Deus Ex: The Fall Interview

You can read our hands-on with title here.

There's nothing quite of this calibre from Square-Enix on the mobile market: is this a test by the company to gauge the response?

When we finished Human Revolution, what I was saying to people was - when they were asking what's next - we'd always said we wanted to take care of the franchise and make it grow. For us, tablets and mobile was a great opportunity because they're become more popular. But they're also becoming very strong in terms of their capabilities and it came to a point were we thought "we could make a Deus Ex game on that". It'd be cool to have the Deus Ex experience, you could go around, and carry it with you. Not just be in your living room. We can get a different flavour with it and, as you said, it allows us to try things differently with certain aspects; accelerators and what not.

It also allowed us to tap into - and yes, our audience from Human Revolution will go on to this - but on the mobile there are people who've heard about the game but have never played it. The entry point is going to be much cheaper as well. For me, I see it as a great opportunity to expand the brand also to newcomers who never played Human Revolution, or who go back to it, or if we do other games...

Even a few years ago, this idea would be inconceivable on the format. Did you guys do a bench test just to see if it'd even be possible?

The way we work is that we analyse all the different possibilities that could work for those devices and after that, we have studies that tell us what kind of market there is. You have to sculpt accordingly. You're not making a forty hour game with the same budget. we have some experts like James Wright, who has been working in the mobile industry for at least twelve years. He was able to help us make the right decision in going in that direction.

Did you consider shrinking or removing stuff - it looks like you've got everything from Human Revolution in there...

It was very clear at the beginning, because we've partnered with N-Fusion in New Jersey, and those guys have been making mobile games for quite a while. They already have a lot of experience, and when we started to work with them, early on they already knew certain things, they were telling me we'd have to drop things, or do things differently, this or that... they were already in the right mindset to what we'd have to do slightly differently. So it helped me to understand me understand, as it was my first experience working on a mobile platform.

It was great way to make the right decisions for the project. and what i love about N-Fusion is the way they brought it to us; it wasn't "oh we can do that". No, it was "we can do this, but not that - either or". They were trying to maintain the experience in a different way. So we were saying you don't have to jump anymore but now we have vaulting. So in the mobile space those kind of actions are easier to perform. So its something that early on, we knew we'd go in that direction. We didn't have to go four months of "oh its doesn't work, it doesn't work". we had the normal process of "its good, but it could be better". We reiterated.

You've all the weapons but no inventory space issues as the suitcase has been removed. But do you still have to favour stealth or combat weapon choices?

you have to build up your arsenal like in Human Revolution. Its just that your inventory isn't limited. There's 29 weapons, you can acquire them all, and have them all with you at any given time. That's the biggest difference. And because we were going with accelerators, like the micro-transactions, you cannot manage it the same way you'd manage with a core game, when a player buys something but doesn't have the space to fit it... it gets complicated. You have to rethink those things.

You've got key personnel from Eidos Montreal back together for this, but N-Fusion is the developer. How'd that collaboration work?

it was quite collaborative. With the partners we have, I try and brief them about the universe we have, how see it, how we created it and what is important to us. Then I want them to pitch their ideas, and see what they understand about the universe, what they suggest. for me its important that those people also have a vision. It's a great opportunity to see different ideas. It's not the original ideas -they may be even better. We don't have pretension whatsoever. We see it more as a partnership. In this case, with The Fall, I had an idea first if it could be a book, or something like that. The N-Fusion guys came back with "what if we do a sequel to the book [Icarus Effect]?" We thought "hey, why not". They pitched, solidified their idea with the Deus Es core team, we helped them build that and support this properly.

Does the arc finish within that time frame before Adam Jensen returns to active duty in Human Revolution?

Jensen's not in the game. He's still with his arm [JF starts shaking his arm out] shouting "I never asked for this!"

How are you looking at the UI for iPad and iPhone? will there be differences?

What we decided to do was offer the option to configure the buttons as you wish. Instead of just going with something we thought was the best - which we did - you can change it if you're not happy. That was the best way to approach it, because different players, different play styles... some have bigger thumbs etc.With those options - be the designer. We involve you in the process [laughs]

Why so many play styles? Have you not hit on the right one?

For us porting a first-person shooter to a mobile device, it's a challenge, and it was a matter of finding whatever useful trick to make it as smooth as possible. Yes we have the virtual thumbsticks, the double tap - but it wasn't trying to integrate everything because we don't know what works. We saw it more as sometimes you'd go like this sometimes like this. We saw it as something that works together, Our goal then was to make it as smooth and as easy as possible. Not that it's not challenging, but -the first game I worked on was a F1 game, and the first question I asked to myself and the team was "are we trying to make you feel what it is to jump into a F1 car and drive it" or are you a professional racer that tries to compete with Schumacher, Hill, etc. We said it was the latter, and that was the direction you go in. you're not trying to simulate, you're trying to give a good experience.

So, boss fights...

They're very exciting, aren't they?

Are they in The Fall?

There are no boss fights.

Is that for story reasons or otherwise?

Story reasons. It fitted this way but I know that all of you guys out there really want them again. I promise you I'll work hard as many boss fights in the future [laughs]

Is there plans for an Android version?

It will be released at some point, but I don't have the details for now.