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 Timesplitters
Free Radical Design/ Eidos/ PS2
screenshots are unavailable at this timeE3.
The one place in the world where games are vaulted onto a pedestal, dressed
to impress (a la Vanna White) and presented to the massive crowds of drooling
onlookers hungry for a glimpse of the newest games, or the best cleavage…whichever
comes first. This year I watched in amusement as the fans fought for the
right to stand front and center at the Eidos booth as a buxom teenager
handed out the annual swag under the guise of Lara Croft, stopping only
to pose for pictures with sweaty men and snap-happy adolescents. To some,
this is the Holy Grail of gaming, gaining access to the legendary tradeshow,
and returning home with buckets of plastic trinkets, XXL t-shirts, and
pornographic polaroids.
However, after many visits to said tradeshow, I have become privy to a
so-called "trade secret". Those booths at E3 are used for more than just
free beer and swanky overstuffed furniture to rest our weary feet on.
Behind the light-hearted melamine façade lies the much rumoured and oft
revered secret cubicle known as the Arc of the Gaming Covenant; the heavenly
haven where the PR gods open the guarded gates and allow a brief interlude
to take place with a game that is not on the show floor, nor mentioned
in any press kit. I am here to say, such a place does exist. Using my
legendary charm (and modesty), I found myself initiated into the rituals
that take place Behind Closed Doors.
If one game can sell the Playstation2 unit on launch day, it's going to
be Timesplitters from Free Radical Design, composed of a few brave
Brits who defected from Nintendo's Rare after getting their hands dirty
with GoldenEye and Perfect Dark. With backstage pass in
hand, I headed into the depths of the Eidos booth to meet with Karl Hilton,
David Doak and Steve Ellis, the directors in charge of this upcoming first-person
shooter.
The first thing that caught my eye when I walked into the room had to
be the frame rate that the game was running at. The smoothness was on
par, if not notches above, the current batch of FPS titles available for
the PC and, being a long time Quake fan, I found this to be highly
appealing considering the choppiness of many shooters on the console market.
The level on display was an airy Deathmatch spectacle containing at least
six or seven character bots, the number of which, Doak noted, could climb
to ten or so without effecting framerate. Not bad, I said.
The multiplayer facet of the game has been in development for a year already,
unlike GoldenEye whose multiplay was more of an afterthought built
in the last three months before shipping (a brilliant afterthought that
built a new breed of Nintendo fans). With features like intelligent character
bots, weapon presets for quick weapon cycling, a slew of hinted-at modes
like Time Challenge and Capture the Flag, and an innovative Map Editor
to build levels of your own, Timesplitters is poised to become
the kind of game to harness months of your time (hopefully until fall
of 2001 when Metal Gear Solid 2 is planning to ship).
The single player game has an intriguing plot, which will take you through
a planned nine episodes that are built like mini movies inspired by the
campy Bflicks of the 50s. Spanning the 1930s to 2030s, Free Radical
mentioned such character portrayals as a 30s tomb raider, and a 70s
cop busting up a Triad ring, alongside episodes including a bank heist
(inspired by Michael Mann's Heat and LA Confidential), and
a visit to an alien planet.
Because of the campy tongue-in-cheek feel to the game, the standard First-Person
Shooter violence may not apply to Timesplitters. Free Radical stated
that they have no interest in gore and prefer the use of special effects
versus animated blood. That's not to say this fast paced shooter isn't
jam packed with nasty weapons including a plasma gun with gunfire that
ricochets off the wall, causing body damage from around the corner. Pretty
cool! (and that's a compliment coming from a PC gamer who vowed never
to give the time of day to a console shooter, not even GoldenEye).
While there is much more to this game, the bulk of my visit was taken
up with a demonstration of the user friendly Map Editor. If you've ever
attempted to design a level for a game like Quake or Unreal,
you know the inherent steep learning curve. Free Radical has created a
simple lego-like interface for creating deathmatch maps for multiplayer.
Using a tile based building system composed of corridors, rooms, and even
lights that can be colored or set to flicker and pulse, the average user
can whip out a level in under five minutes. Whether it's a sci-fi feel
or gothic ambience you are after, a simple button click will achieve the
desired design.
Easy to use, but difficult to master, this system will have gamers creating
signature Capture the Flag maps that one can only hope will be accessible
via Sony's broadband network. While the directors would not comment on
online play, a brief glimpse at Timesplitters shows that this title
is built with online fragfests in mind.
As for some of the rumoured PS2 development issues like anti-aliasing,
David Doak eloquently states the Free Radical Design doctrine, likely
born out of the Nintendo's design weaknesses, that they will work around
any hardware limitations. In the name of gameplay, they will put framerate
before graphics. In terms of those pesky "jaggies", they've tweaked their
physical models to help avoid a case of the uglies.
With the October 26 launch date a reality, Free Radical feels comfortable
that they can make this target for the game's release. My introduction
to Timesplitters behind closed doors at E3 was a definite highlight.
And it's this game that could cause the PlayStation 2 to blow the doors
right off anything else on the market.
-Zoe Flower
>>>next
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Silent
Scope
Konami/ DC
Konami has a version of this arcade sniper game, but
they're trying to suss out if the game works without the arcade sniper's
scope hardware.
Legends
of Baldur's Gate
Interplay
Interplay wasn't actually showing anything other than
a poster that got hung by accident. The game hasn't been announced but
those in the know say it's a console title.
Dreamcast
Mouse
Sega
Surfing the internet and playing first-person shooters
just isn't as effective without a mouse. Sega knows it and the problem
will shortly be solved.
Indrema
Indrema
Despite the fact that they're trying to launch a whole
new console, the crew of Indrema were meeting those whom they had
called at someone else's booth and then moving them down to the
cafeteria to talk.
Lara
Croft
Eidos
You might have noted that, discounting the GBC version, the only Lara
Croft on the floor was a model. There were no Tomb Raider games on the
show floor. Never fear, Eidos is working on a PlayStation 2 game starring
the vivacious vixen, but it probably won't be a Tomb Raider.
Kinesoft
Kinesoft
Kinesoft was hiding in a by-appointment-only meeting
room to show off the games (MageLords & Crimson Order) in development
by their experienced design teams. MageLords from the creator of Masters
of Orion looks interesting, as does Crimson Order, a squad based tactical
combat game where the developers are concentrating on great AI and a
marvelously simple level editor.
Digiscents
Digiscents
Your game area probably already smells, but these guys
aren't talking moldy food, and various bodily excretions, they're talking
mixing aromatic oils to provide computers and games with olfactory feedback.
.
Hurdy
Gurdy
Core/ PS2
A cartoon adventure game in development by Core, originators
of TombRaider and some ex-disney animators. Intriguing!
Turbine
Software
Turbine Software/ online PC
Asheron's Call has been widely praised for some of the
innovative game design ideas that Turbine Software came up with. Much
of the criticism leveled at AC has to do with the graphics. Fed up with
it, the crew at Turbine have been cranking away at their next online
engine which looks as good as the best looking single-player games.
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> Behind Closed Doors... E3's Best Kept Secrets