Bit-tech: Could you elaborate a little more on that, what other areas do you think developers need to be more aware of?
CliffyB: What's the last truly great shooter you can recall playing?
Eek! The hunter becomes the hunted. We were totally unprepared for this change in tack, and fumbled around hopelessly for an answer.
Bit-tech: Bioshock? Although I suppose that's…
CliffyB: …kind of a hybrid, right?
Damn, what next? Can't say Gears of War, we can't suck up like that! What have we been playing in office recently? Serious Sam! That'll do, yeah Serious Sam, because that's a pure unadulterated shooter. In hindsight we would have said Half-Life 2: Episode One, because it's so taught and fun to play, but it's a testament to what happens when you put unsuspecting journalist on the spot in an interview when he isn't expecting it. Anyway…
CliffyB: I mean, my whole thing is, let's master what the rules are for making a great shooter. You know, I play so many shooters on a console these days that really don't do any proper aim assist and also…what Halo did so far as their control scheme, if you're going to make a shooter on a console you better thing very carefully about what you're going to change from Halo, because you got 8 million plus gamers out there who already know how to play that game…
Bit-tech: And love it…
CliffyB: Yeah, and they love it dearly and I look at…Bioshock changed some of the controls as far as A is search where as X isn't, right? Whereas they made Y jump, which was actually a very intelligent decision for that game because you do more searching than you are jumping, so A is prime real estate on that controller. Whereas I play other certain games where they don't put Melee on B for some reason and at that point the game shouldn't be allowed to come out. There's no good reason for making X Melee in your game, no justifiable reason other than you're just trying to different, there's no reason to reinvent that wheel.
Bit-tech: Do you think then that genre defining games; such as the Halo's and Bioshock's, have a detrimental effect on other games because developers feel they need to differentiate their games?
CliffyB: The thing is, man, certain wheels don't need to be reinvented. It could be possible to take the Halo formula and controls, and evolve it in a different direction instead of deciding for some reason you're gonna make the B button is going to do crouch. Right there someone should've just been saying: "No, that's not going to fly". Just make B melee, and think of other ways to be innovative.
At this point the Xbox PR woman pipes in to tell us there's time for one more question. We've overrun our 10 minute slot by two minutes, though it hardly feels like we've been talking all that long at all. Time flies, as they say.
Bit-tech: Okay, so…Gears of War 2, anything you can say about that without having kill us afterward?
CliffyB: I don't know why anybody would think we'd make a sequel to a game that sold over 4 million copies. That would be stupid.
Nicely dodged and that, as they say, was that. We thanked Cliff for his time, and shuffled out to spend more time playing the PC version of the game, our impressions of which can be read very soon.
CliffyB: What's the last truly great shooter you can recall playing?
Eek! The hunter becomes the hunted. We were totally unprepared for this change in tack, and fumbled around hopelessly for an answer.
Bit-tech: Bioshock? Although I suppose that's…
CliffyB: …kind of a hybrid, right?
Damn, what next? Can't say Gears of War, we can't suck up like that! What have we been playing in office recently? Serious Sam! That'll do, yeah Serious Sam, because that's a pure unadulterated shooter. In hindsight we would have said Half-Life 2: Episode One, because it's so taught and fun to play, but it's a testament to what happens when you put unsuspecting journalist on the spot in an interview when he isn't expecting it. Anyway…
CliffyB: I mean, my whole thing is, let's master what the rules are for making a great shooter. You know, I play so many shooters on a console these days that really don't do any proper aim assist and also…what Halo did so far as their control scheme, if you're going to make a shooter on a console you better thing very carefully about what you're going to change from Halo, because you got 8 million plus gamers out there who already know how to play that game…
Bit-tech: And love it…
CliffyB: Yeah, and they love it dearly and I look at…Bioshock changed some of the controls as far as A is search where as X isn't, right? Whereas they made Y jump, which was actually a very intelligent decision for that game because you do more searching than you are jumping, so A is prime real estate on that controller. Whereas I play other certain games where they don't put Melee on B for some reason and at that point the game shouldn't be allowed to come out. There's no good reason for making X Melee in your game, no justifiable reason other than you're just trying to different, there's no reason to reinvent that wheel.
Bit-tech: Do you think then that genre defining games; such as the Halo's and Bioshock's, have a detrimental effect on other games because developers feel they need to differentiate their games?
CliffyB: The thing is, man, certain wheels don't need to be reinvented. It could be possible to take the Halo formula and controls, and evolve it in a different direction instead of deciding for some reason you're gonna make the B button is going to do crouch. Right there someone should've just been saying: "No, that's not going to fly". Just make B melee, and think of other ways to be innovative.
At this point the Xbox PR woman pipes in to tell us there's time for one more question. We've overrun our 10 minute slot by two minutes, though it hardly feels like we've been talking all that long at all. Time flies, as they say.
Bit-tech: Okay, so…Gears of War 2, anything you can say about that without having kill us afterward?
CliffyB: I don't know why anybody would think we'd make a sequel to a game that sold over 4 million copies. That would be stupid.
Nicely dodged and that, as they say, was that. We thanked Cliff for his time, and shuffled out to spend more time playing the PC version of the game, our impressions of which can be read very soon.
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