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AusGamers: Ladies and gents, welcome to AusGamers. You are here once again with Stephen Farrelly. We’ve been invited out, once again, at a special pre-E3 event, to talk to MachineGames... and a bunch of other things, but nothing is as important as your game! [laughs and points at Jens]

.. and I’ve got Jens here, from Machine Games; it’s a studio that’s kind of born from Starbreeze, which is another celebrated studio -- The Darkness was one of my favourite games from this generation. So you guys are working on Wolfenstein, which came out of left field, and I’m curious to know: how did it come about? Who pitched to who? Who ran with this?

Jens Matthias: Well essentially, when we started talking to Bethesda, that was obviously one of the IPs that was in their catalogue, from getting together with id. And we are huge Wolfenstein fans from the olden days; for me personally, that was the game that opened up my eyes to what was possible in games.

So we knew that they had the IP, and we knew that nobody was working on it, so we developed a pitch that we’re really excited about.



AusGamers: It’s arguable that the last lot of Wolf games haven’t done too well, and the license... I mean, it’s been handled well, but I just don’t think it’s had the sort of reverence that the game actually deserves. It’s arguably the first first-person shooter ever made.

For you guys, going into that, what was the pressure like? Or was it more a case of: well, no, here’s this thing that we love; let’s do it right?

Jens: Yeah, it was very much that approach, but that’s not to say there’s not a lot of pressure. There’s always pressure, because we want to deliver a game that’s perfect. But that’s sort of regardless of what kind of game it is, that’s more just the pressure of doing the work that we do. So there’s no real added pressure because of that, but yes, no, yes.

AusGamers: You’re mixing it up. There’s no multiplayer, which is a huge thing. But then, the first game didn’t have multiplayer, right? So you’re genuinely bringing it back to its roots. For you guys, when you brought that up with Bethesda, was that an issue, or were they like “well, you know, we do single-player games anyway, so this makes sense”.

Jens: Yeah, that wasn’t an issue at all, which is also why we love working with Bethesda, is that they put the quality of the game, and the creative freedom of the developer, first. And they’ve proven that they can sell a large quantity of games without multiplayer.

So for them, it’s not something they force us to shoehorn in there. They just want us to deliver the best possible game that we can, and that’s exactly what we want to do to, so we’re extremely happy.

AusGamers: Now, this might sound a bit weird, but it seems like what you guys have done -- and technically Wolfenstein came first-- but what you’ve done with this, is kind of done what Duke Nukem Forever always should have been...

Jens: [laughs]

AusGamers: Because you’ve got BJ and his wisecracking, and he’s just kicking ass everywhere. Instead of aliens, it’s Nazis that have gone to the moon and stuff like that. Were you guys conscious of that?



Jens: No, we don’t really look to other games for inspiration, and especially with this one, you don’t really need to, because there’s such a rich legacy to explore. But we just do the stuff that we think is best for the game -- that interests us, and gives us the right feeling when we play.

So the kind of approach we have is very... it’s very structured, but it’s not bound to a certain game system, or a certain kind of storytelling, or certain this or that. We approach [a] moment of the game, or each scenario, as its own entity, and whatever that entity needs is what we want to give it.

So in the demo that we showed you today, there’s a number of different sections. First there’s an introduction where you ride in this car, then the Panzerhund, then it leads into this other thing. We construct those both conceptually as an emotional arc, in terms of what it gives you when you play it. Then it’s just a matter of trying to implement that to the best of our ability and iterate on it until it feels really solid and strong.

AusGamers: I’ll get onto id Tech 5 in a minute, but before that: it’s kind of funny that id created the game, then it went out into the publisher ether, and other people have had their hands in the pie. Then when id landed back at Bethesda, now it’s come full circle and it’s back under a publishing umbrella that actually works for everybody.

When you guys decided to do the game, did you actually sit down with the id guys, and say “look, we’re going to do this; this is how we’re going to do it”? Was it kind of an asking permission type thing?

Jens: Yeah, that’s exactly what it was like. Because they own their IP, and they’ve always owned their IP. So whenever another developer has done a Wolfenstein game, it has been through a deal with id Software, and they are very careful about maintaining the backstory of BJ, and all of these sort of things, and we are not interested in doing anything that they disagree with.

