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Just Cause 2 Q&A Feature
Jon Wilcox
26/02/2008
TVG heads to the tropics of Panau to chat to Just Cause 2's Lead Designer on Avalanche's plans for Rico's second adventure...
Despite straddling the delicate transition into the next-gen, Avalanche Studios' open world over-the-top adventure, Just Cause, proved a very solid debut for the Swedish outfit back in 2006. Introducing a brand new hero in CIA black ops agent Rico Rodriguez, together with his skills in parachuting and gripping onto the back of aircraft whilst in flight, Just Cause offered gamers a tropical paradise to explore and destroy in a bid to overthrow San Esperitos' dictator.
This year, Avalanche and Rodriguez are back in the aptly named 'Just Cause 2', with Eidos Interactive publishing the title across Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. Besides promising more stunts, weapons, and vehicles than its predecessor, the action is also shifting to the South East Asian islands of Panau, where another autocracy is destined for a taste of Rico.
TVG recently caught up with Lead Designer on Just Cause 2, Avalanche Studios' Peter Johansson to get the latest on Rico's return...
TVG: Can you please elaborate on the plot behind Just Cause 2 and why Rico Rodriquez looks so different this time around?
Just Cause 2 takes place in the island dictatorship of Panau, located in the Malay Archipelago. Panau is a cultural boiling pot with influences from different Asian cultures, such as Malay, Thai, Chinese and Japanese. Rico is sent here to seek out and kill his former mentor and CO, Tom Sheldon, who has gone rogue and disappeared with several million of Agency cash. As always when Rico is involved, things turn out to not be completely black or white and soon escalate to a threat of a much larger magnitude.
Just Cause 2 takes place a few years after the debacle in San Esperito and at the start of the game, Rico has actually quit the agency and spends most of his time drinking tequila in Mexico. He's a little bit older, a little bit rougher and a bit more disillusioned by the Agency but has lost none of his signature skills. In fact, he's learned quite a few new ones.
TVG: One of the few criticisms faced by the original was the issue of little bugs and glitches that were visible throughout the game; are you confident this will not be an issue with the sequel?
While developing the original Just Cause we had to face many challenges at the same time. The engine was developed from the ground up in parallel to the game, the company had to grow very quickly and the game had to work on both last-generation and new-generation hardware. With Just Cause 2 an incredible amount of time is being spent to ensure the game is polished. Rico's animations for example use a completely new system which gives us much finer control over blending which delivers incredibly smooth movement and responsiveness. The vehicle handling system is another significant area where we have spent time to ensure the handling and feel of the vehicles is the best it can be.
TVG: What are you doing in regards of gameplay design to improve variety amongst missions and side-mission for the sequel?
With Just Cause 2 we have focused on delivering the player freedom and variety within a fully populated world. We have achieved this by completely redesigning the mission structure to make sure that everything you do feels meaningful and rewarding. We wanted to get away from the usual repetitive side-missions that don't give you anything apart from perhaps a new weapon you didn't need anyway to complete the game.
The mission structure of Just Cause 2 gives you complete freedom to do what Rico does best - cause Chaos. How you cause it is entirely up to you, maybe you want to do many small activities or larger missions. You can even complete those smaller activities while you're doing larger missions.
There are over 1000 different activities that you can do to cause chaos. Instead of side-missions, everything you do matters, everything takes you closer to your ultimate goal, everything is related to that central theme... chaos.
There are three rebel factions you can work with but that's only one of many ways for you to cause chaos. Maybe you want to operate on your own and prefer to hunt down and kill important Panau military officers, hijack and steal their vehicles or maybe your plan is to destroy important military installations. It's all up to you; there are always many different opportunities for activities all around you and they all contribute towards reaching your ultimate goal.
On top of this, you also have the upgrade parts that can be used to upgrade weapons and vehicles. There are over 1500 of those that you can acquire all over Panau.
TVG: Undoubtedly, the original's biggest quality was the exaggeration of the stunt system and action; can you elaborate on what you're planning for the sequel in this area?
The stunts and action have been taken even further. Rico's signature grappling hook and parachute return with several enhancements that open up new dimensions to the player. The stunt system is quite flexible now and people in the office have started to develop their own playstyles and keep working out new ways to tackle missions.
