Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare developer Sledgehammer Games has its hands full with not only crafting an engaging story, but also providing an authentic one. Kind of difficult when the game features technology that, at this point in time, is purely theoretical. A brief behind the scenes video detailing the research process that went into making the next game in the franchise.
Sledgehammer's Creative Director Bret Robbins stars in the latest video for Advanced Wafare, talking about how the company spent the last three years (a first in the series' history) readying themselves to unleash Advanced Warfare into the world.
"We tapped a lot of experts when we were developing the story: our military advisors, Delta Force operators, Navy Seals," said Robbins. "These guys are the real deal and they bring a level of authenticity to the story."
While that's nothing new, it's a good model to follow, especially with other developers having done the same thing for their own shooters. But what separates Sledgehammer and studios like DICE is that the former went beyond just talking to soldiers.
"We ended up working with a lot of different futurists -- guys that, literally, their job is to think about the world in 40 years, what it's gonna be like," explained Robbins. "Everything from the weapons, to the production design, to the uniforms. Everything had to go through this filter of 'it's 40 years in the future, but it has to be real.'"
Very true. Consider the tiltrotor helicopter seen in the game's trailer. That's actually an extrapolation for a program currently in development for the army. Obviously, we're not quite there yet when it comes to bending light to make a vehicle completely invisible, but Sledgehammer has indeed done their due diligence.
Robbins continued: "This time around, we've really focused on telling a very compelling story with very compelling characters. And we've done new story telling techniques to get that across. Our cinematics all feature fully rendered character animations now. The character in-game looks just like the actor in real-life. We use his voice, we use his full body performance, and you get a very realistic, lifelike, filmic performance out of these amazing actors that we have."
"One of the big differences in our story this time is we focus on a single protagonist. That's made it more compelling because everything that's happening is happening to 'me.' You're gonna see moments and situations that I haven't seen in a movie, let alone a video game before. The audience is gonna experience this epic story that we've been working on for three years. It's like handing out a gift -- you get to unwrap it and enjoy it."
Check out Robbins wax futuristic about Advanced Warfare in the video below.
Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare is set to launch worldwide on November 4 for PC, PS4, PS3, Xbox 360, and Xbox One. The game takes place in 2054, and sees PMC Atlas CEO Jonathan Irons (voiced by Kevin Spacey), waging a war against the United States government, using his company's employees / guns for hire as his own personal army. In addition to the new class of weapons and exo suits, game gear also includes light bending helicopters, and gloves that put Spiderman's wall crawling abilities to shame.
