Q&A With Jack Mamais

**gobbly2100** · 01-01-2007, 11:26 PM

Here is a nice Q&A With Jack Mamais, compliments of Crysis Online

Who are you? What is your job at Crytek? How did you get the job at Crytek? and what does an average days work include?

I’m Jack Mamais, Lead Designer of Crysis. I got the job at Crytek through a friend of mine who was actually interviewed here but decided to stay In the US. (Thanks Jean-Marc!) An average day of work usually consists of getting the latest build of Crysis and playing through it, noting all changes and improvements, lots of meetings and working with various team members to develop Crysis.

1.a) If the Crysis SDK is released before Crysis, what will it allow users to do? Will it have most the models from Crysis? Will it come with some kind of ‘test’ feature so we can test maps or will we have to wait until Crysis is released to do that?

The Crysis SDK, similar to the Far Cry SDK, will allow users to export their models into the Sandbox Editor once it has been released with Crysis and to alter the Game Source code if needed. It also covers all the necessary documentation that is required to get into Crysis modding easily. I’m not certain exactly what assets will ship with it at this time, probably some reference models, enough to get somebody started.

1.b) What are some of the new features in the SDK/Sandbox Editor. What’s changed since the original Sandbox.etc. What can you do with it?

That is a hard question to answer briefly. Let’s just say if you are familiar with our original Sandbox editor, you will feel at home with the Sandbox 2. We have added a ton of features, however, such as a graphical interface that allows users to easily add characters and events to the game, settings to allow time of day, and much, much more.

2) Can you please provide a fairly detailed run down of the Power Struggle multiplayer mode?

Our original multiplayer mode was born out of our desire to create an experience that feels like a single player game. In other words, objective based multiplayer. The game begins with both teams spawning in their barracks. From the beginning, players can access a purchase menu and choose what kinds of weapons and equipment they want to use. Everything costs prestige points to purchase. Players earn prestige points by actions accomplished in the field. For example, if you shoot an enemy you get points. If you repair a vehicle or capture a factory you get points. The bigger the action, the more points you receive. As soon as equipment is chosen, players will be given (by the computer) an objective. Depending on the map, that could be capturing a War Factory or a Naval Factory.

After capturing a factory (usually by finding the main office and holding it against attackers), players will be able to purchase vehicles appropriate to the factory. In this case, the War Factory produces tanks, anti air units, and APCs. The victory conditions for each map will be decided by the server host. He can choose Time based, Score based or Annihilation as the winning conditions. Annihilation means players must destroy the enemies’ headquarters to survive. Only two weapons are capable of this feat: The Tactical Nuke or the Singularity Cannon (Alien Tech). One additional feature we’ve added are crashed Alien Machines around the landscape which, when properly retrieved, allow players to construct some alien weapons (Like the Singularity Cannon).

3) The water in FarCry was quite amazing in its day – I mean it still looks excellent today. Could you explain some of the water technologies included in Crysis?

Not much to comment on this, since we are not final on this subject yet, but be assured that it will be the most advanced water ever in a first person shooter

4) Can you explain the player classes and how they’ll work? Will there even be any specified classes?

There really aren't any classes, per se, in Power Struggle. The player has equipment available from the start and he is able to make up his own class. For instance, if the player purchases a sniper rifle plus a repair kit he is essentially a sniper/engineer. All of our research for elite teams like Delta Force indicated that these individuals are adept at many things so we tried to add this aspect to Crysis. Additionally, there will not be health kits or medics because every player is equipped with the Nano suit which heals in Armor mode.

I’m not going to list our exact equipment list because we are still finalizing some items but it includes a repair welding tool and an electronic lock pick (for stealing enemy vehicles).

Note: Jack Mamais is responsible for coming up with the idea for the Lock Pick.

5) Making movies with video games is becoming very popular, yet many games lack the tools needed to create cinematic movies. What are some of the features being implemented into Crysis which will accommodate ‘movie making’ users?

Crytek released a short machinima a couple of years ago called 'The Project' which was produced using our Sandbox 1 engine. We have included many more tools in Sandbox 2 that make this much easier and enjoyable. All future directors will be very pleased with the results.