The grappling hook can now be attached to pretty much any object in the game world and you can then reel in to get around quickly. You can also do some really cool combination stunts with the grappling hook and parachute, for example the slingshot move that enables you to open the parachute while reeling in, using the momentum to fly high up in the air.
There's now a completely new vehicle stunt system that enables you to climb around on vehicles and shoot its occupants as you go.
Combat has also been significantly improved. The AI has been completely rewritten to make use of a planning system that enables enemies to do all sorts of new tricks; like using the environment more tactically, take cover, adapt to a dynamic environment, use team communication and call for reinforcements like parachute units and attack choppers. Enemies will also stand guard around important objects and installations and return to those guard posts if you get too far away. Combat is much more tactical, staying out in the open is not a good idea - you must keep moving, evade and actively use covers.
TVG: The original Just Cause impressed on a technical level, rendering an immensely detailed yet enormous gameworld; can you please tell us about the game engine (Avalanche 2) behind Just Cause 2, presumably you're not handicapped by last-gen versions this time? Is it harder to match spiralling development costs with technical ambition provided by the new formats?
The new Avalanche Engine is not held back by last-gen hardware and features several improvements, higher resolution textures, more detailed characters and vehicles, a new animation system.
The engine makes it quite easy for us to create very large and detailed worlds so the most difficult thing is to make sure this world is filled with meaningful content. We've worked very hard on making sure the world feels packed with stuff to do. If the structure and content of the game isn't scaled to match the size of the world, it's just going to feel like a regular game with more transportation between the missions.
TVG: Where do feel Just Cause 2 sits compared to other sandbox titles on 360/PS3 (Mercs 2); are you bringing anything significantly new or different to the design table?
Just Cause 2 makes some significant advances to the sandbox genre. The level of freedom, insane stunts, intense action, and vertical gameplay offered is unparalleled. It really has a unique flavour that is rooted in pure fun which means we can bring all those features further than other games. We're simply not too fussed about realism or attitude... we focus on offering a really, really good time.
Panau is a huge playground for you to freely explore, play around in and decide for yourself what your preferred course of action is to achieve your goal. You may for example slingshot your way around the environment with the grappling hook or travel in one of over 100 different vehicles, climb and jump around on vehicles travelling at insane speeds while shooting at its occupants, base jump from mountaintops and skyscrapers towards a military base packed with enemies that hate your guts and then completely wreck it with a grenade launcher in one hand and an SMG in the other.
TVG: Will Just Cause 2 offer multiplayer modes in any form?
When we designed Just Cause 2 we considered the importance of multiplayer, but decided not to jump onto the multiplayer bandwagon, but instead focus on designing Just Cause 2 to deliver the best single player free roaming experience possible. It's likely that Just Cause will have multiplayer in the future but only when we know we can deliver something truly new and exciting to the multiplayer community while retaining all the core values of the game. We don't want multiplayer to limit your freedom, stunts, and intense action, we would want multiplayer to enhance them.
TVG: What prompted the switch to South East Asian islands of Panau? Can you please elaborate on the gameworld and how it compares to the original?
Panau is a much more varied place than San Esperito. It contains a vast range of environments spread out over different climate zones; dense jungles, paradise beaches, snowy alps, deserts and urban cityscapes. Moving between these environments seamlessly without delays for loading is quite a unique feeling and the variety translates to the missions as well. In short, Panau is a perfect place for Rico to cause some major chaos.
TVG: What changes have you made to the grappling hook and parachuting features?
As I mentioned before, several enhancements have been made to the grappling hook and parachute that really transforms the way you play the game. The grappling hook is now integrated into an arm-mounted gadget and both it and the parachute are always available at the press of a button. This means they are much more accessible and integrated to your basic movement and combat and also play a central role in the missions.
You can now also do some really cool combination stunts that makes use of both the grappling hook and the parachute.
TVG: Surely you won't leave Rico without a concluding chapter in the trilogy; do you have any early plans for where Rico should head if a third title was given the go-ahead?
The Agency surely won't refrain from operating in any place it finds necessary to protect its interests so who knows where Rico might end up in the future. Wherever it is, you can be pretty sure it has lots of exotic places filled with things for you to blow up.
TVG would like to thank Peter Johansson for taking the time to answer our questions, together with Rachael Grant at Eidos Interactive. Just Cause is due for release on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PC later in 2008.
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