And what was so amazing for us, was when we started talking to id, they were just completely on board with the idea. Because in this game, we honour a lot of things, but we go in a different way too. It’s in the 1960s, the nazis have won the war, and they rule the world, and they have all of this strange technology, and nazi robots and what-have-you. There’s all of these things that are not traditionally a part of Wolfenstein. But when we pitched the idea to them, they were on board, and they’ve been extremely supportive, and we’re very thankful to be sort of in this family, with developers who care about games first and foremost.



AusGamers: Was it always going to be that you guys were going to use id Tech 5 for this, once the deal was made? Or was that something that you also asked when you were pitching?

Jens: I think they have a history of all of their IPs being made on their engine, so I think it was just the harmonious thing to do. And we love the engine, so we’re extremely happy.

AusGamers: Have you had many hurdles dealing with it, given that it’s not something that you’re immediately used to?

Jens: Not really, and it’s kind of weird, because id Software has always been the leader when it comes to game engine technology -- for first-person games, they were doing things way, way before anybody else -- and so they kind of set the standards and practices for how things make a first-person game, in terms of the tool-chain, and in terms of the methods you use as a developer. So when we were at Starbreeze, and we had our own Starbreeze engine, the practices sort of derived a little bit from what id had done, so when we went to an id engine, it was very familiar -- so it’s this weird full-circle thing there too.

But it was very quick for us to get into it. The big thing about the engine is that you can make every pixel in the world unique, in terms of the game world. So you can really make it staggeringly detailed, and that’s obviously quite a challenge, because you want it as detailed as you can do it, but there’s no end to how much you can obsess over every little thing.

AusGamers: And obviously, Carmack’s baby for the last year and a bit, as been Oculus Rift: have you guys been dabbling with that at all?

Jens: I don’t know, it’s not something that I’m very well informed of, for a technical question.

AusGamers: With the PC, obviously you guys have a history there as well, and id obviously has a big history on the PC. Will there be any differentiation from the console releases and the PC, or are you just going for the platform parity?



Jens: Well... that’s always kind of hard to quantify. But obviously, we’re releasing for next-generation platforms, so I think there’s parity there, and PC will be the same essentially. Currently, with 360, and PS3, I’m sure there will be a difference, but exactly where that line is drawn, I have no idea.

AusGamers: A lot of people have been talking since the teaser trailer was released, and I guess with the presentation dynamic that you have, Tarantino's name has been dropped left, right, and centre, but I’d argue -- apart from the Bubi sequence that we watched earlier, which was hilarious -- were you going for that kind of Inglorious Basterds tone? Is that something that you’re using as a tonal reference?

Jens: Yeah, that’s very much... it’s so great that that movie came out, because it’s one of the few examples ever, that sort of walks the fine line between really intense truthful drama, and just over-the-top mayhem and cathartic action, and that’s exactly our sweet spot for this game.

So it’s not like... our story has nothing to do with that story of course, they’re two different animals, but in terms of the tone, it’s a very good point of reference.

AusGamers: Finally, you guys have worked almost exclusively on publisher’s IPs, and obviously if this does really well, sequels are possible, if not inevitable. Now you don’t have to say that you are, but is there something going on in the studio, were “maybe it’s time we spread our wings and do our own thing, from the ground up one day”? Has that been on the cards at one point, at all?

Jens: Yeah, we are developers, so... and that’s the thing: if you are a game developer, your brain is full of ideas and things you want to do. But I don’t think... we don’t really look at it as though its our own IP, and somebody else’s IP. Because as soon as it’s within our office, it’s ours! We love this project so much; it’s not like if we did something that was our own brainchild, we would love it more.

Obviously, we have plenty of ideas, and we could make some kickass things from the ground up too, but we’re maxed out in terms of how passionate we are on this project.



AusGamers: Alright, well, we’ll leave it there. Thanks so much for your time today Jens.

Jens: Any time.

AusGamers: Sorry, left-handed shake. [laughs]

Jens: Yeah, I was really perplexed there. [laughs]

AusGamers: So guys, you heard it here: Jens; MachineGames; Wolfenstein.