Featured Image Credit: Xbox Game Studios
Topics: Xbox, Xbox Game Pass, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X, PlayStation, PC, Interview
Topics: Xbox, Xbox Game Pass, Xbox Series S, Xbox Series X, PlayStation, PC, Interview
Xbox has a wide variety of talented studios working under its name and while the company has moved away from first-party exclusives, its first-party offering is still very much on point.
Those who continue to support Xbox are rewarded for that loyalty with Xbox Game Pass, as those subscribed to the higher tiers get to experience these titles from day one at no additional cost.
One of Xbox Game Pass’ next additions is a multiplayer game from the prestigious Xbox studio Double Fine, who’ve brought you games such as Psychonauts, Brutal Legend and Keeper.
Its name is Kiln, and it already looks like a Game Awards sweeper. GAMINGbible spoke to its Project Lead and Art Director, Derek Brand to learn all about it, as well as the bizarre “chicken meta” that’s unfolding in its servers.
Kiln is a game about sculpting, baking and battling pottery-based warriors in a multiplayer fight for survival.
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When asked if the game was simply Double Fine’s excuse to go out and have a nice day at a pottery-making class, Derek laughed and said, “Yeah, in hindsight, it feels that way, right? Maybe that's Tim [Schafer’s] big plan, to get everyone to do pottery.”
Actual pottery making was a big part of the design process, though as the team needed to get hands-on to learn how the process worked and how it could be turned into a game mechanic.
That was one of the challenges, but the other was of course making a fun multiplayer game out of it.
While Double Fine has made the occasional multiplayer game in the past, like Iron Brigade, it’s never been something the studio has been known for, and as Derek put it, “that was a different era of multiplayer.”
The vital component to making a multiplayer game is ensuring that it’s actually fun, which means lots and lots of playtesting.
“You can't playtest it alone, and that was a big learning curve for the team. We brought in people, friends of friends and trusted people to play the game, fed them pizza and got them to give us some feedback, as unbiased as we could.”
This eventually led to the game entering a closed beta, which went live last week, and when asked if any interesting developments or metas came from that playtest, Derek had an excellent answer…
After poring over the data and assessing player feedback, an interesting trend emerged, one of the game’s power-ups that utilises a giant chicken was overpowered.
Derek explained that every pot shape in the game comes with its own special move, and one resembling an egg cup lets players crack a golden egg on the top of it. “Then a chicken pops out and turns into a turret, and so a ‘chicken meta’ has come up. Everyone's making these chicken turrets and we're trying to figure out if they’re really overpowered or just annoying to play against.”
In the best line of the interview, Derek summed up the dilemma saying: “Right now we're trying to solve the chicken problem.”
Kiln will launch as a day-one Xbox Game Pass game, which is excellent timing giving the recent price-cut.
READ MORE: Xbox Game Pass Price Drops By 23%, But Day One Games Scaled Back
Developers in the past have praised the service for shining a light on games players might not have played otherwise.
Derek seemed to agree with this as he argued Game Pass “lowers the barrier of entry.”
“There's a lot of multiplayer games out there, so we want to make sure that people have an easy way to try the game,” he said.
It was even thrown into question if the game would even exist without Xbox Game Pass, as without that safety net, what’s stopping thousands of gamers from overlooking Kiln in favour of the AAA multiplayer games they’ve already paid for?
“From my perspective, it's really important for the game”, said Derek before pondering. "Would we have made this game if [Game Pass] wasn't a thing? We’re not sure.”
Rounding off the interview, GAMINGbible asked if any collaborative content was planned for the game. Like if we’ll see cosmetics inspired by some of Xbox’s other IPs, like Halo.
Derek couldn’t say much but encourages gamers to “be on the lookout,” as the team at Double Fine is just as keen to see collaborations as we are.
Kiln launches tomorrow, 23 April, for Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5 and PC via Steam. It’ll be included as part of your now reduced Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass subscriptions.