"Blast Brigade combines both dynamic combat and classic platforming."

World and level design is a crucial aspect of any game adopting to metroidvania approach. What can players expect from Blast Brigade vs. the Evil Legion of Dr. Cread here in terms of the world’s size and how varied it will be?

In total, there will be 10 biomes with differences in visual style and mechanics. We prioritized to make each biome interesting and memorable whilst still preserving the integrity of the world, both in feeling and in a complex system of connections between biomes – plot, mechanical, and directly topological.

Metroidvania design generally encourages slower and deliberate progression, given that it emphasizes exploration so much. How does Blast Brigade reconcile that with the more fast-paced nature of its combat?

Blast Brigade combines both dynamic combat and classic platforming. There are sections where the player needs to shoot and fight a lot, but there are also sections where combat dynamics give way to more thoughtful exploration. By combining these things, we build the game’s difficulty curve and the overall flow of the game.

What can you tell us about the variety and design of enemies and bosses in the game?

About 13 unique bosses and about 70 monsters are planned for release. All of them have attack patterns that the player will have to study which will test the knowledge of the mechanics and the abilities of the game’s heroes.

"The game has several layers of progress, and heroes are the topmost and most obvious. There are also generally accepted mechanics such as increasing the total number of health points and charges of abilities. Weapons can also be collected and changed in the process, choosing combinations of weapons to suit your style of play."

How much will the multiple playable characters differ from each other from a mechanical point of view?

The main difference between the heroes is their platform and combat abilities. Also, each of them is important for the story and has a role in the plot of the game. They are not just re-skins of one hero, but full-fledged characters with their own motivations and background.

Can you talk to us about the progression mechanics in the game with things such as weapons, abilities, and power-ups, and how extensive players can expect these systems to be?

The game has several layers of progress, and heroes are the topmost and most obvious. There are also generally accepted mechanics such as increasing the total number of health points and charges of abilities. Weapons can also be collected and changed in the process, choosing combinations of weapons to suit your style of play. In addition, there are two more intricate progression systems, which we will be ready to talk about in more detail later. One concerns the ability to receive passive perks for characters when the other is more story-driven and concerns the general progress of the player in terms of exploring the world.

Blast Brigade’s story is definitely one of its more interesting elements, especially with its light-hearted tone and its focus on a diverse cast of characters. How much of an emphasis does the game put on narrative and storytelling?

We want to make a fascinating world and tell an exciting story. Each character has a unique place in the plot, has its own motivations, and its own background. The plot itself is also presented in different ways. Things like cut scenes, character comments about the world around them, various notes and diaries, and even some special milestones that in themselves help to understand what is happening on the island.

Roughly how long will an average playthrough of the game be?

About 20 hours, depending on playstyle, the player’s skill and how many of the optional content the player completes.

"We want to make a fascinating world and tell an exciting story."

Since the reveal of the PS5 and Xbox Series X’s specs, a lot of comparisons have been made between the speeds of the two consoles’ GPUs, with the PS5 at 10.28 TFLOPS and the Xbox Series X at 12 TFLOPS- but how much of an impact on development do you think that difference will have?

Xbox Series X can produce a slightly sharper picture in terms of dynamic resolution. However, if you look at the latest multi-platform releases for the current generation of Sony and Microsoft consoles, the differences are minimal. In the case of our game, due to the peculiarities of our visual style and rendering, noticeable differences in the picture and performance between the platforms are not expected.

The PS5 features an incredibly fast SSD with 5.5GB/s raw bandwidth. How can developers take advantage of this, and how does this compare to Xbox Series X’s 2.4GB/s raw bandwidth?

This can affect the gaming experience in some categories of games where there are frequent interactions with storage. Since we try to be careful with the file system and the lower limit for us is Nintendo Switch, these differences should not cause us any problems.

There is a difference in Zen 2 CPUs of both consoles. The Xbox Series X features 8x Zen 2 Cores at 3.8GHz, whereas the PS5 features 8x Zen 2 Cores at 3.5GHz. Your thoughts on this difference?

In general, you can expect a higher frame rate on Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 due to the greater processing power of both the CPU and the GPU.

The Xbox Series S features lesser hardware compared to Xbox Series X and Microsoft is pushing it as a 1440p/60fps console. Do you think it will be able to hold up for the graphically intensive next-gen games?

Recent console trends are forcing next-gen games on consoles to actively adapt to hardware. Of course, not to the same extent as on PCs, but there is a growing variety of devices that neither platforms nor publishers are willing to refuse. For developers, this only means that more effort will have to be invested in optimization.

"If you look at the latest multi-platform releases for the current generation of Sony and Microsoft consoles, the differences are minimal."

Super Resolution is coming to PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. How do you think this will help game developers?

The emergence and spread of cross-platform technologies contribute to their wider use. In theory, if used correctly, it will allow developers to improve the quality of games in terms of graphics and performance.

What resolution and frame rate is the game targeting on PS5, Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S?

