through - harvesting organic civilizations and all that they have created.

It is the year 2183. The gate is about to open…

There is more emphasis on character interaction and dialog, what are some examples of the better character interaction in Mass Effect?

In addition to the new dialog system, players will experience more realistic interactions with other characters throughout the game. Characters in Mass Effect all have something to do, somewhere to go, or someone to talk to. Even when they’re not doing anything, they’re leaning against a railing, or relaxing in a couch.

And when talking to other characters, you’ll know that your responses aren’t just going to silently move the conversation forward. Your responses will be fully voiced (sometimes quite aggressively) by your character. And with amazing improvements to the animation of our characters, your character can even impose himself (or herself) physically in the middle of conversation – shoving other characters, pounding a table, drawing a weapon, etc. We’re bringing the visceral, heart-pounding interactivity of combat into the conversations themselves.

The second part of the Mass Effect interview series will focus on game options and environments. For more information on the game, visit www.MassEffect.com

I hope this game will rock.

I hope Bioware is playing Oblivion right now to see what they have to top. be cool with plenty of worlds maybe not as big as OB' s but each world one 3rd of it would be nice, and i wouldnt mind random generation!