PSX2.com Gets Tribal
A brief Q&A with the developers of the upcoming quirky, gorgeous PS2 adventure Rubu Tribe helps shed some much-deserved light on the development process.
Published: July 18, 2001
Outrage Entertainment isn't one of those companies you'd expect to be doing a dedicated PlayStation 2 project. After all, the company is famous in the PC world for crafting the free-roaming, head-spinning Descent games, a decidedly more action-heavy direction than their current project, Rubu Tribe, but is an unknown in the console world. They're aiming to change that.
We had a chance to fire a few questions at the guys at Outrage recently, and the answers we got from Producer Tom Rigas managed to pique even more interest than the brief hands-on play time we had at E3. Rubu promises to blend action, strategy, puzzle solving and story elements into a 128-bit brew that could easily push the genre in new directions.
PSX2.com: We'd better get this out of the way first. Who all's been working on Rubu, and what are their backgrounds? How big is the team and have you seen it grow since programming first started?
Tom Rigas: The team leaders for Rubu Tribe came from our Descent 3 team. We started with a group of 10 people in the pre-production phase and have expanded our team to over 30 people.
PSX2.com: Okay, obvious question: Rubu, Uut, Muku, what's with the names?
Tom Rigas: The Rubu have a naming convention that centers on the letter 'U'. :) Well, the names work well together. It's just one thing we've done to give the tribe a sense of unity.
PSX2.com: Well, that was simple enough. Now what about the game itself? Rubu Tribe doesn't really look or feel like anything else out right now. What were some of the sources of inspiration for the game's design, and why such a wild departure from your previous work (Descent, Rubu... Descent, Rubu... Just not seeing, well, ANY similarity there--or was that the idea)?
TR: The original concept was partially born from the unlikely union of two games: Oregon Trail and Lemmings. This resulted in the idea of a tribe of small, cute creatures making an epic journey across a dangerous, uncharted world. The movie The Dark Crystal also had a significant impact on the overall style and feel for the game. We wanted a storyline that blended both light and dark themes into a tale that could be enjoyed by everyone, and we wanted an art style that could back it up. And lastly, a huge amount of inspiration simply came from nature itself. Trips to national parks, museums, zoos, and hours in front of the Discovery Channel have all contributed greatly to the vision of Rubu Tribe.
When Descent was released, it was ground breaking in many ways. At Outrage, we have a very strong desire to make original content and gameplay. Rubu Tribe offers this in a myriad of ways, from the unique look of the game, its innovative design and gameplay, to our numerous new technologies. Rubu Tribe is our opportunity to offer players a compelling game that they never experienced before. So, Rubu Tribe isn't a departure as much as getting back to our roots.
PSX2.com: What kind of world are you aiming for here? What we've seen so far is rather open and lush, and Muku, the game's main character, uses plenty of different tools into interact with the environment, but will the game be mostly linear or will everything be open-ended? Is the gameplay quest- or objective-based, or more just "get here/do this by any means necessary?"
TR: We've designed the world of Rubu Tribe to be an ecosystem where creatures within the world will react with the player, one another and the environment. You are on a quest; so, you will have objectives to complete and obstacles to overcome to continue on your path. You will always know what you SHOULD be doing next; but you might go wandering off because you see something that interests you. We've set up the game so that when you are ready to move the game forward, you will be able to.
We're offering the player situations where there are open-ended solutions. For instance, you may find a large grove of berry bushes that you would like your Workers to gather. But it may be right in front of a Woorg (large, dangerous predator) den. It may be possible to lead your Warriors in and kill all the Woorg, but you would sustain heavy damage, maybe even losing a Warrior or two in the process. So instead you venture into a Chikkit (a smaller, weak creature) cave and grab a Baby Chikkit. Now you can run past the Woorg den, awakening them with the sound of the chirping Baby Chikkit, and throw it into a gully. Woorg love these tasty little morsels, so they will jump right in after it. Now the area is clear for your Workers to pick the berries in peace.
PSX2.com: Granted, the game was early at E3, but the overall feel of the texturing and graphics of Rubu almost feels like it would be more at home on the Dreamcast, or even Gamecube. Were there ever plans to develop it for another system, or has this been designed with the PS2 in mind from the start?
TR: From the start we've designed Rubu Tribe for the PS2. We want to offer players a unique experience on the platform.
PSX2.com: Now hopefully this will be one of those questions that you guys are begging for: if there was one (or even a handful) of thoughts or ideas that you want to convey about the game, what you REALLY want people to take away from this game once they've put down the controller, and what do you want us to know before the game comes out? What should we expect once it's all done?
