Exodus, the new time-dilating space epic from developers who worked on the Mass Effect trilogy, Halo, The Last of Us, and Baldur's Gate, lands somewhere on two RPG spectrums apparently - between fantastical games like Skyrim and Final Fantasy, and BioWare bangers such as Dragon Age and Mass Effect.
Speaking during a recent Q&A, Archetype Entertainment describes how Exodus' protagonist works and whether their personality is one left up to players' own interpretation. Will they have a pre-established one, or can fans shape it as they play? "The level of personality that a character might have in a role-playing game is really dependent upon the kind of role-playing game and it kind of goes on a scale," explains studio head James Ohlen.
"On one end, you have massive multiplayer games or Skyrim, where you really can imagine yourself or your character, your avatar, as almost anything you want," continues the lead, detailing how personalities work in some of the best RPGs. "On the other side of the spectrum, you have like Final Fantasy or other Square Enix games where your character's name and gender and everything is decided for you, and personality."
Ohlen goes on to use BioWare's own titles as examples, which he worked on himself for over 22 years. "At BioWare, we had two different types of franchises. One was the Dragon Age, one was the Mass Effect, and Dragon Age allowed more character customizability - it was more important because Dragon Age was a spiritual successor to the Baldur's Gate franchise, and that was important." Mass Effect, on the other hand, was slightly different.
"Mass Effect was more authorial in how the personality was developed, in that the developers gave Shepherd more personality," states Ohlen. As for how and where Exodus fits amid all of these RPGs, the director says Archetype Entertainment is "leaning more towards the BioWare science fiction game." Players will "make choices with lots of cinematics, and where you're fully voiced, we want to have lots of drama - that's hard to do if you don't have a personality."
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