Call of Duty Advanced Warfare Interview: Narrative Focus And Exo-Customization

Just around the launch of Call of Call of Duty Advanced Warfare, GamingBolt was able to interview the Studio Head, Chief Creative Officer and Co-founder of Sledgehammer Games, Glen Schofield. Check out his response below.

Kurtis Simpson: So from what’s been shown of Advanced Warfare, everything already looks improved. Visuals are amazing and it’s clearly a step up from past games, what with the new engine and all. With the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One, would you say the game is close to pushing the hardware of these new consoles?

Glen Schofield: In our game? No I wouldn’t. Based on the fact that this is my seventh console transition I would say that we’re barely…no we’re not pushing it yet. It’s going to take another two years before we understand. Remember these things don’t come with instruction manuals, so right now we’re just trying to get as much done as we can, trying to learn more, trying to get the game done. But yeah, give the engineers another two years and you’re going to see some great stuff.

"We have some great engineers, some of these guys have been doing this for...well like I've said I've been doing this for around twenty something years now and a lot of the engineers have been here with me for over fifteen. They know what they're doing and that's the key.

Kurtis Simpson: Well from what I’ve seen from the game, It already looks brilliant.

Glen Schofield: We have some great engineers, some of these guys have been doing this for…well like I’ve said I’ve been doing this for around twenty something years now and a lot of the engineers have been here with me for over fifteen. They know what they’re doing and that’s the key.

Kurtis Simpson: Okay great. While a lot of my questions about single-player seemed to have already been answered prior, through videos and what not, but are you able to discuss how long the single-player campaign may be?

Glen Schofield: All I will say is that it’s a little bit longer than…You see, you might play it five hours. The guy down the street plays it in ten hours. So every time I give a number it sets people on fire, right?

Kurtis Simpson: (Laughter)

Glen Schofield: It’s just all over the place! What we can say with some authority is that it’s probably just a little bit longer than some of the other recent Call of Duty’s. Which I’m excited about.

Kurtis Simpson: I’m excited too because you mentioned that there would be more of a narrative this time round with a soldier named Private Mitchell.

Glen Schofield: Yes.

Kurtis Simpson: So will there be any other characters besides him in the game’s storyline that we’ll get to interact with? Or will there be any possibilities for a Co-op mode within the campaign?

Glen Schofield: Oh, you’re going to be seeing other characters in the game. We got a couple of great characters characters. You know, we’ve got Gideon who’s in it, there’s Cormack and yeah you can play either one of those guys in the multi-player. You know in the custom create-a-character mode, you can create an Operator.

"We started to go over it again we added persistence, there's so much you can add to your character. But it's way over the top there's so much you can add to your Exo. The enemies now they have an Exo! there's the waves and the cloak. So yeah it's just way better.

Kurtis Simpson: Sounds great. So in the new Co-op mode the Exo-Survival mode, it’s reminiscent of the Spec-Ops mode from Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3.

Glen Schofield: Well it’s…remember we had survival mode in there when we did that game. So yeah, we had survival mode and there would be just waves after waves right. But when you died you went back to zero right. So we started to go over it again we added persistence, there’s so much you can add to your character. But it’s way over the top there’s so much you can add to your Exo. The enemies now they have an Exo! there’s the waves and the cloak. So yeah it’s just way better.

Kurtis Simpson: Will there be anything in the way of progression in the Exo-Survival mode in terms of the Exo Suit? So will there be any choices for other suits? During the trailer I noticed that there was a big tank-looking Exo-suited guy.

Glen Schofield: Yup. I’m not going to say much on that but yeah. There’s a lot in that. There’s a lot in the way of the Exo and in the survival Exo, and you can also upgrade. And you know what? We’ve also added an upgrade system in the single-player. So you’ll get points as you’re playing but it’s not one that’s going to change you thematically or artistically.

What happens is you’re gonna see head shots and all sorts of different things to level up, and at the end of the level you’re going get a score. And you can take those points and you can put them in to your Exo. So you may want faster reload, if you want this if you want that, you can put them in to your Exo for the next level. It’s not a deep system but it will probably take you twice to go through it if you want to get them all.

Kurtis Simpson: Sounds interesting and with the amount of things you can do in the way of progression in the single-player mode for your Exo-suit, can you take all that in to the multi-player or the Co-op mode?

Glen Schofield: Umm. We are not really discussing it right now there’s still a bunch of things we’re not ready to talk about.

Kurtis Simpson: Are we going to see any wacky pets this time round?

Glen Schofield: (Laughter)

Kurtis Simpson: In the last game we saw a Dog. 

Glen Schofield: Umm…Turtles. You’ll see Turtles. So yeah you might.

"We got a couple of great characters characters. You know, we've got Gideon who's in it, there's Cormack and yeah you can play either one of those guys in the multi-player.

Kurtis Simpson: We might? there’s going to be a lot of surprises aren’t there?

Glen Schofield: I’ve gotta leave you some surprises. But yeah if he wasn’t here I would just tell ya everything. Ha-ha! [referring to the PR]

Kurtis Simpson: He’s keeping you on hold? Ha-ha.

Glen Schofield: Ha! Well yeah three years of keeping me under my hat. Hey, what size shirt are you?

Kurtis Simpson: Shirt? Medium.

Glen Schofield: No problem here you go.

Kurtis Simpson: That’s great thanks. Glen it’s been great talking to you.

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