Empire at War Interview

 Star Wars Empire at War Interview by Gareth Von Kallenbach

Recently I had the chance to speak with David Silverstein, Assistant Producer at LucasArts about the pending new Star Wars Real Time Strategy Game Empire at War. The game is not only poised to give Star Wars fans the RTS fix they have been waiting for, but also will take the genre into a bold new direction. I want to thank David for taking time away from working on the game to answer our questions.

1) GVK: What is the background and setting of the game? How close does it tie in with events of the film series?

EAW begins at a time when the Rebel Alliance is still fledging but becoming a greater threat to Imperial control and goes through to the end of Episode IV. In the Star Wars timeline, it begins at a few years before the battle of Yavin and ends with the destruction of the first Death Star (or destruction of the Rebel Alliance). The later parts of EAW’s timeline do follow movie events, but leaves the particulars up to the player.

2) GVK: What can you tell the readers about the graphical engine, A.I. and interface for the game and how will it differ from others in the genre?

I think our Lead Artist Gary Cox said it best… Let me try to paraphrase:

Our game engine is brand new and it utilizes the latest graphic hardware capabilities. It's entirely shader driven, which allows us to easily customize visual development while being fully optimized to run on a wide variety of PC hardware. Also, it was important that the interface reflected the art style from the earlier Star Wars movies since the time period of the game is between Episodes III and IV. In regards to functionality, we worked hard to simplify the interface to its minimal form and have the intuitiveness needed between all the game modes.

3) GVK: I am intrigued by having both Space and Ground battles as part of one campaign. I have heard that losses that a player occurs in space will affect the number and type of units they have on the ground. Can you expand upon this please?

Sure, I can expand on that, but first let’s break it down by mode:

- Galactic: When you are playing on the Galactic map in EAW, you have a big-picture view of all the planets in the campaign or scenario that you are currently playing. From this view of the game, you have the ability to build up your land and space forces and expand your control. As you build more space and ground units, you can move them around the galactic map to try and take control of more planets. As you take control of more planets, you receive bonuses, such as the ability to increase the number of units you can support, credit increases to spend on building more units, and planetary bonuses, which give you access to specific units that you can only build as long as you control that planet.

- Space: As you move your space fleets around the galactic map to different planets, you can initiate space combat if the planet you move them to has enemy space units or space stations in their orbit. You must eliminate the enemy presence before you can take control of the space above a given planet.

- Ground: Once you have control of the space above a planet, you can send troops down to a planet and initiate a ground assault and fight for control of the planet itself if there are enemy troops and/or a base present. You must eliminate the enemy forces to take control of a given planet.

Depending on what happens or what you do in one mode, the results will persist into the other modes of play. For example: I won a ground battle but I lost half my troops during the fight. I now gain control of the planet which is reflected in the Galactic map and I only have the troops that I finished the battle with still present in my forces. I can build new units and/or move them wherever I want at this point. Also, during combat if I have an ion cannon at my planet and I'm being attacked in space, I can fire it at ships during the space combat. On the ground, I can call in bombing runs if I have bombers in orbit. There are other ways these modes of play connect as well.

4) GVK: How many units are available and what are some of the weapons and features that will be included? Will there be super weapons?

The Rebels and Imperial have 29 units total on each side. Imperial - 7 Heroes, 8 Ground Units, 10 Space Units Rebel - 8 Heroes, 7 Ground Units, 10 Space Units Both sides can also get Fleet Commanders, Field Commanders, Smugglers and Bounty Hunters.

Units, vehicles and ships come equipped with standard weapons like blasters, turbolasers, ion cannons, missile launchers, proton torpedoes, etc. Also, all units have a unit mode they can switch between that adds an additional layer of strategy to how and when you use the units.

Additionally, players can build ground and space weapons at their bases, like turbolaser towers, ion cannons, hypervelocity guns, magnapulse cannons and even the galaxy’s ultimate weapon… the Death Star.

5) GVK: In games of this type, micromanaging resources as well as units is not only necessary, but often very tricky. How will this be handled in the game?

Well, we do things a little differently in Empire at War. Basically, the acquisition of galactic credits drives the game’s economy. In the Campaign and Galactic Conquest modes, you gain more galactic credits by controlling planets. Each planet provides you with a certain amount of income each galactic day. The more planets you control, the more credits you will receive. You can increase the amount of credits that any planet provides to your economy by building mining facilities on them. You can build as many mining facilities on a planet as it can hold, but every planet has different bonuses, and some planets naturally provide higher income than others. Certain planets also have trade routes between them allowing for additional income, provided you are in control of all of the planets that are connected by a trade route. Lastly, if you control planets that allow you to build cantinas, you can also hire smugglers and send them to steal credits from your enemy’s planets.

In Skirmish mode, your base provides a small amount of income over time. In land Skirmish, this amount can be increased by capturing mining facilities and resource pads on which you can build resource centers. In space Skirmish, you can capture mining asteroids and build asteroid mining facilities on them in order to increase your income.

6) GVK: Will missions be objective based as well as combat influenced or will the victor be the last army left intact? I am guessing weather may be a factor as well.

Missions are mostly what you make of them. For the most part, the player will want to invade and conquer planets, but there are a variety of things the player can do when in combat, and it depends on what you want to do and how you want to do it. You can send a raiding party to a planet and sabotage a building, or liberate the Wookiees on Kashyyyk. Maybe you want to use the Death Star to blow up a planet or just blockade it. How you take over the galaxy is up to you.

Also, there are random missions in the Campaigns and Galactic Conquest scenarios. These missions can involve raiding or liberating a planet, conquering a planet, building certain forces and other surprises that you’ll find as you play through the game.

7) GVK: What sort of graphic engine is the game using and what features does it allow you to include?

I asked Greg Hjelstrom over at Petroglyph this very same question and here is how he put it:

Empire at War uses a custom graphics engine built on Microsoft’s DirectX 9, which Petroglyph dubbed “Alamo.” The engine was designed from the ground up to fully support pixel and vertex shaders, and it uses 3DStudio Max with a custom plugin to generate content for the engine.

8) GVK: Who are some of the characters from the films that will be in the game and will players for example be able to play as Vader and lead the fight? Players don’t actually play “as” a hero in the game, but players can bring their heroes into any battle they wish to have them fighting in. If a player has Vader and wants to use him in battle, they can. The complete unit and hero list is also available on the EAW website: [url]http://www.empireatwar.com[/url]

9) GVK: What forms of multiplayer will be available? There is a multiplayer campaign that is a two player 1v1 match. The game will also have a multiplayer Skirmish mode that is a 2-8 player 1v1 or team game.

10) GVK: What are some of the planets that will be featured in the game? We have over 40 planets in the game, including Yavin, Coruscant, Tatooine, Geonosis, Naboo, Hoth, Endor, Sullust and many more… Check out the EAW website for a complete list of planets.

Thank you Very Much.

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Gareth Von Kallenbach