Spellforce Interview

by Sia 'Garrett' Manzari, 2003-02-20

Spellforce is the new game by Volker Wertich (The Settlers), which will combine RPG and RTS elements. We had the chance to put several questions to Volker Wertich...

Volker Wertich: My name is Volker Wertich, I am the Lead Designer of SpellForce. Previous games created by me were the famous Settler series (Settler 1 and 3), on which I also worked as one of the Lead Programmer. Another well-known game I did before in the old days of Amiga is Emerald Mine. I've started working in the games industry very early and sold my first selfmade game at the age of 14.

RPGDot: Tell us a bit about Phenomic also. When was it formed, how many people does it employ?

Volker Wertich: Phenomic was formed in 1999, although its founder Volker Wertich (myself ;-)) and some of the leads have already worked together before, for example on Settlers 1 and Settlers 3 (both Blue Byte). We have currently 20 employees here at Phenomic working on coding, content/design, graphics and project management. Besides, we have an external team in Russia doing some additional graphics as well as an external music/sound team. Overall there are about 30 people currently working on SpellForce.

RPGDot: Can you tell us about the background story of Spellforce in a few words?

Volker Wertich: In a world far away, thirteen magicians - blinded by the promises of some evil gods - have ignited chaos and mayhem in their greedy pursuit for god-like power. Summoned by the magicians through dark rituals, fierce elemental powers have torn the world's continents apart. Remaining are small islands, floating in the sky, connected by magic portals. Now, 8 years after the end of this huge sorcerer's war, evil tries to make its way back into the world and to finish what it once began. But prophecies tell of a man - a human. Damned for immortality - bound to the powers of the blood runes, he needs to stop the armies of darkness. This is the setting, where the game starts.

RPGDot: Why did you choose to change the genre and switch from 'The Settlers', which is an RTS only, to a game with RPG elements?

Volker Wertich: Real-Time-Strategy has always been my favorite genre, but a little more than 2 years ago I had a bit of a feeling that RTS-games got into a dead-end. More units or upgrades and better GFX just don't make the cut to create the next generation of RTS-games. I was especially thinking about how we could drag the player more into the action of RTS-games and how we could avoid the effect that the player needs to start "from scratch" each mission. That was the basic idea for SpellForce.

RPGDot: Is Spellforce more an RPG or an RTS game?

Volker Wertich: With its unique mix of game elements, SpellForce cannot really be assigned to any of the standard genres. However, the main part of SpellForce is an RTS game, but it uses RPG-elements to create a long-time motivation for the player. Having an avatar - a Virtual Alter Ego in the game, that you can freely choose (warrior, white magican, black magican, rouge etc.) - gives you a much better possibility to identify yourself with the game and the story than just by commanding nameless and faceless armies.

RPGDot: We are playing through the whole game with the same character (Avatar), is that right? What happens, if the avatar dies? Is the game over then?

Volker Wertich: Yes, that's true - you have one virtual Alter Ego, that you play through the whole game. That is to give the player a maximum identification - he will really feel as if he lives in this world. But the game won't be over, when you die. You're immortal, bound to the power of a rune. But of course, their will be some kind of penalties - more details will follow, when we reveal more about the rune system.

RPGDot: Is the game mission based like other RTS games, like you complete a mission and the game automatically continues with the story or plays a cutscene and then you are assigned a new task or does it play like an RPG, where you travel where you want, explore areas, talk to NPCs, accept missions etc?

Volker Wertich: Well, as there's a main story, there's a beginning and an end. But, the player has much more freedom than in other RTS games, where you have your campaign and play one scenario after the other - and that's it. Our game world is persistent - you can go back to a map, that you may have cleared 10 hours ago from a horde of orcs, only to find out, that it's now conquered by a goblin army. Besides, what gives the game a great replayability, you can choose different directions of magic and fighting classes for your main hero. So if you have decided to put all your earned experience points into black and mental magic, when you play the game for the first time - you can play it once again and see how you will succeed as a heavy warrior for example.

RPGDot: Which different areas are there in Spellforce? Are there dungeons in the game or icy areas, islands, mountains? How do you travel between these areas?

Volker Wertich: There are no Indoor-Levels, but we have a huge variety of different landscapes. From beautiful green forests to deserted places, from snowy, icy, cold mountains to jungle like vegetations - it's everything in the game.

