Introduction

The Interview

RPGDot: Could you give us a brief summary of what RatHunt is all about?

Pawel Kalinowski: Just like Hamlet it is about betrayal, vengeance and love. Seriously - we wanted to create a game with several meanings.
An easy one for those who just want to relieve after work or studies and a deeper for those who get involved into the plot. Our weasely idea is to make people buying the game just for shooting and later convince them that RPG and storyline-based game advance is not as difficult as one might think.
This is the result of our small marketing research (please remember RH was intended for consoles first) that hard core RPG lovers would hardly invest their money in absolutely no franchise-supported title. These are rather casual gamers who buy titles because of an interesting marketing campaign or, generally, curiosity. What we intend to do is to create demand in such a casual player for more RPG in the game - and he/she will find it in the next RatHunt.

RPGDot: How long has RatHunt been in development so far?

Pawel Kalinowski: So far it took us appx. 18 months, but it all started in 1999 with a later abandoned Warhammer 40000 based FPP shooter.

RPGDot: When you started working on RatHunt, was there any game that served as a role model or source of inspiration? Would you disagree if I said that RatHunt could be "DeusEx"-like to a certain degree?

Pawel Kalinowski: DeusEx is one of our all-time-favorites, of course, but we started a little earlier in a different world - there was much more of old-school RPG there, let me mention Ishar, Robinson's Requiem, Might and Magic, Deus (yes, maybe someone still remembers this title).
Later we found out that we do not feel good in such stories and that we would do nothing for RPG community releasing next old-school title. As devoted RPG fans (our first 8-bit RPG title was released in 1988) we want new people to understand basics of RPG to come later and say "Yea, this RPG is not all devilish as I was told!".
I am writing this because RH has possibly less RPG than DeusEx and one can't make direct comparisons between these titles, especially as RH is more character interaction oriented.

RPGDot: You are utilizing Monolith's LithTech engine for RatHunt. Now, we've heard from developers complaining about LithTech being a very difficult tool to work with. Have you come across any difficulties and to what extent has LithTech prevented you from implementing features you would have liked to implement?

Pawel Kalinowski: Possibly it vastly depends on what you want from the engine - if you are looking for a Quake-style multiplayer game, better choice is Quake itself. For us LithTech was a perfect choice because it was flexible enough without need for tons of coding. Maybe in a next project we will take RenderWare, definitely not Quake and Unreal engines (and derivatives). Of course there are unpleasant parts of LithTech, but the most important one - character animation - is supported really good.
I do not remember a feature that would be absolutely impossible in LT - maybe support for mirrors - but still you are allowed to make a mirror in the old Duke-Nukem style. And this is only for the version 3.x we are using next incarnations of LT (Jupiter, etc.) do support all kinds of mirrors.

RPGDot: RatHunt is set in a modern day environment. Will we be seeing any real world locations in RatHunt or are all locations fictional?

Pawel Kalinowski: There is one location that fully came from the real world - Eastern Europe dwellers will immediately notice which one. But I must say that level designers here are of the architectural degrees so they always want to create something special. The game offers lots of eye candy (especially in Chinatown levels), but still we were rather looking at playability, not visuals only. Short answer is almost all locations are fictional, but with roots in the real world.

RPGDot: The player's 'Alter Ego', Mason, is a criminal. Will most quests involve criminal actions like stealing, assassinations etc.?

Pawel Kalinowski: That is true, fortunately our hero is fighting other, worse criminals only and later it turns out that the criminal background is only a cover for something much more dangerous - terrorism.

RPGDot: Is RatHunt level-based? Does the player finish level after level or will it be possible to freely go wherever the player wants to go?

Pawel Kalinowski: It is one world split into levels due to technical reasons only, so the player will be able to go wherever possible and makes sense. But no cheating - RH is not a "non-linear" game - we like to think about the game as a movie with twists, depending on the player's actions.

RPGDot: RatHunt is "action-packed" with tons of combat according to your website. On the other hand, it states that the player can also choose to avoid combat by sneaking around enemies etc. How do you plan to award a player experience points for sneaking? Is there other ways to gain experience than by killing?

Pawel Kalinowski: Fulfilling quests is the way and the silently made quests are better awarded to balance gain from kills. On the other hand, if one wants combat only, the game becomes very hard with insufficient points gained to make the progress. So, one can try combat and in many cases will succeed, but sneaking is often highly recommended. For die hard lovers of combat and combat only there is one level - The Monastery - where the goal is to locate and kill Don Vasyl, who, together with his soldiers is already aware of your presence, betrayal and hostility.
Interesting fact about this level is that we built it with a deathmatch approach - Don Vasyl and his guards behave like bots. Don Vasyl is trying to keep a long distance while his guards are attacking and respawning when killed.

RPGDot: It seems like RatHunt is going to mix an action-based skill/stat system with a skill point-based skill/stat system. You say that when the player runs a lot he becomes a better runner and gains more stamina (action-based). On the other hand, the player will get skill points for distribution to stats and skills on level-up (skill point-based). How do these two systems work together? Why not make it all action-based or all based on skill point distribution?