TR: First of all, Muku is a great character. People will love controlling him as he explores, fights, and directs his fellow tribe members. Second, everyone loves the Uut. There is definitely something very cool about befriending a 40-ft. tall creature. You look out for her, and she will look out for you. Third, in Rubu Tribe, you become a leader. You get to tell other Rubu what to do, and hopefully keep them safe and earn their respect and admiration in the process. Lastly, you get to experience a day to day journey through a living world with varying ecosystems. You'll need to learn from your surroundings and use that knowledge to your advantage in order to survive.
People should come into Rubu Tribe expecting something totally new. From the point in which they start playing the game, our goal is to offer them fresh gameplay within a unique and exciting world.
PSX2.com: Can you go into the combat a little more? We realize Rubu isn't necessarily a violent game (no more so than the Mario games), but exactly how much control will you have over combat when eventually things have to come to blows. We also got to see the rather unique system for "making" weapons MacGuyver-style from what's on hand. How many options will the player have of building inventory items when all's said and done?
TR: Rubu tribe has a deep combat system. We used Zelda, Maximo, and traditional fighting games as a base of the design. We have combo attacks, jump attacks, rolling maneuvers, strafing around targets, special smash down attacks and a whole lot more. It is designed to accessible to new players and experienced players will be able to really enjoy the breadth of possibilities it offers.
Your weapons will be what you find around you in the environment. You don't really make weapons in Rubu Tribe. It's more like you wrangle them from the environment. The weapons in the game are creatures in the environment that your Squid-Stick, the staff that Muku carries, can use. Each Squid-Stick creature introduces fun new attacks based on what they do in their natural environment. So a creature that shoots darts out of its mouth at you can be used as a dart gun when you have in on your Squid-Stick. A spiny creature makes a great mace, and a creature with a long, lashing tongue can be used as a whip.
PSX2.com: I know you've probably been asked this a billion times, but it's something we've heard less and less about as of late: How has programming for the PS2 been? We've noticed people saying "oh, it's easy as hell," but then churning out crap, or someone saying "it's damn near impossible," but we get stuff like Metal Gear Solid 2 and Gran Turismo 3 -- games that clearly prove the system can be tapped to do amazing things. What's even more amazing is that you hear these things from established console devs and newcomers, and old-hat and first-time PC developers too, and nobody seems to be saying the same thing. Without being afraid of dumbing it down for the layman, let us know what you guys have discovered. Strengths? Weaknesses?
TR: The PS2 is a very powerful machine. Look at our early screen shots. :) With this said, we have worked very hard to learn how to maximize what the PS2 can do. Making a game DESIGNED for the PS2 is the only way to go. Our render, animation system, particles, effects, and even our physics and collision detection are geared toward the features and strengths that PS2 uniquely has to offer.
The PS2's strengths are two-fold: First, it offers a great level of parallelism. We have the Emotion Engine (PS2 processor), IOP (PS1 processor), and two vector units all simultaneously processing various portions of our game. Secondly, while the PS2 has limits, as PC developers know - fixed limits are a wonderful thing. The EE will not change in speed. The GS will not be replaced by a newer version. All PS2 have 32 Megs of main RAM. Fixed limits assist in guiding the game to a logical and obtainable design.
We have also benefited from the fact that our toolset has been exceptional. We are using SnSystems integrated with Visual Studio for coding. We use a custom build Maya plug-in for all our game content. We make our characters, levels, scripts, objects, and even our object information database in Maya. Alias-Wavefront has worked directly with us to ensure that Maya is the best tool for game development - and it is. It was one of the best decisions we have made in terms of the time saved and how it has enabled us to do so much with PS2.
PSX2.com: What's the programming schedule been like for Rubu, and do you guys have any other plans for more PS2 stuff when this is all done? Another Descent game, perhaps? 128-bit power could mean some pretty wild indoor and outdoor environments--even more impressive than what we saw with the Fusion Engine and Descent 3.
TR: Rubu Tribe is using the next generation version of the Fusion Engine. We have taken what we have learned from D3 and we are applying it in a brand new way. I am sure this new engine will be seen in games to come.
PSX2.com: Any plans for an online extension of Rubu or anything that would ship with the game? Also, have you guys played around with online in any capacity? We're curious to know how the libraries supplied by Sony are.
TR: Rubu Tribe is designed to be a single player experience. Our plot and play mechanics are focused with that in mind. We haven't put any thought into multiplayer or online environments.
PSX2.com: How's the development community that's cropped up around the
PlayStation 2? Have you guys found any free-flow of q&a from developers that have already tackled certain issues, or does everyone pretty much clam up about what they've learned?
TR: We have had a lot of contact with companies that have assisted us in making smart decisions to architect our game for the PS2. Sony has done an exceptional job of releasing information on their developer website and newsgroups. Volition (makers of Red Faction) and Outrage have had a long-term relationship and their assistance in getting us from the PC and on to the PS2 was paramount. Interplay, our publisher, worked with us on many aspects of our game renderer. We're thankful for all the help that we've gotten.