RPGDot: Some more gameplay issues: Is there an automap or a fog-of-war map? A journal? A quest book? A magic book? A resource overview?

Volker Wertich: Yes - to all questions :). No, wait, we don't have a sole journal, this is more combined with the quest book.

RPGDot: Do you have to collect resources to built new armies like in other RTS titles?

Volker Wertich: Yes, although, this is a bit different in "SpellForce" than in traditional RTS games. We don't have a Tech-Tree for example, but the runes you can find are from major importance. Unfortunately can not go into further details right now. This is something we will reveal soon. But of course, you will need the resources for the building of your armies.

RPGDot: Can you describe typical situations regarding combat and magic?

Volker Wertich: Okay, let's say the player has just entered a new map, which is crowded by hordes of goblins. The first thing you need to decide is whether you want to encounter those goblins only with your avatar or build up an army. Goblins are weak, but if your character is for example specialized in white magic like healing it would be probably a bad idea to face those creatures just by yourself. If your character is on the other hand a strong warrior, it might be enough to summon some additional heroes (we have a limit of 5 heroes in the game, that can support your avatar) and blow the goblins away. If both ways are not an option for you, you will need to find a monument. Those monuments are some kind of an equivalent for main buildings/headquarters in traditional RTS games. At the monument you can summon workers (by the way: to summon heroes you will also need a special monument) - but to do so you first need runes, because the quality and quantity of the workers will depend on the runes. So if you don't have a dwarf rune, you won't be able to build up a dwarf army unless you've found one (maybe one of those friendly goblins will drop one, if you convince him ;-)) By wiping out those hordes, your main character will advance in level - you can then add some points to your different skills - and he also might get new equipment by looting those monsters.

RPGDot: Can the Avatar also fight him/herself with weapons or use magic only? What weapons are there in the game? Is there ranged combat also?

Volker Wertich: Yes, the Avatar can also fight with swords, bows, axes and stuff like that. There are seven classes in which you can develop your avatar - 4 magical ones and 3 fighting classes. There will be a large number of different weapons, unique items and many others, more than a hundred at least. And, yes, there will be also ranged combat - a speciality of the elves.

RPGDot: What different spells are there? How does the spell system work? Based on reagents, only mana or totally different?

Volker Wertich: We have four different main directions to chose from: white magic, black magic, elemental and mental. For each spell line exist a number of individual spells - and I mean individual. It's not like that you have black magic fireballs and white magic fireballs :). The spell system works on a mana base.

RPGDot: As we are very interested in the RPG aspects, can you describe the RPG system? What attributes, stats, races are there? Is there an Avatar creation process? Of which race can the Avatar be (Human, Dwarve, Elve, Dark Elve, Orc and Troll)?

Volker Wertich: Your avatar will be human, but you can chose gender and look of him/her. He evolves during the game, so with the gaining of new experience points, you can enhance your magic or fighting skills. We have a couple of different skills like strength, charisma etc. - more to be revealed soon.

RPGDot: How does level up work? Do you get XPs for killing monsters and/or solving riddles, quests? And if so, how can you use the XPs?

Volker Wertich: Yes - and yes :). You get XP's for killing monsters as well as for solving quests. You can use them by enhancing your skills/stats (see comment above).

RPGDot: Will there be Multiplayer support and if so, what does it look like (different modes)?

Volker Wertich: We will have different LAN-modes (Coop, Death-Match and some other) that can be also played via Internet. That's all what I can say for now.

RPGDot: Weren't you afraid to use the Krass engine as for example the Descent engine proved to be totally useless for an RPG in Descent to Undermountain?

Volker Wertich: KRASS is a very open engine and allows us to get a top notch quality with a graphical richness never seen before in any other RTS. In addition, we have four main areas, which were mainly coded by our inhouse-programmers: terrain, effect system, water and shadows - so we're using KRASS as the core engine, but it was totally customized to our needs.

RPGDot: Is there anything else you would like to tell our readers?

Volker Wertich: We hope, that you will enjoy "SpellForce - The Order of Dawn", and we're absolutely convinced, that it will be the next generation of Strategy Fantasy gaming. Be prepared! ;-)

RPGDot: Thanks for your time!