Pawel Kalinowski: Once again, we wanted to introduce both systems to casual gamers. The trick is on the beginning of the game you just do not need help from experience points very much - the action based system does it automatically. Little bit later, when opponents are tougher, you notice that you can balance your skill yourself and invest in a particular weapon or ability. So we let casuals get involved into the story without flooding them with numerical statistics data, later we show them it is not as complicated as they thought. All this is because we want more RPG players, not because we need to please existing ones. For hard-cories there is Another War - a classic (and hopefully classy) iso-metric RPG with hundreds of stats to explore.

RPGDot: What's the deal with the weapon skills? What influence does my e.g. M-14 skill have on gameplay? (better accuracy, faster reloads..?)

Pawel Kalinowski: You hit the bull's eye! Exactly these two are affected. First we also had things like weapon wear and tear, jams, reloading was automatic only with rounds in belt. We had to simplify this to fit in our picture of RH.

RPGDot: Just checked out this screenshot. There are only weapon skills and general stats to be seen. What skills are there aside from the weapon skills? How many skills in total?

Pawel Kalinowski: Still there is something to be done in balancing the game and therefore it is possible some of the more advanced skills will not appear in the final game and that's why we are not presenting them now. Also to simplify the game play we resigned from general weapon skills like "Ability to use heavy machine guns". There are only few types of weapons and therefore you set skill separately for each weapon.
Anyway, the stats that will be present in final version are (besides shown on screenshots) Charisma, Speed, Agility, etc.

RPGDot: What can you tell us about the enemies in RatHunt? There seem to be three mafia clans and the police...

Pawel Kalinowski: Exactly. Later you find out who is your real enemy. And, revealing a piece from the script, these are not the police forces. The real enemy is using mafia clans to realize its own plans.

A Chinese Soldier

A Chinese Officer

RPGDot: Will Mason be able to become an ally of one of the four factions? Or is he going to be a "lonesome hero" throughout the whole game?

Pawel Kalinowski: During the game it will be highly recommended to ally with Italians, or at least pretend to do so. Otherwise the game will be very tough.

RPGDot: An interesting approach is that the more often Mason is hit by enemy fire the better he gets at taking damage. In general terms: how much realism is there in the player's damage model?

Pawel Kalinowski: As always we had to choose between realism and playability - hits does differ, but I must emphasize RH is not a simulator - again, pure entertainment is what we seek. In other words - head shots are critical, but not that often.

RPGDot: And how much realism is in the enemy's damage model? Quote from your website (Shotgun description): "The weapon is able to rip limbs off." Sounds like RatHunt will offer some "Soldier of Fortune"-like gore fest...

Pawel Kalinowski: In current stage of contacts with possible publishers of RH we have very different feedback, generally not so enthusiastic about gore-like elements. We are very negatively experienced with our game Mortyr that had at least five different versions depending on country - with or without Adolf H., blood, nazi crosses, Third Reich marches, even sexual elements on tainted glass windows. Possible there will be much less blood and gore than some people would like to see and than (sometimes) we would like to use.

Model of a doctor

Somewhere in Chinatown

RPGDot: A general question. How much RPG is there in RatHunt and to what extent do the RPG elements have a *real* influence on gameplay? Why should RPG fans look forward to RatHunt?

Pawel Kalinowski: Possibly RH is not a game for RPG fans - it is a game that makes RPG fans out of more casual players. For RPG people we have DCI - a way of interacting NPC's that, as we see it, will change FPP genre and generally make all genres closer. In a future I see, besides typical genres, a super genre that uses the best elements from action, adventure and RPG titles - something that would be a Gladiatior of games - a presentation that would please almost everyone for its story, deepness, technical excellence, user interface, fun.

RPGDot: To conclude this interview let's move on to some generic questions ;)
Like: Are you planning on Multiplayer in RatHunt? If so, which modes can we expect.

Pawel Kalinowski: As you already know, we first planned RH for consoles. It means multiplayer was not in the schedule in the beginning and therefore we will not do it now. Interesting thing is that in so called "meantime" we prepared design doc for a MMORPG in the RH world (races are mafias, etc.). If we have funds for such a large project, we will do this. At this point we must focus on single player aspects of the game.

RPGDot: How far into development are you? When will RatHunt be released and does RatHunt have a publisher yet?

Pawel Kalinowski: We see the end better and better, our work schedule says April, but due to time a publisher will need for marketing the game I would not expect anything earlier than July. Anyway, for the game itself it will mean better balancing. Publisher is still unknown. It means "don't hold your breath".

RPGDot: Are you planning on expanding the RatHunt series? Are there plans for an add-on or a sequel?

Pawel Kalinowski: It depends on financing and of course on success of the part one. MMORPG is our dream, sequel is more probable. In the meantime, the RatHunt team will have to look at two simple local market projects and RH on consoles (where testing is especially important).

RPGDot: Is there anything else I should have asked? What is it? Here's your chance to tell us what you would really like us to know about RatHunt.

Pawel Kalinowski: Although we are primarily doing RH for money the other goal is to expand the RPG world. We hope to do so with your help and suggestions. While waiting for RatHunt have fun playing good RPG titles!