Porting a recreation from PC to console is tough, particularly if the sport in query is from a style historically one native to the PC. It may be tough to make the transition throughout platforms with out dropping one thing alongside the best way, however within the case of Dune Awakening, the sport has been “designed with a controller in thoughts”.
All this, with none phrase on when a console model is popping out. In actual fact, the sport’s launch on PC (which we all know will likely be coming first) can be a thriller. To assist determine what issues had been taken with this inevitable multi-platform launch, I sat down and spoke to Nils Ryborg. Ryborg is a producer on Dune Awakening, however previous to his time at Funcom he labored on the console port of Pillars of Eternity at Paradox, and so might present some distinctive perception on the method.
“The wrestle there, I keep in mind Pillars of Eternity (laughs) we spent a number of time making an attempt to determine the UX in it, and introduced in a bit of little bit of influences from motion RPGs, particularly with how you progress.” Ryborg said. “It is primarily a really tactical recreation, and clearly you are very restricted if you use a controller. So we created AI architects you would work with, so you would make your NPCs make higher selections, and direct them a bit of bit.”
He continues, “We made it simpler so that you can transfer your character round and make fast selections, and do real-time fight a bit extra successfully. However we additionally left within the mechanics that allowed you to pause and pull off extra sophisticated methods. All this alongside fundamental UX issues like discovering methods to cycle completely different buttons and what not. However the driver there was shifting issues to extra of a ARPG whereas protecting as a lot tactical stuff as we might”
So that is what the Paradox crew needed to do, what about Funcom? Was its method the identical, or had been issues taken to make the transition rather less problem?
“So from the beginning, it is the better method of constructing a recreation, going console-first. A whole lot of that transitions simply again on the PC, whereas for those who make a pure PC recreation the place you employ a mouse and keyboard to regulate, it is actually tough to port over. So it has been designed with a controller in thoughts from the get-go.”
“Clearly, we’re releasing on PC first, proper? In order that’s the place we’ll have a superb setup, however the console UX-wise, I am not tremendous involved. Clearly it is all of the basic tech stuff, y’know, the place they’re a bit of extra restricted in sure {hardware} issues. So it must carry out effectively and different tech stuff. It should not be overly sophisticated.”
So, whereas these anticipating Dune Awakening on console are nonetheless going to should bunker down for some time, ready for more information, they need to at the least be completely happy figuring out that the model they get will not be drastically completely different from their friends on PC.