Thanks again to the guys over at Outrage, and everyone at Interplay that helped everything happen.
We had a chance to fire a few questions at the guys at Outrage recently, and the answers we got from Producer Tom Rigas managed to pique even more interest than the brief hands-on play time we had at E3. Rubu promises to blend action, strategy, puzzle solving and story elements into a 128-bit brew that could easily push the genre in new directions.
PSX2.com: We'd better get this out of the way first. Who all's been working on Rubu, and what are their backgrounds? How big is the team and have you seen it grow since programming first started?
Tom Rigas: The team leaders for Rubu Tribe came from our Descent 3 team. We started with a group of 10 people in the pre-production phase and have expanded our team to over 30 people.
PSX2.com: Okay, obvious question: Rubu, Uut, Muku, what's with the names?
Tom Rigas: The Rubu have a naming convention that centers on the letter 'U'. :) Well, the names work well together. It's just one thing we've done to give the tribe a sense of unity.
PSX2.com: Well, that was simple enough. Now what about the game itself? Rubu Tribe doesn't really look or feel like anything else out right now. What were some of the sources of inspiration for the game's design, and why such a wild departure from your previous work (Descent, Rubu... Descent, Rubu... Just not seeing, well, ANY similarity there--or was that the idea)?
TR: The original concept was partially born from the unlikely union of two games: Oregon Trail and Lemmings. This resulted in the idea of a tribe of small, cute creatures making an epic journey across a dangerous, uncharted world. The movie The Dark Crystal also had a significant impact on the overall style and feel for the game. We wanted a storyline that blended both light and dark themes into a tale that could be enjoyed by everyone, and we wanted an art style that could back it up. And lastly, a huge amount of inspiration simply came from nature itself. Trips to national parks, museums, zoos, and hours in front of the Discovery Channel have all contributed greatly to the vision of Rubu Tribe.
When Descent was released, it was ground breaking in many ways. At Outrage, we have a very strong desire to make original content and gameplay. Rubu Tribe offers this in a myriad of ways, from the unique look of the game, its innovative design and gameplay, to our numerous new technologies. Rubu Tribe is our opportunity to offer players a compelling game that they never experienced before. So, Rubu Tribe isn't a departure as much as getting back to our roots.
PSX2.com: What kind of world are you aiming for here? What we've seen so far is rather open and lush, and Muku, the game's main character, uses plenty of different tools into interact with the environment, but will the game be mostly linear or will everything be open-ended? Is the gameplay quest- or objective-based, or more just "get here/do this by any means necessary?"
TR: We've designed the world of Rubu Tribe to be an ecosystem where creatures within the world will react with the player, one another and the environment. You are on a quest; so, you will have objectives to complete and obstacles to overcome to continue on your path. You will always know what you SHOULD be doing next; but you might go wandering off because you see something that interests you. We've set up the game so that when you are ready to move the game forward, you will be able to.
We're offering the player situations where there are open-ended solutions. For instance, you may find a large grove of berry bushes that you would like your Workers to gather. But it may be right in front of a Woorg (large, dangerous predator) den. It may be possible to lead your Warriors in and kill all the Woorg, but you would sustain heavy damage, maybe even losing a Warrior or two in the process. So instead you venture into a Chikkit (a smaller, weak creature) cave and grab a Baby Chikkit. Now you can run past the Woorg den, awakening them with the sound of the chirping Baby Chikkit, and throw it into a gully. Woorg love these tasty little morsels, so they will jump right in after it. Now the area is clear for your Workers to pick the berries in peace.
PSX2.com: Granted, the game was early at E3, but the overall feel of the texturing and graphics of Rubu almost feels like it would be more at home on the Dreamcast, or even Gamecube. Were there ever plans to develop it for another system, or has this been designed with the PS2 in mind from the start?
TR: From the start we've designed Rubu Tribe for the PS2. We want to offer players a unique experience on the platform.
PSX2.com: Now hopefully this will be one of those questions that you guys are begging for: if there was one (or even a handful) of thoughts or ideas that you want to convey about the game, what you REALLY want people to take away from this game once they've put down the controller, and what do you want us to know before the game comes out? What should we expect once it's all done?
TR: First of all, Muku is a great character. People will love controlling him as he explores, fights, and directs his fellow tribe members. Second, everyone loves the Uut. There is definitely something very cool about befriending a 40-ft. tall creature. You look out for her, and she will look out for you. Third, in Rubu Tribe, you become a leader. You get to tell other Rubu what to do, and hopefully keep them safe and earn their respect and admiration in the process. Lastly, you get to experience a day to day journey through a living world with varying ecosystems. You'll need to learn from your surroundings and use that knowledge to your advantage in order to survive.
