Vermintide 2 dev needs to work on the game “for five to ten years”

Vermintide 2 has been an enormous success for developer Fatshark, promoting properly over 1,000,000 copies, and exceeding inner targets. Going by its person evaluations and regular spot in essentially the most performed games on Steam, gamers are having fun with it, too. But that success has raised the query of what’s subsequent for the game – will there be new characters, weapons, occasions, one other sequel? We spoke to Martin Wahlund, CEO of Fatshark, to seek out out.

We additionally wished to know why the crew made the bizarre determination of pulling its content material roadmap. It’s a standard sight now for builders to publish a plan of what they’re engaged on, notably with stay games, because it provides gamers a way of what to look ahead to and when to count on it. Fatshark had such a roadmap, nevertheless it has now been pulled.

We additionally requested who’s prone to be a part of the heroes of Ubersreik as Vermintide 2’s sixth playable character – I’m hoping for a Bretonnian, which might make sense for the reason that present setting of Helmgart is simply over the border – and who may face them as a brand new enemy race. Surely it’s time to see the undead hordes of the dastardly Vampire Counts? It would solely be becoming, provided that Vermintide is the perfect fashionable successor of the zombie-slaying basic Left 4 Dead.

PCGN: What’s subsequent for Vermintide?

Martin Wahlund, CEO: What now we have labored on quite a bit the previous couple of months is constructing instruments and processes to ship content material quicker, as a result of it’s essential to maintain the game alive and do fixed updates. We have a crew, the stay crew, that’s going to work with all the things from bug fixes to small occasions – we had related occasions within the unique Vermintide the place you needed to kill a sure variety of rats.

There might be an ongoing story arc that can direct how we replace the present stuff within the game. That’s one factor we’re obsessed with and, with out saying an excessive amount of, we’re taking a look at content material that’s short-term, that we’ll put into the game and might be stay for possibly per week or two. And then we transfer it and put in one thing else in order that there are totally different flavours to the game over time.

There’s quite a lot of concepts happening internally. We have what we name hack weeks. Every quarter, now we have per week the place we enable all the staff to do no matter they need – so long as it’s helpful to the corporate or the game. So folks do quite a lot of loopy stuff and we discuss it, quite a lot of ‘this stuff is really cool, how could we get it into the game?’.

The pub brawl within the first game is an efficient instance of one thing that was enjoyable. You flip it on then you’ll be able to simply throw your gloves and drink a beer within the inn and have a brawl with the opposite celebration members. That sort of occasion is one thing we need to do extra of and be extra in line with.

The greatest problem with each launch is all the time getting all of the QA completed, discovering all of the bugs. The game has so many careers, so many abilities, all the things is random so each single playthrough is a unique one. That means it’s very arduous for the QA crew to check all the things regardless that now we have automated components of it. I imply, you can play a stage 100 occasions, and on time 101 it crashes.

We’re working extra betas now and attempting to exit and see as a result of, regardless that we did quite a lot of testing, some extra hardcore followers are actually good at recognizing stuff, which is nice clearly.

You’re principally seeking to make the subsequent Shadows of Bogenhafen even greater?

Yeah, precisely. And it might additionally comprise greater than ranges. We’re attempting to divide what we do in Vermintide into three broad genres. Weapons, enemies – there’s quite a lot of issues we might put into these kinds of offers. The second factor is a bigger sort of journey. We have just a few of these within the pipeline. And then the third one is what we name extra experimental tasks. It’s one thing I can’t discuss as a result of we don’t know if we need to launch it however we’re attempting new stuff that’s an even bigger step from the place we’re proper now.

You’ve drawn on the Warhammer Fantasy roleplaying game for Shadows of Bogenhafen and earlier items of DLC. Are you going to proceed wanting into the lore for future content material, or are you seeking to inform unique tales?

I believe we’re going to do each. I can’t say an excessive amount of but, however for the subsequent two, one is extra unique and one is extra classical. We love to make use of all the nice lore that’s within the Warhammer world. End Times is definitely one thing that basically helps us as a result of it permits us to have far more Skaven and Chaos. Maybe you wouldn’t have seen these totally different combos as a result of lore restrictions within the Old World earlier than the End Times.

And, additionally, quite a lot of loopy stuff is occurring. For instance, I’m capable of be a Shade similtaneously a Wood Elf, that’s one thing that couldn’t have been potential with out the End Times. The End Times does assist gamify the Warhammer Universe in some methods. You can see sure factions that will by no means battle alongside one another outdoors of the End Times.

Why did you pull the roadmap?

I’m unsure how and when and why, however we had some optimistic plans from the start, and we realised that there was a lot and we have been slipping behind for numerous causes. Sometimes, you assume, ‘this is an easy thing, we can fix this, this goes fast’. And then we simply realised, ‘oh, we’ve run into points’. And then we have been between a rock and a tough place as a result of we promised to do one thing however a few of these issues we promised have been like, ‘ok, if you put them out now, the game will actually be worse. Which is better? It’s like, sure, wait and repair this, or ship it and possibly put the game be in a worst place’. That’s a tricky one, and we’re nonetheless debating about how we must always deal with this, as a result of we need to be clear however should you’re clear you’re typically going to overlook issues.