6) Could you please tell us your system specs and explain how well Crysis is running on it?

I have an Athlon 3500+ Processor and a Radeon X1900 with 2 gigs of Ram and Crysis runs great on my machine at most settings. The official specs are not final yet, but rest assured it will run on 3 year old computers by the time we release our game.

Note: There is still a lot of optmizations to go, so this really is great news for all pc gamers.

7) All we’ve been hearing about is power struggle. What about the other multiplayer modes. Is there anything that makes them special?

In addition to Power Struggle, Crysis features instant action and team instant action. Players will be able to quickly grab a server and jump in and basically have access to most of the items in the game in a very controlled and exciting map. Similar to Power Struggle, the host will have options that allow him to customize the experience (for instance, he could have an Instant Action level with or without vehicles, for example.)

Comment: Seems like 'Battlefield 2' (aka: Bugfield 2) will have nothing on Crysis.

Natural Disasters is something that is talked about quite a lot, but not many of the details have been explained. What are all the natural disasters that will make it into Crysis?

Weather is one of the final things we are working on but we can confirm that tornadoes and earthquakes will definitely make it in to the game. Tornadoes will move through a scene and lay waste to anything it touches. Additionally, it may even pull smaller objects upside it and fling them away at high speed. Earthquakes will cause landslides and cause many natural obstacles that the player will have to traverse. We probably will not see these kinds of things in the multiplayer for the initial release of Crysis. (Who knows what mod teams will do)

Comment: This game is sounding better and more 'epic' every day.

9) We’ve seen how the jeeps tires can be flattened and even blown off. What other component damage is there on other vehicles? For example, if you crashed a jeep into a tree, would it create a big dint or not?

We’ve tried to add component damage to every vehicle in Crysis. I don’t want to go into finite detail but for the jeep itself we have gas tanks which explode, windows that can be broken, a mounted gun that can be destroyed and tires that blow out. Each vehicle will have similar damage where appropriate (our rubber boats do not have glass for instance). In your example, if you crashed into a tree, it would do some hull damage (which would show as decals) and probably break the front window.

10) Instead of asking a general system requirements question which I’m sure you are all sick of, can you instead explain how the optimization of the game is coming along?

We have a specific team of our brightest engineers working on optimization. They have really just started on the process (although they have been working hard to generally optimize the engine for quite some time) because most of the levels are basically content complete, and that is content optimizations as well.

11) Could you tell us about the graphical customization users will have – will there be as many options as there was in FarCry? As an example, some fans have been worried about the level of motion blur seen in some of the videos. Will the user be able to adjust how exaggerated the motion blur is?

We will allow full customization of their experience either through menu options or console variables. As far as I am aware, we do have enough customization to please any gamer, so everybody will be able to adjust what is important to them. Motion blur can be adjusted or turned off completely.

**gobbly2100** · 01-01-2007, 11:27 PM

12) How powerful are the weapons in Crysis?

We are still right in the middle of the final balancing for the weapons so this is a difficult answer to get precise at this point. Suffice to say we are going for ‘Hollywood Realism”. That is, our damage system would look like it came right out of a movie like HEAT. We want our guns to feel big and powerful but we want the player to have fun with enemies. Headshots will be very hard with anything but a sniper rifle but they are possible if the player is really good.

Grenades will explode in a radius (which is Hollywood) and damage rather than kill all in vicinity. A direct hit with a grenade will probably waste the unlucky person (unless they are in full armor mode in the nanosuit). The rocket launcher will primarily be effective against vehicles and less so against humans (unless you hit them in the exact right spot). Rockets are very effective against the components of vehicles but take longer to destroy the entire hull (unlike BF, for instance).

Comment: The fact that it's hard to get a headshot is great. Certainly better than counter-strike where headshots are more common than body shots.

13) In multiplayer, will there be squads like there are in battlefield 2? What kind of measures have been taken to enhance and encourage teamwork?

Our maps and reinforcement strategy (a clock which ticks down and forces players to spawn together) are the tools for encouraging squads. We are also considering many options with VOIP, but no details can be release as of yet.

