Following the collapse of THQ in 2012, the fate of a Homefront sequel looked to be in the balance for several years. Now, after being passed from pillar to post, Dambuster Studios is ready to show the world just what they have been working on all this time.
With a new open-world setting and re-jigged game engine, there is plenty to get excited about here. The first Homefront game may have had a mixed reception on it’s release, but as we discovered after playing the beta at a preview event, things look a lot more promising the second time around. Mark Pilkington discusses guerilla tactics with Homefront: the Revolution game designer Fasahat Salim…
GameWatcher: To begin, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you came to be involved with this game?
Fasahat Salim: I’ve been at this studio for about five years now, and I started out as an Associate Producer with Crytek UK, and eventually made my way into game design. I worked on the Crysis series; Crysis 2 and Crysis 3. Now I’m working on Homefront: The Revolution. That’s basically me in a nut shell.
GameWatcher: Homefront has a pretty turbulent past, with THQ closing down because the studio went bankrupt. The big question really is why take up the option of developing a sequel to the game?
Fasahat Salim: Well one of the things we know is that quite a lot of people actually enjoyed the first Homefront. Or to be more exact, they enjoyed the premise of the game, in other words America being invaded by a hostile force and war coming to their doorstep for the first time. That was something that resonated with players for some reason, but everyone seems to agree there was something about that game that didn’t quite deliver on the potential it had.
GameWatcher: Yes, it received very mixed reviews upon its release…
Fasahat Salim: Exactly. So, for that reason, when THQ came to us we saw it as a good opportunity to see what we could do with it. But when THQ arrived they very much wanted to make a sequel to the first Homefront, so it was an extension to the first game. It was going to be just a continuation from, where they left off. But then obviously the whole THQ thing unfolded and Crytek got the game to themselves. That gave us the opportunity to step out from what we were doing and take the game in a slightly different direction. We decided to go open world and just open the whole game up, and try exploring a completely new style of gameplay where we are giving the player this huge space to roam around in. But not only can they go where they please, but it also allows them to create unscripted moments. All we had to do was create a mission and an objective, and the players can then complete the mission in their own unique ways. We are just providing the tools for them to do as they want to do.
GameWatcher: How does playing as a character in Homefront differ from other first person shooters?
Fasahat Salim: We want to give the player an experience of being involved in guerrilla warfare. Being an underdog and not being that soldier that we are so used to play as in video games – the guy who has a pocketful of grenades and endless ammo. We really wanted to showcase what it would be like to have the world against you, where your resources would be limited, and you would be running out of bullets all the time. These were all dynamics that made it a lot more interesting in the way a player would be forced to think about the repercussions of what he was doing. And obviously once we had that gameplay nailed, we thought about it on a multiplayer level. We felt like the co-op delivers an experience where players feel part of a team, and they have to work together to achieve goals. You can’t just go blindly running away into a combat situation, you have to figure out how to work together tactically. For us, it was important to stay true to what it meant to be a guerrilla fighter. We are just giving four guys or girls the ability to complete an objective in whatever way they see fit. It’s entirely up to them how they want to do it.
GameWatcher: It sound like there is a lot of focus on making the missions as replayable as possible…
Fasahat Salim: Yes, we would like to think there is a lot of replayablity. Each mission becomes different every time you play it. Not only can you approach it in a different way, but when you change levels the dynamics of the opponents will change as well. It changes how the enemy will react to you and how much damage they can cause and take. There is quite a difference between the difficulty levels, but that is what we want – we want players to realise this isn’t going to be a walk in the park.
GameWatcher: Talking of walks in the park, this is a very difficult game to play. I died a lot during my hands-on session…
Fasahat Salim: Yes, and that was to be expected. It’s not the easiest game to play, but it was never intended to be. The more you die, the more you understand you need to use the tactics of guerrilla warfare.
GameWatcher: How does the co-op mode relate to the single player game? Are they tied in in any way?
Fasahat Salim: The events of the co-op game take place after the story detailed in the solo player game. The single player campaign has its own story and narrative, and then when that finishes you have this co-op mode. All the missions in co-op are wrapped in their own narrative, all presenting scenarios relating to guerrilla warfare. We wanted all the missions to stand alone as their own separate stories, all wrapped up in the same narrative.
GameWatcher: In terms of character creation, you have a very large pool of professions to choose from, everything from an American football player to a personal trainer. How did you come up with the list?
Fasahat Salim: The different professions are to highlight the kind of lives these people had before they joined the resistance. It gives you a base skill level to start off on, but that doesn’t necessary mean that is the route you have to take. You can customise your character so they become specialised in lots of different things. We want players to be in a position where they are comfortable with their character and the weapons at their disposal, so we want to evolve their characters into what they want them to be. You can them create multiple characters all who specialise in separate skills, all ready for different situations.
GameWatcher: Finally, what is the reason people would buy Homefront: The Revolution?
Fasahat Salim: When you buy the game you will get a very deep and immersive single player campaign, and then you will get a completely enriched co-op experience after that as well.
Homefront: The Revolution is set to ambush your nearest games retailer when it is released in May 2016.
