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The Official Haze Thread

Sounds pretty sweet. And I still play GOW, even though I know its not as old, but it is only single-player, and single-player games need to have awesome gameplay and story to be played for long periods of time. Games like Halo, Resistance, FNR3 do have great gameplay, but you can also play real people which helps alot with the replay value. I'm not sure how Resistance or Gears would've done if they didn't have online like Black.
 
Haze and the evolution of co-op: a quick chat with Free Radical Design

Mulitplayer is changing. Once upon-a-time studios flung a couple of deathmatch modes in at the arse-end of the development process, and considered that job done. But now the co-operative option has become a key, integrated element of next-gen console releases. Halo was a trendsetter of course, but since then, we've had the tactical tension of four-player GRAW and the pitch dark, blood-splattered carnage of Gears of War, designed very much with two-player co-operation in mind.

Now, co-op is gradually being refined and re-thought. Soon we'll see EA's Army of Two, in which players must communicate constantly, collaboratively clearing obstacles, protecting each other, employing the characters' different weapons and skills in a holistic, combined approach. Interestingly, players that race off ahead will be penalised by drawing much more enemy fire (or 'Agro' as its referred to in the game). Everyone is in this together.

Meanwhile, Io Interactive has just revealed a fascinating new 'Fragile Alliance' mode set to appear in forthcoming shooter, Kane and Lynch, where players must work co-operatively on a bank heist but then figure out ways they can betray their colleagues and escape with the most loot. According to the CVG preview, gunned down crooks return as cops to take revenge on their back-stabbing cohorts - a neat little revenge wrinkle on an already intriguing premise.

Then there's Free Radical Design's Haze, which presents a co-op mode that integrates with the single player missions, beefing out plotpoints and narrative gaps that won't get explained in the main campaign. I asked the game's project leader, Derek Littlewood, about the growing role of the co-op mode and where he thinks the concept is going...

Do you agree that there's been a resurgence in the importance of the co-op mode over the last couple of years?
I don't think it's ever become less important in the minds of gamers - I mean, ask any gamer if they'd like a coop mode in their favourite game and the answer is invariably 'Yes'. But it's perhaps been more highly prioritised by developers in the last couple of years.

Is there a specific game that's led this charge? Why was it so influential?
Gears of War is perhaps the most obvious high-profile example in the last couple of years. Although there were a few instances of interesting co-operative moments contained within the level design of the game, for me the most important aspect of Gears' co-op mode was simply that there were a solid set of gameplay mechanics already there in the singleplayer game that became amplified in co-op play. What I mean by that is things like the ability to revive downed squadmates, or the excellent cover system, both of which worked even better in co-op.

That's the thing about great co-op games - a well-balanced, well-designed singleplayer game is essential for them to succeed. Co-op in itself doesn't make a game good, but it can help make a good game great.

Do you think there are technical reasons why the co-op mode has become popular?
Definitely. Obviously the continuing rise in processing capability makes it easier to render split-screen games at an acceptable framerate and without compromising the experience at all, but I think the greater reason is the rise of online play. Now, obviously we've had online gaming for many years but it's only with this generation of consoles that all the major contenders support it out of the box. Because of the increasing importance of online multiplayer gaming, developers are being forced to think much harder about what multiplayer functionality their game will offer all the way through development, resulting in a rise in the amount of multiplayer functionality offered by many games, including co-op play.

Do you think the rise of social gaming (guitar hero, Singstar, etc) has contributed to this new more amiable form of multiplayer gaming?
Possibly, but then multiplayer gaming existed long before Singstar, Eyetoy and the Wii came along, so it would be rash to suggest that it's some new phenomenon ushered in by the Wii generation of casual gaming. It would probably be more relevant to look towards examples like the incredible success of World of Warcraft as reasons why co-operative gameplay is becoming more prevalent.

In what ways do you feel that the co-op mode is evolving with the next generation of titles?
I think it's starting to be designed into the experience from the very start, with sections or mechanics that explicitly require cooperative play, rather than the cooperative experience simply being the singleplayer experience with two players in it. Obviously with HAZE and Halo 3, you're seeing the introduction of a cooperative experience that supports four players, rather than the traditional two, which is another way in which co-operative play is evolving.

