CGNetworks Studio Profile
Oddworld Games & Characters
Barbara Robertson, 11 March 2005
Oddworld Inhabitants founders Sherry McKenna and Lorne Lanning brand a first person shooter with the company’s signature humor and storytelling skills and move games closer to cinematic realism.
In ancient game history, about eight years ago, puzzles were priorities for game developers. And for years, the prince of puzzle games was an unlikely character named Abe. Created by Oddworld Inhabitants, the adventure games Abe’s Oddysee, Abe’s Exoddus, and later, Munch’s Oddysee introduced people to an unusual combination of gritty graphics, quirky humor, masterful character animation, storytelling and compelling game play.
But, the world changed. Puzzles became so last year. To stay alive, Oddworld’s inhabitants had to mutate.
“It’s show business,“ says McKenna. “You’ve got to sell units. It was clear after Munch that Grand Theft Auto had changed everything. It became apparent that the games that people were willing to buy were action games.“
The market wasn’t the only driving force, however. “We see ourselves as an IP [intellectual property] creation company,“ says Lanning. “We didn’t want to leverage all our weight on one character; we wanted to show our diversity in terms of design, style and game play.“
So, Oddworld left the pacifist Abe’s dank universe behind and created the Stranger, a bounty hunter in the American Old West. Since its release in January, the new game, Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath for Xbox, published by Electronic Arts, is receiving rave reviews from critics and from game players for its as-expected excellent graphics and oddball humor, but also for a surprising and smooth blend of game playing styles.
“We blended three game styles,“ says Lanning. “FPS [first person shooter], RPG [role playing game] and adventure platforming, but let me call it third person adventure not platforming. The innovation was letting the player change from first person perspective to third person. It has been done before but not as fluidly or as deeply. And, we designed it so there were benefits from either perspective.“
For example, in first person mode the shooter can shoot, but he can run only 15mph. In third person mode, he can speed up to 55mph and attack things physically – ram into them. The opportunity to switch between first and third person had a second impact as well, one a bit more subtle: It changes, in effect, the camera view. Sometimes you look at scenes as if through the character’s eyes; sometimes you see the Stranger acting in the world. And that makes the game more cinematic.
“Having first and third person perspective helps make it feel like a filmic experience when you’re playing it,“ Lanning says. “And it helps break the pacing. We’re going to see more of that. The more that experiences start to emulate the feeling we get from motion pictures and TV shows, the easier they are to connect to. The more they look like games of the past as we identify with them, the less people will be emotionally engaged in them. And of course, you need story and character.“