People should come into Rubu Tribe expecting something totally new. From the point in which they start playing the game, our goal is to offer them fresh gameplay within a unique and exciting world.
PSX2.com: Can you go into the combat a little more? We realize Rubu isn't necessarily a violent game (no more so than the Mario games), but exactly how much control will you have over combat when eventually things have to come to blows. We also got to see the rather unique system for "making" weapons MacGuyver-style from what's on hand. How many options will the player have of building inventory items when all's said and done?
TR: Rubu tribe has a deep combat system. We used Zelda, Maximo, and traditional fighting games as a base of the design. We have combo attacks, jump attacks, rolling maneuvers, strafing around targets, special smash down attacks and a whole lot more. It is designed to accessible to new players and experienced players will be able to really enjoy the breadth of possibilities it offers.
Your weapons will be what you find around you in the environment. You don't really make weapons in Rubu Tribe. It's more like you wrangle them from the environment. The weapons in the game are creatures in the environment that your Squid-Stick, the staff that Muku carries, can use. Each Squid-Stick creature introduces fun new attacks based on what they do in their natural environment. So a creature that shoots darts out of its mouth at you can be used as a dart gun when you have in on your Squid-Stick. A spiny creature makes a great mace, and a creature with a long, lashing tongue can be used as a whip.
PSX2.com: I know you've probably been asked this a billion times, but it's something we've heard less and less about as of late: How has programming for the PS2 been? We've noticed people saying "oh, it's easy as hell," but then churning out crap, or someone saying "it's damn near impossible," but we get stuff like Metal Gear Solid 2 and Gran Turismo 3 -- games that clearly prove the system can be tapped to do amazing things. What's even more amazing is that you hear these things from established console devs and newcomers, and old-hat and first-time PC developers too, and nobody seems to be saying the same thing. Without being afraid of dumbing it down for the layman, let us know what you guys have discovered. Strengths? Weaknesses?
TR: The PS2 is a very powerful machine. Look at our early screen shots. :) With this said, we have worked very hard to learn how to maximize what the PS2 can do. Making a game DESIGNED for the PS2 is the only way to go. Our render, animation system, particles, effects, and even our physics and collision detection are geared toward the features and strengths that PS2 uniquely has to offer.
The PS2's strengths are two-fold: First, it offers a great level of parallelism. We have the Emotion Engine (PS2 processor), IOP (PS1 processor), and two vector units all simultaneously processing various portions of our game. Secondly, while the PS2 has limits, as PC developers know - fixed limits are a wonderful thing. The EE will not change in speed. The GS will not be replaced by a newer version. All PS2 have 32 Megs of main RAM. Fixed limits assist in guiding the game to a logical and obtainable design.
We have also benefited from the fact that our toolset has been exceptional. We are using SnSystems integrated with Visual Studio for coding. We use a custom build Maya plug-in for all our game content. We make our characters, levels, scripts, objects, and even our object information database in Maya. Alias-Wavefront has worked directly with us to ensure that Maya is the best tool for game development - and it is. It was one of the best decisions we have made in terms of the time saved and how it has enabled us to do so much with PS2.
PSX2.com: What's the programming schedule been like for Rubu, and do you guys have any other plans for more PS2 stuff when this is all done? Another Descent game, perhaps? 128-bit power could mean some pretty wild indoor and outdoor environments--even more impressive than what we saw with the Fusion Engine and Descent 3.
TR: Rubu Tribe is using the next generation version of the Fusion Engine. We have taken what we have learned from D3 and we are applying it in a brand new way. I am sure this new engine will be seen in games to come.
PSX2.com: Any plans for an online extension of Rubu or anything that would ship with the game? Also, have you guys played around with online in any capacity? We're curious to know how the libraries supplied by Sony are.
TR: Rubu Tribe is designed to be a single player experience. Our plot and play mechanics are focused with that in mind. We haven't put any thought into multiplayer or online environments.
PSX2.com: How's the development community that's cropped up around the
PlayStation 2? Have you guys found any free-flow of q&a from developers that have already tackled certain issues, or does everyone pretty much clam up about what they've learned?
TR: We have had a lot of contact with companies that have assisted us in making smart decisions to architect our game for the PS2. Sony has done an exceptional job of releasing information on their developer website and newsgroups. Volition (makers of Red Faction) and Outrage have had a long-term relationship and their assistance in getting us from the PC and on to the PS2 was paramount. Interplay, our publisher, worked with us on many aspects of our game renderer. We're thankful for all the help that we've gotten.
Thanks again to the guys over at Outrage, and everyone at Interplay that helped everything happen.