In Haze, it seems co-op is the primary multiplayer experience, integrating closely with the single player campaign. Why is this?
I wouldn't say it's the primary multiplayer experience - we've always seen it as being an equal to our team assault and deathmatch modes, it's just we haven't shown much of them yet - but it's certainly massively important to us. Something I've always found with co-operative play as opposed to competitive (deathmatch etc.) play is that if you're not such a great player (like me), co-op play can often provide a more fun experience than competitive play, reason being that skill differences between the players involved matter a lot less in co-op than they do when playing competitively.

In other words, play against a player much better than you in a competitive game, and you'll likely not have a lot of fun, as he'll be killing you over and over again, but play with the same player cooperatively, and he suddenly becomes this heroic character, able to help you through the most difficult of firefights and come to your aid when you've overstretched yourself.

Obviously there's a lot of people who love competitive play, which I do too, but I think it's easier to guarantee a fun experience in co-op than it is with competitive play. As a result, we wanted to make sure that HAZE offered players at least as much to do cooperatively as competitively, which resulted not only in the four player co-op campaign but also the prioritisation of team-based multiplayer modes like our team assault as opposed to solo play.

What are your favourite current and forthcoming examples of co-op modes?
My favourite all-time cooperative experience is still the first Halo - the combination of superb balancing, decent AI and large-scale environments made it feel unlike anything I'd played before and I spent many months playing it through over and again. As for more recent examples, I enjoyed Gears of War much more in coop than I did in singleplayer, probably because I pretty much suck at Gears, so the opportunity to get some help playing it through was most welcome!

http://www.n4g.com/ClickOut.aspx?ObjID=73590
 
Watching all the developers videos and stuff on gametrailers made me anticipate this game even more.
 
http://www.gametrailers.com/game/2682.html
The 3 developer diaries are pretty nice, but the "comedian" dude tries to hard to be funny sometimes. The walkthrough is alot better, cuz you can see the Mantel troops freaking out and being used by the rebels to kill each other. The throwable knives are pretty sweet, they remind me of Turok. This game also makes me think of Escape from Butcher Bay, cuz of the Mantel armour. I'll probably pick it up, just need to check out a demo first.
 
Heres some new images: http://gamersyde.com/news_5359_en.html

and one of the 4 player co op

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:woot: :woot: I love the fact that u can play dead in this game. Sweetness!!:heart:
 
That better not be cheap, cuz if you can play dead whenever you're low on health how would you die?
 
That better not be cheap, cuz if you can play dead whenever you're low on health how would you die?

Or they may have random sadistic enemies that see a dead body and decide to just pump it full of bullets because they get off on it. That would be scary as hell. Not that I'm all gung ho for this game anyway.
 
It's about the only thing that could sell the game to me TBH. I'm very leery about Haze, and I know I'm not the only one. Really, they need to put out an great demo, because the majority of people who own PS3's and know about it seem unconvinced as to its quality. I'm not sure why it has this stigma about it, but the demo is their chance to prove that stigma wrong.
 
Agree totally. With this coming out wedged between more anticipated games, a demo is the only way to get it noticed. I will definatly give the demo a shot.
 
It's about the only thing that could sell the game to me TBH. I'm very leery about Haze, and I know I'm not the only one. Really, they need to put out an great demo, because the majority of people who own PS3's and know about it seem unconvinced as to its quality. I'm not sure why it has this stigma about it, but the demo is their chance to prove that stigma wrong.
I think thats bc there are too many FPS coming t the PS3 in such a small window. People need to see them first hand in order to decide which to get. So far Haze is a foreign IP that people know little about so a demo might change their opinion.
 
So I just read on PS3today.com that the band Korn has done a song exclusivly for the game HAZE. They said the game is just outstanding and that it gets your adrenaline pumping so hard they tried to make a song that would go with the game.

Expect to hear the song sometime this week on the radio, and keep your eyes open for a new HAZE music video.
 
So I just read on PS3today.com that the band Korn has done a song exclusivly for the game HAZE. They said the game is just outstanding and that it gets your adrenaline pumping so hard they tried to make a song that would go with the game.

Expect to hear the song sometime this week on the radio, and keep your eyes open for a new HAZE music video.

Are they just trying to push customers away?
 
*weird drum solo intro*

Johnathan: Rawwrrrrr!!!!


That's the whole song.
 

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