Gothic horror sandbox Revival cuts a bit of a polarizing figure, at least early on in its development process and at least here in the MassivelyOP comments section. While some fans seem genuinely interested in the title’s focus on medieval pseudo-realism and virtual world stylings, others seem put off by the developer Illfonic’s relentless pursuit of immersion.
We asked creative director Kedhrin Gonzalez about that perception and those in-game houses that Revival is currently selling. See what he had to say just past the break!
MOP: Revival articles typically generate a lot of comments on Massively, and usually they’re pretty polarized between the handful of people who are looking forward to the game and the majority who are like “logistics isn’t fun” and “this sounds too realistic and tedious!” Why do you think that is? Does it ever bother you as a developer that so many modern MMO players tend to value instant gratification over immersive virtual world gameplay?
Kedhrin Gonzalez:Â Our goal for Revival is to build a more immersive world because it is our passion to do so. We know not all players are going to like it. But we are making the game so it’s open for everyone. It is not going to be some crazy hardcore game that only 1337 players will be able to play.
I believe in casual experiences on the surface but a deep game the further your dig. To me, this opens the world to the players. There hasn’t been a game like Revival before, so it’s going to be a new experience for everyone. If the players that have been spoon fed MMO experiences over the years don’t like it, I can’t help them there. This is a project out of passion and not a money grab, so if the uber masses don’t get it – they don’t get it.
Revival is privately funded as opposed to crowdfunded or supported by early access. But you are selling in-game housing via a cash shop. Will that continue throughout development or is that more of a pre-alpha bone thrown to the truly hardcore fans?
This is an ongoing thing and will continue throughout all of Revival. We are privately funded, but the money we generate from these houses goes right back into development to speed up in other areas. We consider these cash buy-ins premium content and are for players who want to really show their love for the game. Players aren’t bullied into spending money with Revival.
If you had to give a one-sentence elevator pitch to sell Revival to either a potential customer or a potential investor, what would it be?
We’ve been working on this for years. We just can’t do it. There is too much epicness in Revival that can make it a one sentence or one paragraph pitch. It always spirals into a rant. The game is just too awesome to fit in a sentence.
When can we expect to see gameplay vids for Revival? Even early prototype stuff. Or are you holding off for something more polished?
On our website we outline our first six stages of development. These stages are based on a lot of things and are planned out so we can take our time on core systems and mechanics before pulling the trigger on massive production. It is smart development and allows players to interact with us early on.
We won’t even be showing combat for quite a while now. We need to worry about our other systems, NPC interactions, character customization, server load balance and all the insane amounts of telemetry data we’ll be doing on the servers. Our roll out plan is built to build smart but still allow players to have access to the game if they want. We don’t want to over promise on anything and we also don’t want to give any dates.
Dates are always a burden we don’t want to carry. We’re wanting to get this done as fast as possible, but this is an ambitious project and we need to play it smart in our development. We’ve been in situations where a product was forced out the door too many times and we don’t want that happening with Revival.
Thanks for your time!