We’re aiming for: Xbox Series S – 1440p and 60FPS; Xbox Series X – 4k and 120FPS; PS5 – 4k and 120FPS.

With next-gen right around the corner, it’s only natural to hear about games coming to the upcoming platforms with much more frequency. And while that’s something of a given for upcoming games that will be releasing around or after the PS5 and the Xbox Series X, it’s worth mentioning that there’s also plenty of older titles that might be looking at next-gen ports.

One such game is Warface– as a live service multiplayer shooter that has bee around for years across various platforms and has cultivated a large and dedicated playerbase, continuity, stability, ad consistency are going to be very important even heading into next-gen- and so, you’d think that this is a game that might be eyeing ports on the PS5 and the Xbox Series X (after all, it already did so with the Xbox 360 and the Xbox One).

And based on the words of Warface franchise lead Ivan Pabiarzhyn of publishers My.Games, there’s a very good chance that that’ll end up happening.

Recently, speaking in an interview with GamingBolt, Pabiarzhyn said that even though he couldn’t confirm anything yet, the developers were still “looking into what the next-gen consoles can offer us”, mentioning that CryEngine – the engine the game is built on – was “heavily modified” so that it could “run smoothly on a vast variety of systems.”

“We’ve already started communicating with the platforms about new hardware,” said Pabiarzhyn. “For obvious reasons we cannot announce anything solid at this point. The engine that powers Warface, CryEngine, was heavily modified by our team to be able to run smoothly on a vast variety of systems. If you download it and launch the game on a relatively weak PC, for example, you will be surprised how well it will run.

“With that in mind, we’re definitely looking into what the next-gen consoles can offer us, especially in terms of increased performance and graphical fidelity.”

Warface is currently available on PS4, Xbox One, and PC. The PS5 and the Xbox Series X are releasing this Holiday season. You can read our full interview with Pabiarzhyn through here.

Solid state drive technology has long been the domain of PC gaming, though some users have fitted them into current gen consoles. With the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Scarlett, SSD technology will be in the consoles from day one. We’ve already heard and see a lot about how these drives will reduce loading times, along with increasing the overall speed of the game.

Speaking to My.Games’ Ivan Pabiarzhyn, franchise lead for free to play shooter Warface, the transition to solid state drives will be the “most important improvement” for next-gen consoles. “The performance of the disk subsystem is the narrowest bottleneck of the current generation. And this problem is becoming more urgent every year with the growing trend for open worlds of the size of tens and sometimes hundreds of square kilometers in modern game projects. As for the open game worlds, it is impossible to keep the entire game map in RAM, so developers have to add new objects location by location as the player moves forward.

“In order to do this, the developer has to use tricks in the schedule (deterioration of detail and range of drawing objects, using fewer unique objects on the map) and gameplay (limitation of the maximum speed of a player’s movement, creation of buffer zones on the map with a reduced number of unique objects in order to be able to load next zone with more details). Of course, developers do not like to make such compromises, because it affects their games.”

The SSD in this case will act as an extension to the system’s RAM. “But SSD solves this problem. You can think of SSD as an extension of RAM. Levels should load faster, drawing distances can be increased. It should also allow developers to get rid of such a rudiment as a ‘loading screen’ and make the game as seamless as possible. Fast streaming allows making larger game worlds with richer content locations.”

Of course, as some people like Remedy Entertainment technical director Mika Vehkala have pointed out, loading times won’t necessarily be faster if developers don’t optimize for it. There could be situations where game production will cost less from not having to optimize content, resulting in little improvement. At the very least, first party studios under Xbox Game Studios and Sony Worldwide Studios will look to avoid this but what about the rest?

As always, time will tell. Both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Scarlett are planned to release in Holiday 2020. Stay tuned for more details on both in the meantime.

With the recent X019, Microsoft has been making some big moves to prepare for the next generation. Xbox Game Pass is seeing several new additions like Kingdom Hearts and Yakuza while new IPs like Rare’s Everwild and Obsidian’s Grounded have been announced. However, it may be a while before we see the impact of Xbox Scarlett’s hardware on game development.

For instance, how will technology like GDD6 RAM affect games development? We had a chance to speak to My.Games’ Ivan Pabriarzhyn, who’s the franchise lead for free to play shooter Warface. He said that GDD6 RAM should fix one of the bigger obstacles for developing on consoles.

“Memory performance is one of the biggest bottlenecks when developing for a console,” said Pabiarzhyn. “GDDR6 offers a big leap in data transfer rates between the processor and RAM. This means that the CPU will spend less time waiting for access to data in RAM, which should have a beneficial effect on the frame rate. With GDDR6, developers can put more stuff on-screen without sacrificing stable frame rates, which is awesome.”

In essence, this would mean that games like Halo Infinite could offer the same large scale battles as its predecessor, only with more objects on-screen and at a higher resolution. Then again, for all the benefits that the hardware provides, it may take some time before developers fully optimize for it. Such is the case with every generation, it seems.

Xbox Scarlett is out in Holiday 2020. Sony’s PlayStation 5 is out in the same period.