BT: Again, Battlefield is known for being on PC – why have you tried to go for a console game at all?
JK: We wanted to use the power of the next-gen consoles – really kind of push it a little bit and see how far we could get with it all. Just put ourselves in the market and see what possibilities it gave us.
BT: And you don’t find next-gen PC hardware at all interesting?
JK: <Laughs> No, we really do, but for Bad Company we really wanted to go strongly into that market.
BT: There’s kind of an attitude among some hardcore PC gamers that console gamers are a bit dumber – people talk about games being ‘dumbed down’ for console releases. Did you have to simplify things from your original vision to get Bad Company of consoles?
JK: No. I think that’s one of the things that we really tried not to do with Bad Company. As you said earlier, we’ve got a lot of PC heritage but we don’t really want to talk down players or take away that tactical depth from the console experience.
Instead, we wanted to bring that over to the console market and give console gamers a lot more tactical choices with the different weapons, classes, vehicles and gadgets. This isn’t just a basic shooter. On top of all that we’ve got the destruction too and squad spawn.
One of the largest challenges for us is bringing that stuff over without dumbing it down. Making them more accessible is hard too because obviously you don’t have the mouse and you can’t just flick the wheel between weapons. I’m actually really interested in doing all that and tackling the problem of getting these deep gameplay elements and making them accessible on a new platform.
BT: And your move to consoles wasn’t at all motivated by piracy?.
JK: Um, not that I’m aware of no. Piracy is what it is, you’ll find it wherever you go and no matter what platform you’re on you’ll find that people are pirating games. It wasn’t something we were really worried about at all.
BT: Ok, so, looking to the future there’s obviously going to be another Battlefield game at some point. Do you imagine that if Bad Company does well then you might stay on consoles?
JK: With Bad Company we’re hoping to build a good franchise here on consoles and going forward we hope to grow that, but that doesn’t mean that DICE isn’t going to be developing PC games in the future. We’ve got Battlefield: Heroes and some other stuff forthcoming too. PC is our roots and we want to stay true to that.
BT: Cool – so, when’s the release date?
JK: It’s the 27th in Europe and the 24th in the US. Of June. On PS3 and Xbox 360.
JK: We wanted to use the power of the next-gen consoles – really kind of push it a little bit and see how far we could get with it all. Just put ourselves in the market and see what possibilities it gave us.
BT: And you don’t find next-gen PC hardware at all interesting?
JK: <Laughs> No, we really do, but for Bad Company we really wanted to go strongly into that market.
BT: There’s kind of an attitude among some hardcore PC gamers that console gamers are a bit dumber – people talk about games being ‘dumbed down’ for console releases. Did you have to simplify things from your original vision to get Bad Company of consoles?
JK: No. I think that’s one of the things that we really tried not to do with Bad Company. As you said earlier, we’ve got a lot of PC heritage but we don’t really want to talk down players or take away that tactical depth from the console experience.
Instead, we wanted to bring that over to the console market and give console gamers a lot more tactical choices with the different weapons, classes, vehicles and gadgets. This isn’t just a basic shooter. On top of all that we’ve got the destruction too and squad spawn.
One of the largest challenges for us is bringing that stuff over without dumbing it down. Making them more accessible is hard too because obviously you don’t have the mouse and you can’t just flick the wheel between weapons. I’m actually really interested in doing all that and tackling the problem of getting these deep gameplay elements and making them accessible on a new platform.
BT: And your move to consoles wasn’t at all motivated by piracy?.
JK: Um, not that I’m aware of no. Piracy is what it is, you’ll find it wherever you go and no matter what platform you’re on you’ll find that people are pirating games. It wasn’t something we were really worried about at all.
BT: Ok, so, looking to the future there’s obviously going to be another Battlefield game at some point. Do you imagine that if Bad Company does well then you might stay on consoles?
JK: With Bad Company we’re hoping to build a good franchise here on consoles and going forward we hope to grow that, but that doesn’t mean that DICE isn’t going to be developing PC games in the future. We’ve got Battlefield: Heroes and some other stuff forthcoming too. PC is our roots and we want to stay true to that.
BT: Cool – so, when’s the release date?
JK: It’s the 27th in Europe and the 24th in the US. Of June. On PS3 and Xbox 360.
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