Demigod Guru

We’ve got a brand new interview with Demigod’s Lead Designer, John Comes. Check it out after the jump.

1. How do you plan to balance General type heroes to Assassins in terms of power and utility? To elaborate, would it be possible for a team full of Assassin Demigods take on a team full of Generals, or will it be necessary to mix and match the two archetypes?

This is a great question! This is one of Demigod’s core features. Because we had the game playable so early we’ve been able to experiment with all types of ways to balance the two types of demigods. A team of generals versus a team of assassins will be a completely balanced, enjoyable and action packed game. We believe we’ve found all the advantages generals have over assassins and vice versa. Once we had this understanding, we’ve given assassins and generals counters to the advantages of the other type.

2. Concerning the game’s RPG aspects, does Demigod feature character levels and items that are purchased from game to game, and subsequently reset in new games?

Demigod gives you the whole experience of seeing an RPG character grow greatly in strength in just a short time. In the matter of 20-30 minutes you can achieve maximum level, buy powerful artifacts and win the day. Then when you play again, you start back at level 1 with nothing and can choose a different skill path, choose a different demigod or a set of different equipment.

3. Will there be some form of persistence (e.g. permanent skills) that players can carry from game to game?

There will! Demigod has teamed up with the guys from Stardock to use the Impulse system as our back end. This gives us the ability to have achievements in the game. Unlike other games, Demigod’s achievements will actually be upgrades to your castle. So you’ll be able to get into a game and see how advanced other players are depending on how decked out their castle is. This isn’t just visual flair either, some achievements will actually make your castle stronger.

4. Will Demigod’s online service, Impulse, feature ranking or achievements components? If so, will these have any effect on the player’s aesthetics or serve any kind of function?

As mentioned above, Demigod will be the first game, that I know of, that will show off achievements in game.

5. Likewise, will there be a leveling system that matches players of similar skill together?

We are still working out the dynamics of the matchmaking system but I believe we’d be doing the fans a great disservice if we didn’t match people based on skill level.

6. Will it be necessary for players to connect to Impulse in order to play a game of Demigod together, or is it also still possible to play through LAN? Are there any benefits to playing on Impulse?

There’s tons of benefits of playing through Impulse! Things like community services, match making, auto patching, game add-ons and all the other robust features that Impulse provides will be more than enough reason to use Impulse as the launching point for any game in the Stardock catalog. With that said, LAN play will still be available for the fans who just want a ‘friendly’ game with their buddies.

7. Will Demigod have any support for custom rulesets for players who wish for an experience different than the vanilla game? If so, will this affect their “ranking”, if there is one?

Heh, hopefully with the uniqueness of game play and visual style of Demigod no one considers the game ‘vanilla’.

Custom rule sets are something we are currently talking about, both on if and how to allow them. It’s not something I would rule out but it’s also not something I have an answer for as of yet.

8. Will it be possible for players to create their own custom maps? If so, will it also be possible to share them with other players via an in-game file-transfer system?

I can neither confirm nor deny any aspect of the allowance or extent of the modability of Demigod. (That one is for all you GPGNet forum peeps!)

(For everyone else) We are still discussing how and if we should allow custom maps or any other mod. It’s definitely on our radar and know how much the fans love to tinker with the game. The detail level that goes into the custom maps takes a large team a long time to pull off. So, if we allow custom maps we want to make sure the fans have the robust tool set to make maps that fit their highest expectations.

9. Besides the DOTA and Footmen Frenzy influenced gameplay, are there any plans to incorporate other popular game modes like Capture the Flag, Tower Defense and King of the Hill?

The game play was influenced by much more than just DotA and Footies! I’ve also drawn inspiration from titles such as Team Fortress 2 and the Battlefield series. That’s why I tend to classify Demigod as an action game. I’ve taken the action aspects of all these inspirations and incorporated them into Demigod’s game play. At this point I’m not sure you’ll see CTF, Tower D or King of the Hill in the initial release but I wouldn’t discount the possibility of having different game play in some later content releases.

10. What kind of role will the Strategic Zoom play with regards to the gameplay, especially as Demigod is much smaller in scope compared to Supreme Commander?

I feel like the Strategic Zoom feature that the Supreme Commander engine contains has changed the way these games feel forever. I don’t want to play RTS like game with out it. I would be remiss if I didn’t include it in Demigod. I believe that Demigod uses Strategic Zoom in ways that Supreme Commander did not. Demigod has giants that are actually giant sized because of the zoom feature. When playing Demigod I find that I zoom out to see how teammates are fairing and how the over all war is going. I then zoom in to be able to use my abilities on specific units and hit precise locations on the map.

11. How large are the maps/arenas in Demigod?

They. Are. HUGE!

We’ve tried very hard to make every arena feel like you’re playing in an epic setting. After all, you are a demigod. Minotaurs, which are bigger than a human, are dwarfed by the giants. The giants are dwarfed by the castles and strongholds, which are dwarfed by the sheer size of the arenas you play in.

12. Will terrain, height and line-of-sight play any strategic or tactical purpose in Demigod as they did in Supreme Commander?

Absolutely. However it’s not quite like Supreme Commander. Because of technical reasons, we chose to have the terrain be flat. In light of that decision, we created the interesting arenas that really offset the flat feeling of the terrain. We also created lots of game play that centers around visibility. After all, you still want to be able to ‘gank’ opposing demigods! There are lots of strategic and tactical ways to manipulate your demigod to not be seen by your opponents.

13. Piracy is a major problem that hurts the gaming industry. Can you release any details on how you intend to deal with the problem of illegal copies of the game being played on LAN and Hamachi (a LAN emulator) if not through copy protection?

I can’t speak to this directly, the copy protection is up to how Stardock wants to handle it. Stardock is very much in favor of not making fans and gamers feel like criminals just because a small subsection of gamers pirate games.

14. Are there any plans to port Demigod to other next-gen platforms besides the PC?

Currently Demigod is slated for a PC release next year. Any platforms beyond the PC are not out of the realm of possibility.

15. Last, but not least - when is Beta starting?

“Soon”!