WildStar interview with game design producer Stephan Frost: optimization, concerns, guild housing and more

Roughly two weeks until WildStar's launch, I was able to conduct a Skype interview with game design producer Stephan Frost. When it comes to WildStar, Carbine Studios' new sci-fi MMO, Frost is the man to talk to. Not only is he a community favorite, but he knows everything about everything with the game, and he's the voice of the DevSpeak videos.

However, with only two days left of the Open Beta, it hasn't all been smooth sailing. Like every MMO launch, there's some problems popping up and the team is addressing it on-the-fly. We discuss quite a bit, including recent optimization problems with gaming rigs, what the team is currently working on, the post-launch content updates, guild housing, and his biggest concerns, among other things.

For specific questions, skip ahead to the following times:

• 0:19 What's it like in the office two weeks prior to launch? What are you working on? Optimization.
• 2:23 Are you doing anything to address the concerns of the beginning of the game being too boring/unappealing?
• 3:38 Is there a reason for not having racial bonuses?
• 5:51 Why are classes race-specific?
• 7:15 What are the odds of quality-of-life features — like sell junk — coming to the game?
• 9:13 Is there a launch-day patch for optimization? And is the first post-launch content update all set?
• 11:22 Can you expand at all on Guild housing?
• 12:37 What is the hardest thing about WildStar​ that you think prevents new players from getting into it?
• 14:38 Two weeks before launch, what's your number one biggest concern, and what's the one thing going swimmingly?
• 17:01 Was that you really playing the drums in the Raiding DevSpeak?
• 18:04 How horrible was it eating that habanero pepper on Hot Pepper Gaming?
• 19:39 Frost's pitch on why you should play WildStar.

WildStar releases on June 3, 2014.

You can follow Senior Editor Lance Liebl on Twitter @Lance_GZ. He likes talking sports, video games, movies, and the stupidity of celebrities. Email at LLiebl@GameZone.com