“Within the first game, we did what I call Choice and Consequence Lite,” says Warren Spector as he demos Epic Mickey 2’s newly announced Fort Wasteland level. “We did not want to scare ‘normal’ people, so we lightened up just a little. This time we aren’t doing that.”
Fort Wasteland is an oddly appropriate place to illustrate what Warren Spector promises to be a more lasting type of player choice. This a part of the sport is a gloomy and gloomy tackle Frontierland, the Old West-inspired chunk of Disneyland where saloons, steamboats, and simulated wilderness dominate the landscape.
If during your platforming adventures you spot a high point the need arises reach and no thanks to get there, you will cut back a tree and use it as a ramp to simply walk as much as that in the past inaccessible point. The one problem? That tree is down for good. Make a habit of this and you’re effectively clear-cutting the yank West. You’ve become your personal Disney villain, and no amount of leaving that level and coming back to it’s going to change things.
“We didn’t try this within the first game,” says Spector. “We didn’t ever say, ‘You can’t undo this.’ We allow you to get all of the thinner rewards, after which you will return and get your entire paint rewards within the same place.”
This gets me wondering: How do you stress-test a system like this? How do you ensure these permanent choices don’t eventually break the sport?
“Brutal testing!” Spector responds. “What you do is test the intense cases. In Deus Ex, I made people play through without ever using a weapon. I made them play through and kill absolutely everything that moved. Or get in the course of the game without ever using a skill, or an augmentation. In the event you do this, you’ll be pretty certain that anything within the middle is gonna work.”
“Publishers hate that,” jokes Spector. “It’s really scary, but persons are going to determine the best way to do things which can be impossible. In Deus Ex, we had such a lot of people understanding the best way to get outside of the gameworld that we needed to put crates and ladders outside the maps so that they could come back in.”
Back in terms of Epic Mickey 2, Spector remarks, “That you may literally get in the course of the game without ever using paint. Or, without ever using thinner.”
Half-jokingly, I immediately respond with, “How about both? Are you able to get through without using paint or thinner?”
“i do not believe you may,” Spector responds. But he sounds uncertain. It is a crazy idea, when you consider it. Paint and thinner are the yin and yang of Epic Mickey, your two most central tools for reshaping the Wasteland as you spot fit. Sure, you may get throughout the game without using one. But both?
It is exactly when Irvin Chavira chimes in. As a QA tester on Epic Mickey 2, Chavira has to damage the sport in order that it could be fixed. If there’s anyone who knows the limits of practicality in Epic Mickey 2, it’s him.
“You possibly can,” Chavira counters, matter-of-factly.
“Are you serious?!” Spector exclaims from around the table, practically spitting out the sandwich he’s been engaged on in between discussions concerning the game.
“It won’t be one hundred pc, because in an effort to get 100 pc that you need to make sure decisions [involving paint and thinner]. But i feel you will get during the core path without using either paint or thinner,” says Chavira.
“That is the great thing about these things!” remarks Specter, beaming from ear to ear. “When games are open-ended enough that the folk who work on them do not know if something’s possible, that’s pretty magical.”