Dontnod on why Vampyr isn't set in an open-world

At a recent preview event hosted by Focus Home Entertainment, we were able to catch up with Dontnod's Stéphane Beauverger (Narrative Director) and Grégory Szucs (Art Director), with the pair telling us about the concepts and ideas that have influenced their next game, Vampyr.

With the game being an RPG, many people wondered whether it would be an open-world affair. This isn't the case, and in our interview the game's narrative director explained to us why the studio decided to keep things more focused.

"The more you create an open world, the less the storyline will be important for the player," Beauverger said. "For example, I really like games like Skyrim, but really there is so much things to do that your main quest it's just really a secondary quest finally. The most important thing is what you'll do in this world.

"Dontnod likes to create strong characters with strong fates and destinies, and to control that we have to, a few times, guide the player throughout a process of discovering things. So there is freedom of movement and there is freedom to go where you want in the game we created, but you cannot go freely wherever you want, there are some parts of the game that will be unlocked only when we want it."

You can check out the full interview below, which includes some off-screen gameplay of the title in action as shown to us by Dontnod. Our preview from the same event is available for your viewing pleasure here.