We’re nonetheless discovering the center floor as a result of we nonetheless need to be very clear and we need to be like ‘hey, this is what we are doing right now’, however regardless that one of many DLCs we’re engaged on is pretty near being full we nonetheless know that there’s quite a lot of testing to be performed and we might discover stuff that [will delay release].

It’s not straightforward. For instance, speaking about loot, one straightforward resolution is ‘give everybody everything! Everybody will be super happy!’, however that doesn’t work, all people will simply cease taking part in as a result of there’s nothing to lengthy for. That’s one thing now we have struggled quite a bit with, discovering the precise stability, particularly cosmetics. People really feel like, ’oh you’re holding again for some devious [reason]’ – it’s not that, we simply need them to be scarce, we wish folks to lengthy to get them, as a result of we all know if all people has 100 hats no one could be desirous about hats.

What’s coming after Geheimnisnacht? A brand new character?

I don’t need to say an excessive amount of but, however yeah, we’re wanting into other ways to do this and what we are able to do with these. The downside is that you should discover someone that basically suits into the celebration as properly. They’re a choosy bunch. We’ll see what we are able to do about that, now we have been wanting round quite a lot of character stuff. It’s an amazing enterprise: you should get all the voice strains, how they react to one another, there’s fairly just a few of them. There’s quite a lot of gameplay mechanics that must be proper and expertise bushes and stuff like that. So we’ll see what we do with that. I don’t need to promise something.

What military could be subsequent?

There are quite a lot of cool factions that we actually need to do, which could not belong to the identical facet as Skaven and Chaos, after all. But from our perspective we need to be in the long term, we need to be right here for 5 to 10 years, at the least. It’s humorous as a result of should you have a look at the highest sellers on Steam, the highest 12 prime sellers for the primary half of this yr, I believe Vermintide 2 and there was one different game that have been the one two new titles that yr. The remainder of the titles the place like GTA V, Warframe, PUBG – they have been games that had been out for fairly a while. And Counter-Strike and Dota 2, and people giants, so I believe that individuals get hooked up to games.

It’s crucial to have a very long time mindset on the best way to construct your games and there’s a lot stuff we are able to do. I imply the humorous half is lots of people assume you ship a game and then you definitely need to do one thing new. There’s part of me who needs to do this however one other a part of me is whenever you ship the game you’ve a extremely nice platform to construct on. You have an viewers, you’ve the core mechanics, after which you’ll be able to construct on prime of that.

We don’t must stress about issues, we don’t want to leap on to the subsequent venture and simply depart just a few folks engaged on Vermintide 2, with the remainder of them engaged on one thing new. It’s been eight months since launch and we nonetheless have all however 5 folks engaged on Vermintide 2 within the workplace. Which is nice.

What are the opposite 5 doing?

They’re performing some prototyping for potential new issues, for like 5 years in a row, as properly. You all the time must work on new issues. Working within the yr now going ahead we’re simply filled with content material. But sooner or later if there’s some thought or an idea that we wish to discover, that’s an ongoing course of for many game builders, you all the time have a venture you have a look at like, ’this could possibly be one thing sooner or later’.

Would it’s Vermintide Three or one thing else?

I don’t know. I don’t assume we’d do Vermintide 3. As lengthy as we’re pleased with Vermintide 2 it doesn’t make sense to do the sequel.

So you assume you’re pleased with the platform you’ve bought now?

Yeah, precisely. I believe there’s quite a lot of issues within the first game that we wanted the sequel to alter. If we really feel like, ‘hey, we need to rework some fundamental systems in order to do the third one’, then we would do a 3rd one. But proper now, we’re in an excellent place the place now we have been capable of change quite a lot of issues, so we are able to do stuff extra effectively and we are able to launch extra content material quicker. That’s the important thing factor for us proper now.

Back at first we did quite a lot of consulting gigs for various publishers. We did small games the place we wished to show our engine that we constructed. But now, with Vermintide, earlier than we knew it was a hit we mentioned, ‘hey let’s go right into a style and ensure we’re among the best builders within the style and attempt to enhance on a regular basis’. I believe that’s what we’re doing proper now: we need to enhance on what we’re good at and we all know what we want, now we have quite a lot of issues we are able to enhance on, and we have to work on that and be higher at constructing these components of the game. There’s quite a lot of enchancment all the time.

If we do a brand new game we’ll in all probability have some energy from Vermintide 2 however there’s nothing deliberate but, simply quite a lot of small footage and a few inner prototyping happening within the background. There are some prototypes that I would like to do however proper now we want all of the builders on Vermintide 2. So we’ll see once we begin new issues.