Jamesadin
2002-07-08, 04:38 PM
Here is a discussion between two people about COMMAND AND CONQUER GENERAL
This year's E3 was widely regarded as the best one in recent years and was arguably the best one ever. The big three--Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft--all had a great showing for their respective consoles, and the PC game publishers had an equally impressive lineup of future blockbusters the likes of Age of Mythology, Warcraft III, and, of course, Doom III. Adding to that list was Electronic Arts' latest addition to the venerable Command & Conquer series: Generals. The game was announced earlier in the year and had its first public appearance at E3 in Los Angeles, where it was very well received, even in the face of other anticipated real-time strategy games from Blizzard and Ensemble Studios.
Now that the designers at EA Pacific have had their post-E3 rest, we caught up with studio head and executive producer Mark Skaggs to get his reactions to the show and to get a progress report on this anticipated game.
GameSpot: Welcome back from E3, Mark. How was Command & Conquer: Generals received at the show?
Mark Skaggs: The response to Generals at the show was incredible. I think we surprised a lot of people with the progress we've made on the product since we announced it earlier this year. The demo really reflected the hard work, dedication, and talent of the team, and it was a nice reward to see people leave the theater smiling and happy. The fun of the show was topped off when we won the Game Critics award for Best Strategy Game of E3. We know there were a number of other great strategy games at the show, and we feel lucky to have won.
GS: What kind of feedback have you heard from showgoers? Are you implementing any changes to the game based on this response?
MS: The feedback was mostly "hurry up and finish so I can play." One of the questions we faced quite often was whether the sequences were prerendered, or if the game engine was running in real time. Most people were surprised when we told them it was, in fact, the game engine, but this told us that at our next public showing we're going to have to give people some hands-on play time.
American tanks try and fail to stop the launch of a Chinese nuclear missile.
GS: Was the reception as good as you'd hoped?
MS: The reception caught us a bit by surprise. The team worked hard, and we had high hopes about how well it would be received, but we weren't certain. This might seem odd, but we know we're too close to the product to see it objectively. The show allowed us to see the product through other people's eyes for a few days, and we were reassured by the great reception. Of course, there are always things we think we could have done better, and we'll work on those.
GS: Warcraft III, Age of Mythology, and Rise of Nations also received their fair share of accolades at the show. Are you at all worried about competing with those games?
MS: They are all great-looking games. I'm actually really looking forward to playing all of them, as are most people in the studio. I think there's always room for great games, and that's what we're focused on for Generals--making it a great game that people want to play.
GS: Was there anything that you wanted to include in the demo that you couldn't because of time constraints?
MS: Ha! There are always things that you want to include in a product or demo that you don't get time to do. For the E3 demo though, we ran into a different issue. We had too much stuff to show and had to actually cut down the demo because the original version was running more than 20 minutes.
That being said, there were a couple of cool effects and situations that we would have liked to include but couldn't get polished well enough to show. Specifically, we wanted to have tanks on the bridge that get washed away in the wave from the broken dam at the end.
GS: You guys actually had a second demo that you were considering showing at E3, a Black Hawk Down scenario. Why did you opt to show the dam mission instead?
MS: The original plan was to take the Black Hawk scenario and spice it up with the dam break and other cool elements. An AVI of the Black Hawk demo was released to the Net in April, so it was then that we took up the challenge to revamp it into the scenario we showed at E3. Doing that exercise was great because it gave us the opportunity to test what we knew about making great demos and prove that the Black Hawk scenario wasn't just a stroke of luck. Overall I think the game really benefited by the change of plans.
-Thanks to gamespot for this information
This year's E3 was widely regarded as the best one in recent years and was arguably the best one ever. The big three--Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft--all had a great showing for their respective consoles, and the PC game publishers had an equally impressive lineup of future blockbusters the likes of Age of Mythology, Warcraft III, and, of course, Doom III. Adding to that list was Electronic Arts' latest addition to the venerable Command & Conquer series: Generals. The game was announced earlier in the year and had its first public appearance at E3 in Los Angeles, where it was very well received, even in the face of other anticipated real-time strategy games from Blizzard and Ensemble Studios.
Now that the designers at EA Pacific have had their post-E3 rest, we caught up with studio head and executive producer Mark Skaggs to get his reactions to the show and to get a progress report on this anticipated game.
GameSpot: Welcome back from E3, Mark. How was Command & Conquer: Generals received at the show?
Mark Skaggs: The response to Generals at the show was incredible. I think we surprised a lot of people with the progress we've made on the product since we announced it earlier this year. The demo really reflected the hard work, dedication, and talent of the team, and it was a nice reward to see people leave the theater smiling and happy. The fun of the show was topped off when we won the Game Critics award for Best Strategy Game of E3. We know there were a number of other great strategy games at the show, and we feel lucky to have won.
GS: What kind of feedback have you heard from showgoers? Are you implementing any changes to the game based on this response?
MS: The feedback was mostly "hurry up and finish so I can play." One of the questions we faced quite often was whether the sequences were prerendered, or if the game engine was running in real time. Most people were surprised when we told them it was, in fact, the game engine, but this told us that at our next public showing we're going to have to give people some hands-on play time.
American tanks try and fail to stop the launch of a Chinese nuclear missile.
GS: Was the reception as good as you'd hoped?
MS: The reception caught us a bit by surprise. The team worked hard, and we had high hopes about how well it would be received, but we weren't certain. This might seem odd, but we know we're too close to the product to see it objectively. The show allowed us to see the product through other people's eyes for a few days, and we were reassured by the great reception. Of course, there are always things we think we could have done better, and we'll work on those.
GS: Warcraft III, Age of Mythology, and Rise of Nations also received their fair share of accolades at the show. Are you at all worried about competing with those games?
MS: They are all great-looking games. I'm actually really looking forward to playing all of them, as are most people in the studio. I think there's always room for great games, and that's what we're focused on for Generals--making it a great game that people want to play.
GS: Was there anything that you wanted to include in the demo that you couldn't because of time constraints?
MS: Ha! There are always things that you want to include in a product or demo that you don't get time to do. For the E3 demo though, we ran into a different issue. We had too much stuff to show and had to actually cut down the demo because the original version was running more than 20 minutes.
That being said, there were a couple of cool effects and situations that we would have liked to include but couldn't get polished well enough to show. Specifically, we wanted to have tanks on the bridge that get washed away in the wave from the broken dam at the end.
GS: You guys actually had a second demo that you were considering showing at E3, a Black Hawk Down scenario. Why did you opt to show the dam mission instead?
MS: The original plan was to take the Black Hawk scenario and spice it up with the dam break and other cool elements. An AVI of the Black Hawk demo was released to the Net in April, so it was then that we took up the challenge to revamp it into the scenario we showed at E3. Doing that exercise was great because it gave us the opportunity to test what we knew about making great demos and prove that the Black Hawk scenario wasn't just a stroke of luck. Overall I think the game really benefited by the change of plans.
-Thanks to gamespot for this information