The downloadable market has increased in size over the last couple of years. With a range of genres that make up XBLA and PSN, players can go a long time without stepping into to a retail store to pick up a $59.99 game.
The XBLA library of games is about to add an action RPG into the mix. Crimson Alliance, developed by Certain Affinity, is hitting XBLA next week on September 7. We recently got a chance to talk to Tim Fields, Director of Business Development at Certain Affinity, about some of the team’s inspirations for Crimson Alliance and more insight into this action RPG.
Check out the interview below (interview conducted by William Saw):
How long has Crimson Alliance been in development and what stage are you currently towards completion?
We’ve been working on the game for more than a year now, and the engine and tools are a good bit older than that. But I’m happy to announce that we’re FINISHED! The game launches on September 7th!
What inspirations or sources did the writers at Certain Affinity draw upon to create the mythos of Crimson Alliance?
We’re inspired by a lot of classic dark-fantasy fiction, from games, from books, from movies, and from artwork. We love the old Howard Conan universe for example, as such a morally grey world, so brutal. More recently, we’re enchanted by the fiction of George Martin and Patrick Rothfuss. We love the Frazetta artwork, especially the stuff on the walls at Conan’s Pizza, a great oldschool local pizzeria in Austin, where a bunch of us grew up. Max, our President and Creative Director is draws heavily on his love of traditional Chinese fiction, as well as kung-fu films. I could keep going, but you get the idea. We’re into this kinda stuff.
I read that you are experimenting from various previews that you are implementing microtransactions in-game, how will that work? Why was the reasoning in enabling that particular option for players?
We’ve not announced anything about microtransactions so far – but there are a few interesting pricing models that we’re probably going to offer on XBLA. The full game costs 1200 MSFT points though.
How is the difficulty/learning curve for players new to dungeon crawl type of adventures?
We’ve got a few different difficulty settings, so even if you’ve never held a controller before, you can learn to play the game, especially if you’ve got a friend or three to play alongside you! But don’t worry, if you grew up on Gauntlet, and played more Diablo than you care to remember… we’ve got the Ridonkulous difficulty setting specifically for you. There’s a challenge for people at every level.
In supporting four-player co-op, with three different classes at your disposal, will there be options to create say an entire team composed of wizards? Will that create a new difficulty dynamic for those that choose to go this route?
Oh yeah! You can create parties with whatever combination of characters you and your friends want. And since you can customize your character, and make them specialize in different things, you can assemble parties that will be really diverse and powerful. For example, maybe you and I both bring a wizard, fine, but yours is a master of ice, and I’m a master of lightning, and we’ll compliment each other nicely. Of course, some enemies and areas will be a lot harder than others if you don’t have a balanced party; but other areas will be easier too, so it’ll work out either way.
Is there an option for drop-in, drop-out co-op gameplay?
People can drop out of gameplay, but to join a game in progress, you have to all start up at the beginning of the level.
Since it’s a fairly new IP are you exploring other mediums i.e. comic books, novelization, to flesh out the world of Crimson Alliance or are is it primarily focused around this downloadable action RPG experience?
Oh, we’d love to explore something like that. For the moment, we’re focused on getting the game out, the website and forums looking great, and all that. But we’d love to do more in the world of Crimson Alliance.
Will Crimson Alliance be playable on PCs in the near future?
It’s exclusive on Xbox Live Arcade right now!
