Ghostrunner Interview – Combat, Setting, and More

With its grim cyberpunk setting and its blend of fast, challenging, and kinetic first person combat and platforming, on paper, Ghostrunner is looking like a very intriguing game. Though one can never be too sure about the quality of a game until actually going hands-on with it, the footage we’ve seen of Ghostrunner so far is promising something unique and slick. There’s still a while to go before the game lands, but curious as we were to know more about it, we recent sent over a few of our questions about Ghostrunner to its development team. Read our interview with developers One More Level below.

"We treat fast-paced platforming and the whole movement system as a core mechanic. According to our premise, reaching the enemy in one piece should be a challenge for the player, not just killing them."

Can you speak to us about combat? Melee combat can be tricky to pull off in first person games, but Ghostrunner’s combat is looking fast and kinetic.

It’s true that players often find feeling the distance and the range of the blow hard. That’s why we’re using a system known from, for example, slashers where the player is drawn to the enemy. Our one-hit-one-kill mechanic is very satisfying as you can see the result of the hit immediately. The combat in Ghostrunner is quite fast, requires dexterity, but the trial and error method is another part of the game: there’s nothing unusual about dying several times at one point.

Ghostrunner has shown some interesting glimpses of what looks like slick, fast-paced platforming. How much of a focus is that going to be in the game?

We treat fast-paced platforming and the whole movement system as a core mechanic. According to our premise, reaching the enemy in one piece should be a challenge for the player, not just killing them.

Will combat and platforming expand as players earn more abilities?

Yes, we’re taking a character development system into account. It would cover both movement and combat abilities as well as new skills, which we have not disclosed yet.

Cyberpunk settings and stories inherently often go hand in hand with some very interesting themes, such as transhumanism- is that something that Ghostunner will be looking to tackle?

Yes. This is one of the topics we would like to dive in a bit deeper. For example, leaving your humanity behind in order to survive in the hard, post-apocalyptic world.

"The difficulty in our game will be defined by more and more complex and challenging archetypes of enemies. I believe that the players will be satisfied with both the number and the variety of enemies."

What can players expect in terms of enemy variety?

The difficulty in our game will be defined by more and more complex and challenging archetypes of enemies. I believe that the players will be satisfied with both the number and the variety of enemies.

Roughly how long will an average playthrough of Ghostrunner be?

It should be around 5 hours.

Do you have any plans to launch on Switch?

For now it’s only PC, PS4, Xbox One.

Will the game will feature Xbox One X and PS4 Pro-specific enhancements? Is 4K/60fps on the cards?

We’ll definitely support enhancements, but it’s too early to go into details.

How is the game running on the original Xbox One and PS4, frame rate and resolution-wise?

As the game is still in an early development stage, we’re unable to give such information. A good optimization of the game is one of our top priorities.

The PS5 is confirmed to have SSD. From a development perspective, how will this help you to improve game performance in the future?

It’ll definitely help to load the levels faster.

"Backwards compatibility is a great feature. If it does appear on next-gen consoles, it lets us hope that, for example, God’s Trigger, our previous game, will sell on the next-gen as well."

Xbox Scarlett features GDDR6 memory. How will this increase in memory bandwidth help you in the future?

It’ll definitely help to generate the frames faster as the GPU stall will be shorter during the data transfer.

Backwards compatibility is a big feature PS5. How will it help your past library to evolve and grow?

Backwards compatibility is a great feature. If it does appear on next-gen consoles, it lets us hope that, for example, God’s Trigger, our previous game, will sell on the next-gen as well.