Harker Interview (con't)

FiringSquad: Will there be any multiplayer features planned for the game?

Nigel Cook: We are currently designing a number of multiplayer features for consideration. One that stands out is that fact that the Vampire Hunters in the single-player experience would be great fodder for a ‘Hunters vs. Vampires’ mode of play.

FiringSquad: What other unique features will Harker have?

Nigel Cook: Real time day-to-night lighting will enable Harker to use sunlight and sun beams to bring pain and suffering to Vampires. Enter into a dark eerie location, and open up spaces to allow sunlight in through boarded up windows and cracks in the walls. Beyond the releasing of sunlight into a once darkened space, Harker also gains various upgrades such as a special Gauntlet that allows him to stand in a beam of light and reflect it across the room burning all vampires on contact, making them suffer as they slowly burn as the Sun quickly sets in the sky outside.

Harker’s killer vampire hunting gear is designed to be used so that the player can adapt to the different displayed behaviors of Vampires within the game. Harker has tools at his disposal that allow him to cope with the freedom of movement Vampires possess. The crucifix will ignite a Vampire if Harker has managed to trap them long enough for the effect to take hold. Holy Water is used to immolate flesh on Vampires, and is also useful for bringing them down from the rafters.

During the game, other Vampire Hunters may aid you during a particular quest, or moments in the game. Here they can either aid you in fighting a certain Vampire, or later, you actually get to take control of the other Vampire Hunter for a period of time.

FiringSquad: What can you tell us about the graphical features that Harker will have?

Nigel Cook: All the graphical features in Harker are created to ‘Scare the Audience’.
History books are full of details of life in the 18th Century. The areas we don’t see very often are the underbelly of life - places where people feared to go - a side of life that few people witnessed and even fewer who strayed, lived to tell the tale. Crime was common and murders hard to prosecute. It was a place full of despair. This is the side of the 18th Century world that Harker will depict.

Though combat plays a very large part of the game; Harker will spend some time during the hunting phase exploring lairs in an effort to uncover final resting places for the Vampires. This part of gameplay is where the game will concentrate the fear aspects of Harker; skillfully weaving tension and narrative before the inexorable climax of combat approaches. The strongest elements of the game needed to produce these moments of fear are the pacing, lighting and sound.

Vampires are a cunning prey. This cunning is reflected in the enemy AI. Rather than simply being an ambush specialist, or even a direct attacking opponent, Vampire AI will be based upon their character type. For example; a humanoid vampire will display all the cunning a player would expect from a human. On the other hand, a feral version will attack in a blind rage, using brute force and ignorance to overcome its prey.

Using a cutting edge form of goal-based AI gives the enemy natural variation of how to behave under given circumstances based upon available choices. The player will need to adapt to this variation in order to overcome the enemy. There will also be some controlling enemies that alter the complexity of some simpler AI creatures into more organized forms of attack, destroying the controlling enemy will force the simpler AI creatures back to their normal AI patterns, making them easier to defeat.