Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom: A Legendary Interview with Producer Andy Sites - Part 2

In my first interview with Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom's Producer, Andy Sites, I was able to dig up some info on the early status of the game's development. With that said, at the time of the last Q&A, certain game details could not be revealed until E3 rolled around. Now that E3 has been over for a few months, I finally got the chance to follow up with Andy on a few things I had been waiting and waiting to find out…

Matt Litten: With E3 now having come and gone, what are your impressions of how Dark Kingdom fared in its showing? I couldn't make it to the show to see it firsthand myself, unfortunately, but I caught your live demo on G4 and the game looked great (now I just want to play it :)

Andy Sites: In all honesty, we couldn't have been happier on how well Dark Kingdom showed at E3 this year. Of course as game developers we always want to do more, but it was great to hear the positive responses of the people that saw the game two months prior, while it was in a much rougher state. It was also great to see people playing the game that the team has been pouring all of their energy into, and really enjoying it.

ML: With a little more development time under your belt since our previous check-in, how is the process of working with and learning to take advantage of the PS3 hardware going?

AS: At this point, in the battle of our development tools - PS3 performance 1/ PC performance 0 - heh :. Due to our development tool needs, we maintain both a PC and PS3 client. Early in development, our PC client was far superior in performance since we were not taking advantage of the CELL architecture. However, once we starting moving threads off to the individual SPU's, such as water, flora, physics, etc., we saw huge performance gains. That said, even with the performance increases we're seeing, I know that there is still much more that the system is capable of. Second and third-gen PS3 titles are going to be insane…

ML: That being said, how has the game come along from what was shown at E3? Any new game details you can fill us in on?

AS: The team has been crunching away for most of the year, but we've really intensified our efforts since E3. Since then, our remaining two playable characters have gone into the game (Scout and Mage), along with a ton of new levels, creatures, visual and audio effects, gameplay functionality, content, etc. We've also been doing a lot of iterative play testing internally and externally to further refine our core features and playability. We plan to maintain this effort for the next few months in order to meet the launch date.

ML: What can you tell us about the plans for Dark Kingdom's online suit? Are there any modes or features beyond the cooperative online play that you can discuss at this time?

AS: Right now, we're really focusing our energy into the single and multiplayer storyline modes. We've also been creating a lot of really fun co-op and versus multiplayer "arena" style modes that we intend to provide both on-disc and as downloads through the PS3 on-line service.

ML: Now that Sony has confirmed that the PS3 will be fully equipped with a hard drive right out of the box, are there plans in place to take advantage of the HDD in Dark Kingdom? Downloadable content, for example, or any other possible uses? If so, what types of downloadable goodies can we expect and how will players go about acquiring said content based on what you know of Sony's upcoming online service?

AS: First let me say as a developer, knowing that every single user will be guaranteed to have something as significant as an HDD in their PS3 is HUGE. The fewer hardware inconsistencies that exist in your desired audience, the more confidence you have in your decision to support a specific feature. Luckily, Sony did the right thing and included the HDD in the $499 and $599 versions of the PS3. With this being the case, we plan to take advantage of the PS3 HDD for downloadable content, pre-caching of game assets to reduce load times, and so on.

ML: One of the biggest surprises from E3 was the new tilt-sensitive feature Sony announced for the PS3 controller. Did you have any knowledge of this new function or was it just as much of a surprise to you? It's hard to see this feature being used in a hack-n-slash game, but I am still curious- have you put any thoughts together on possible ways to use the tilt action in Dark Kingdom?

AS: While we didn't have our hands on one prior to the show, we were aware of Sony's plans to provide this functionality in the new controllers. Unfortunately, we're still in a state of development that I'm not ready to discuss potential uses of the motion-sensitive controllers.

ML: Finally, what estimate do you have on the game's completion status in its current build? Is everything still on track for a launch lineup release?

AS: Development of Dark Kingdom is going full-steam ahead, and we're looking to be on-track for delivering a great launch title in November!

For the first part of our in-depth interview, click here!