Thursday 27-Oct-2005 4:33 PM Lionhead's strategy general wields his godly powers and smites the guilty on all things B&W2 Black & White 2 roared onto your PC just a short while ago and having checked out our extensive review, you've probably been gorging yourself on exercising your new found godly powers, smiting the evil or innocent as you see fit and exploring the giant sandbox of deity-derived fun that is Black & White 2.
Of course it used to be the case that a game would release, you'd read the review and that would be that, but our new Post Game Analysis feature allows you to see what developers think once their game's actually hit the streets and heard what the fans have to say and we've recruited Lionhead's very own Design Lead Ron Millar to give us the post-match low down on Black & White 2.
Over to you Ron:
Is Black & White 2 pretty much the same as your original vision, or were there any major changes/feature introductions you made during the course of development that meant it's turned out a little different?
Ron Millar: Black & White 2 was an incredible concept and it turned out to be an amazing game. How many other games have you heard of that allow you to play God and choose whether or not you are going to be good and build massive cities to influence people or evil and build huge armies to conquer people and all the while with a giant creature in tow? Every game morphs a little during implementation but usually for the better. Black & White 2 really took on a life of its own because it is a full simulation. There are loads of things you can do that we never even thought of while we were making it.
What would you say you are most proud of in Black & White 2?
Ron Millar: First and foremost I'm proud of our team. I've never worked with such a talented, funny and great bunch of people. Black & White 2 was a massive undertaking and the results were only due to the hard work put into it. They truly are stars. I'd also say we're most proud of pulling together a game that features full developed versions of five other games; a city builder, an RTS, a god sim and a pet sim. Not only pulling it all together but making sure it is fun.
And what's your most memorable B&W 2 playing experience? There must have been some hilarious stories from testing....?
Ron Millar: One of the most memorable moments was when some special animations called "key moments" for the good and evil advisor animations were completed and added to the game. It really brought your good and evil conscience to life as they commented to each other about your actions.
There were some other moments where the armies began to work and the first time a volcano erupted and wiped out a town with its liquid hot lava. I love working on a game when it is almost completed because you get to play around with all the things you have created and watch them come to life. It's amazing stuff.
What was the biggest development hurdle and challenges to overcome with the game?
Ron Millar: Getting it all to work together was probably the hardest part. Black & White 2 is a gargantuan project with many pieces all having to work together in harmony and without crashing. I'm very proud of the hard work the team put in to achieve this.
How important has the fans' support been to the series? What kind of input have they had into the title?
Ron Millar: Lionhead is very loyal to the community with dedicated boards and people to encourage correspondence and mutual support. We love our fans and do our best to address their desires.
Just how sophisticated is the creature this time around? What did you learn about the creature from the original game? Will he/she continue to grow throughout the series?
Ron Millar: This time the creature is far more advanced technically and graphically. The creature can now help you build your city and be loving and friendly or he can be the ultimate weapon of destruction and war. All his graphics morph to show his alignment, his size, weight, strength and more. He is again featured in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most intelligent being in a game. We learned a lot from the first game and now the creature has a thought bubble which lets you see what he is thinking and roles which you can assign him which helps a great deal with his playability. We are already looking into ways of improving him and he will grow as the next generation of technology allows us to push him further.
Lionhead has always supported its games really well post-release - what plans do you have to release additional content this time around?
Ron Millar: We are of course responding to any issues from the community in the form of patches and looking into releasing tools for the mod community to take the game wherever they would like to take it.
What about the future of the B&W series? It was originally going to be a multi part series - have you already begun work on part three already? What kind of ideas are you playing around with?
Ron Millar: Unfortunately I can't tell you anything about this at the moment.
Aha, well will B&W as a series always remain on the PC? Do the new next-gen consoles offer you enough power to realise B&W's full potential?
Ron Millar: Unfortunately I can't tell you anything about this at the moment
The big barrier on consoles for strategy games always seems to be the interface. Will console gamers need a mouse and keyboard to enjoy the best strategy offerings or should we invent a whole new interface?
Ron Millar: I worked on a game called Goblin Commander that was a console RTS designed around the console controller. I think it can be done. You just need to not think in terms of a PC RTS game. The new controllers and consoles coming out are definitely going to allow us to move the genre forward.
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