Ken Levine, the creator of BioShock, has been hard at work on a new game, with 12 former Irrational Games developers. His new studio, Ghost Story (formerly known as Irrational Games), hasn't offered much as for as details go on their new project, but luckily we have heard something.
Levine offered light details on the game that is currently in production from his new studio, without revealing too much. From what we know, after an onstage interview at EGX Rezzed in London (via IGN), it's clear that the upcoming game will feature a smaller world, like BioShock, but with plenty of details. The game will be unique, as far as narrative driven games go and will have plenty of secrets to be unlocked.
The BioShock creator detailed how the Nemesis System, found in Shadow of Mordor, has influenced his upcoming project. Essentially, the upcoming game will feature a more reactive narrative and the Nemesis System helped shape that:
"The game that inspired me most – that we were maybe onto something, on the right track – was Shadow of Mordor with the Nemesis System. […] That was a very limited, rudimentary approach to it, that covers a very narrow area.
"It’s more of a metanarrative, and there’s not a lot of dialogue support for that stuff, so our thing is much more ambitious. That sort of gave us, like, ‘OK, maybe we’re not completely crazy in what we’re trying to do.'"
Levine further details on how reactive the upcoming game will be to the player's choices, failures, or accomplishments:
"One of the most important things about what we're doing now is this concept of Radical Recognition […] that if the player does something, the game should – as often as we can – recognise that accomplishment, or failure, or whatever it is, and find ways to have the world feed back that it cares […] The heart of that is something that’s central to our game."
"They're still built on a different model, sort of a branching structure model […] Our game is a deeply systemic game, underpinning everything from gameplay to narrative.
"To be able to then have a narrative that seems traditional – like our other games [Bioshock or System Shock 2], one of those kind of narratives – but can react and comment on much more small-level actions the player takes – that's the goal."
The BioShock creator has done a fairly good job of offering insight on his studios' upcoming game, without offering much in terms of what the game is. We can only look forward to seeing more details of the game in the coming months.
