Thanks to Metro for the interview with Michel Ancel and Gabrielle Shrager:
http://www.metro.co.uk/tech/ga...d-beyond-good-evil-2
GC: So, as we have you here we must ask you about Beyond Good & Evil 2. But it's interesting that you're working on both it and the UbiArt engine now, when you're quoted as saying that Beyond Good & Evil 2 has to wait until the next generation of consoles before it can become a reality. What is it that current consoles can't do that you need?
MA: Mainly the reason that we just talked about, the fact that you… we've already worked on the game and it's really big cities and freedom. I really want to make a game where you have this feeling that the investigation is your investigation and depending on the different direction you want to take in your investigation you're going to lead a different story.
It's not like choosing between stories, it's really working on an organic system that allows you to collect informations, that allows you to understand the investigation freely and take a risk if you want or not and this kind of game you know…
Today's console really allows us to display good graphics in a small place or if you look at games the bigger they become the less immersive are the graphics or the more constrained. And my feeling is that I don't want to spend too much time on technical issues and I'd love to spend more time on making the game.
Rayman is right for this kind of consoles because we are not using all the memory, we are just very comfortable with the technology. When we are designing the levels we are not thinking about technical constraints. I'd love to make Beyond Good & Evil that way too. Just focusing on the game.
The first one was really that big [indicates reasonably sized fish] but to make it possible on the PlayStation 2 it was really frustrating, like cutting the story, cutting the abilities… Every week it was about cutting, technical limitations, it was horrible! So now I prefer doing games that really fit in the console's constraints.
GC: So is the whole game designed and you're sitting waiting to start?
MA: Yeah, the main direction, the main vision I still want to make it that way and I don't want to change for technical problems.
GC: And the YouTube video that leaked out , was that real? Was that really footage of the game?
MA: Yes, yes, yes. It was made from the prototype.
GC: So presumably you could've made something that looked like that on the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3, but it wouldn't have had the scale.
MA: Yeah, it would've been really constrained. We had this ability to create millions of people living in the streets, technologically we know how to do it, but it's a problem of physical hardware.
GC: So it's an artificial intelligence issue?
GS: Well yes, artificial intelligence is extremely hard on the CPU if you want to make intelligent systems using intelligent data…
MA: Engineering the city and making the city interesting to play in and all those things. I think we're really gonna be surprised by the next games that are coming. I like the idea that we can be surprised by very simple 2D games and very complex 3D games too.
GC: You make Beyond Good & Evil 2 sound like a very expensive game and presumably a financial risk?
MA: Not really, because we're working on toolsets that could make more work on the side of the computer for the very repetitive tasks. And even for Rayman we can show you parts of the tool that really put away some very boring parts of the work and let people concentrate on the art. So that's really something… the UbiArt is based on the first researches we did on Beyond Good & Evil 2.
Read more:
http://www.metro.co.uk/tech/ga...evil-2#ixzz1eQGIwDPf
sure hope the new consoles get released late next year, can't wait to play this game
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