Next Darksiders could reduce scope to improve detail
Darksiders 2 lead designer Haydn Dalton says that depending on the reaction, Vigil may make the next game use a smaller, more focused world.
Vigil Games decided that bigger is better in Darksiders 2, making the world as much as four times larger than the original by some accounts. As Vigil wraps up work on the game, it's already thinking about the next step in the franchise--and might just scale things down for the next title if the reaction and sales call for it.
"If Jason's [Rubin, THQ President] sat there and we go and sell 4 or 5 million units, I'm pretty sure he won't say, 'Let's go and do something different now'," lead designer Haydn Dalton told Videogamer. "Maybe what he might do is turn around and say, 'We'll do another Darksiders game, but we'll try and reduce the scope so that we can make it even higher polished'. Because our scope is huge. Maybe he says, 'Bring the scope down a little bit, we'll still do another game but it's a lot more focused'. That's not such a bad thing to do either."
Dalton says that a smaller world could allow for more "detail or destruction," and balks at the idea that a smaller world would be less interesting for players. "Quantity is not about quality," he said. "Just because you make something bigger doesn't mean it's better. That's something people are saying to us: 'You keep quoting about size'. I tend to not really go on about the physical size of the world so much because it's more about what you're doing within that area that's important to me."
Darksiders 2 is set to launch August 14, and will include a Season Pass for its DLC plans.
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Steve Watts posted a new article, Next Darksiders could reduce scope to improve detail.
Darksiders 2 lead designer Haydn Dalton says that depending on the reaction, Vigil may make the next game use a smaller, more focused world.-
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It doesn't sound like he's saying they over extended themselves.. it just sounds like a design choice. Sounds like they decided to make more areas with more square mileage in this game. Resources are always limited in some way.. if you want to make larger area to play around in, you sacrifice some detail. If you have very tight areas you can go crazy on the detail in the environments. Both choices have their strengths. Star Wars Galaxies had crazy huge environments you could get lost in... but huge areas of the game were just bland and repetitive (but it did give you an excellent sense of scale - and plenty of room to drive vehicles around in). World of Warcraft has tighter, more focused areas, but everything is hand sculpted and more detailed.
Based on the screenshots and videos I've seen so far, I'm not really worried. The game looks great.
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Interested in this, but having not played the 1st i am prob going to hold off for awhile. With Counter Strike: GO and Guild Wars 2 just a few weeks out....my gaming plate will be pretty full for awhile.
Here is hoping that they agree to put Darksiders 1 free on PS+ like they did with Space Marine. If that pulls me in, i would most likely get more interested in 2. -
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Bullshit. His example was that they went big with what they've done on the first, and on the next maybe they'll go crazy in detail. It is the difference between having a big world with lots of places to go and things to do versus a small world where everything is more rich in detail, presentation.
It is Red Dead versus God of War. Neither is the "right" thing, just different approaches.
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