[Q&A] Gun: Showdown
We sit down with Rebellion Entertainment and get their take on taking Neversoft's brutal portrayal of the Old West and making it portable.
Published: September 12, 2006
TotalPlayStation.com: Who originally pitched the idea of doing a PSP version of Gun, and what was the idea, just to make a portable version of the Gun universe or something that approximated it but stayed true to the original?
GUN Showdown was an ambitious project from the start. Coupled with the requirement for at least 30% new content that Sony require of any ‘conversion’ to the PSP, we had a big task on our hands.
It was never enough to just blindly follow the original version; the console version was written for the console, and we needed to make a PSP game which is so much different.
On the art front, we wanted to make the best looking game possible, our art team set to work with the original graphics both cramming it into the available space whilst keeping the visual quality as high as possible. Towards the end of the project, the art team were doing little else but refining the lighting tuning, textures and optimizing the mesh.
Game design was as much of a challenge. We had all of the new additional missions to weave into the plot and impossible to reproduce content to deftly side-step.
Does the game use the Asura Engine, or is it something that's built specifically for the game? Any tricks that you can share with us that you've done with the PSP hardware? We've seen software HDR by other devs like Backbone Entertainment.
Yes, Gun uses our Asura engine. It’s a very mature and stable environment. Using it allows us to start a project with pretty much everything we need. It’s been through the mill several times on the PSP platform. Asura is constantly being improved by our core technology team, so it’s always up to date.
Care to delve into the multiplayer a little? What kind of modes are there, what do they entail, and how much of the single-player world do they incorporate? Are there tweaked maps? Original stuff? Can we possibly pad this question with more questions?
We wanted to stick as much as we could to plain, simple tried and tested MP modes – ones that people will pick up and play. Deathmatch was an absolute must; we added the Golden Cross mode, where the players have to fight over a single golden cross, scoring points for how long they hang on to it and also bonus points for wasting the poor guy who’s managed to grab it. The poker game proved to be a very popular feature in the single player game, so we shoe-horned that too into our schedule.
What's your take on the Old West? The original console version of Gun and input from the Neversoft team probably helped, but is there the temptation to romanticize things a little?
There is some temptation to put our own spin on the story, but to be quite frank, GUN is such a well-crafted and tight story, that there’s not much we’d change. We were able to find some areas to jump in and add some elements to flesh out the middle of the story, particularly when Colton goes to Empire. We are very proud of being able to fit all of these missions in, without breaking, and even enhancing, the continuity of the main storyline.
GUN Showdown was an ambitious project from the start. Coupled with the requirement for at least 30% new content that Sony require of any ‘conversion’ to the PSP, we had a big task on our hands.
It was never enough to just blindly follow the original version; the console version was written for the console, and we needed to make a PSP game which is so much different.
On the art front, we wanted to make the best looking game possible, our art team set to work with the original graphics both cramming it into the available space whilst keeping the visual quality as high as possible. Towards the end of the project, the art team were doing little else but refining the lighting tuning, textures and optimizing the mesh.
Game design was as much of a challenge. We had all of the new additional missions to weave into the plot and impossible to reproduce content to deftly side-step.
Does the game use the Asura Engine, or is it something that's built specifically for the game? Any tricks that you can share with us that you've done with the PSP hardware? We've seen software HDR by other devs like Backbone Entertainment.
Yes, Gun uses our Asura engine. It’s a very mature and stable environment. Using it allows us to start a project with pretty much everything we need. It’s been through the mill several times on the PSP platform. Asura is constantly being improved by our core technology team, so it’s always up to date.
Care to delve into the multiplayer a little? What kind of modes are there, what do they entail, and how much of the single-player world do they incorporate? Are there tweaked maps? Original stuff? Can we possibly pad this question with more questions?
We wanted to stick as much as we could to plain, simple tried and tested MP modes – ones that people will pick up and play. Deathmatch was an absolute must; we added the Golden Cross mode, where the players have to fight over a single golden cross, scoring points for how long they hang on to it and also bonus points for wasting the poor guy who’s managed to grab it. The poker game proved to be a very popular feature in the single player game, so we shoe-horned that too into our schedule.
What's your take on the Old West? The original console version of Gun and input from the Neversoft team probably helped, but is there the temptation to romanticize things a little?
There is some temptation to put our own spin on the story, but to be quite frank, GUN is such a well-crafted and tight story, that there’s not much we’d change. We were able to find some areas to jump in and add some elements to flesh out the middle of the story, particularly when Colton goes to Empire. We are very proud of being able to fit all of these missions in, without breaking, and even enhancing, the continuity of the main storyline.