14) Can players jump out of air vehicles while they’re in flight? If so, will players be able to open a parachute or something (presuming they’ve bought one)?

Players will be able to jump out of helicopters and VTOLs while in flight. They must have a parachute (either provided for free or available for purchase in barracks) in order to survive the fall. Players can also quick exit vehicles in motion but this usually will not cause harm (unless the driver somehow runs over him!)

15) This question is about camping and other player habits. Will Crysis feature anything to reduce the number of snipers camping in the dense vegetation? In FarCry for example, you had the sniper flare. Bunny hopping is another thing many gamers hate (bunny hoping is were players jump around as they shoot), will there be anything in Crysis to combat that? And last of all, can you provide some details on how you'll combat cheaters.

Again, this is a matter currently under examination but we are planning on making sniper glints or trails to help ID snipers. Also, they will appear on a players’ mini-map after firing. We are trying to prevent stuff like bunny hopping by making the animation required take a little longer to jump and not actually making the player more vulnerable when hopping. In Power Struggle, we like camping, BTW. It is called ‘defending’ and we think this is a valid combat option. Enemy spawn camping will be more difficult in our game because this usually happens in an area protected by auto turrets.

16) This question is about AI. What will happen when you walk up and punch or kill an ally on the carrier? Will they all turn against you? On the same track, what are some of the things the AI will be doing in the background. For example, will jets and things constantly be taking off and landing on the carrier? Will some guys be lighting cigarettes.etc? ( Will they then get cancer and die – Joking

Players will generally not be able to harm friendlies. His weapon will not fire when it is centered over a non-enemy NPC (except in MP, of course). If the player finds some way to bypass this (using grenades, vehicles, etc) the suit will signal a self destruct which will terminate the player. (He is working for the good guys after all). AI will react normally around the player and warn him when he goes into bad places (like, for instance, a flight landing zone). If the player decides he wants to stay there, he will probably be killed by a plane. North Koreans will be smoking cigarettes but they will not get cancer in Crysis.

17) Could you elaborate on all the operatable air vehicles in Crysis? I understand there are VTOLs and a few helicopters (how many exactly?). Will the choppers have mounted weapons? If so, what will they be? And can VTOLs attack or are they for transport only? We’ve also seen in one the screenshots, a helicopter carrying a jeep. Is this possible in multiplayer or not? – if so, how do you do it?

We have one NK helicopter and one US VTOL in Crysis. The Heli and VTOL both have two seats (pilot and gunner). The pilot can fire rockets and forward facing machine guns while the gunner has a movable 50 cal. This is similar to the VTOL but they have different rockets available. VTOL’s can attack and transport troops just like the helicopter. We have some Transport VTOLs that will carry some vehicles in single player but they are not planned for us in Multiplayer.

1 When players are a passenger in a vehicle, are they locked into a specific position or in some cases, can they move around?

We are still working on that aspect but I’m pretty sure you will be locked into a seat when riding as a passenger of any vehicle.

19) Can you give us some interesting scenarios you’ve come across while testing multiplayer?

Let’s see, there are many but I’ll try to remember my favourite. We have been playing MP games everyday for quite a while now and everybody involved is having a ton of fun. My favourite scenario happened late in a game when the other team had managed to capture and hold the main War Factory for the map. I knew I wanted to get into the War Factory to take it from them but I had two fully loaded heavy tanks blocking my way. I grabbed a small civilian boat and used a back river to get me close to the factory and then destroyed the boat. This brought one of the tanks to investigate so then I used my suit speed to sprint behind trees until I reached the base. I then dialled up to full strength, jumped the fence and actually out manuevered the remaining tank. I barely made it into the factory and got under some good cover (I hid under a desk). The enemies were reluctant to come after me but after a while they tired of blasting the entrance with heavy shells so one of them jumped out and came to hunt me down. I took him out, purchased a lockpick and stole his tank from him. I could literally hear him screaming from the next room. It felt like a scripted single player game except it was live and no AI was involved. My team was able to come help me hold the factory after this and, eventually, we blasted their headquarters with our Tactical Tank. It was a blast!

Thanks to Crysis Online for the content