An Interview with Jeremy Dunham - Part 1

Jeremy Dunham of Psyonix talks about design choices, importance of player feedback, DLC, and the most important thing to master in Rocket League.

-Alpha: Thanks for joining us, Jeremy. Firstly, what is your role at Psyonix exactly?

Jeremy: I am the Director of Marketing and Communications here at Psyonix, which means that I head up all of our community stuff, marketing, public relations, things like that. I also do a fair bit of business development and a little bit of design work when and where I can. At Psyonix, you wear a lot of hats!

-Alpha: I've been reading a lot of impressions from other first time players, and it's always overwhelmingly positive. How surprised were you by the fan reaction for Rocket League from new fans?

Jeremy: No doubt, we were surprised.

We always knew that fans of the original game, Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars, enjoyed it, and we knew that it was fun, but the enthusiasm we saw from the two betas far exceeded our expectations. Their positivity fueled our own positivity, and it really pushed us to make the game the best that we could. We didn't want to let anyone down.

-Alpha: You guys had a closed alpha for this game, were there any significant ideas in early development that were dropped or changed, that didn't make it to the final game?

Jeremy: The most well-known features and ideas were probably the "Mutators" and Item crafting. In the original alphas (on PC), we were experimenting a lot with different ideas and those were the two features that were pretty prominent. Ultimately, we decided to move away from Item Crafting because it added a lot extra steps to a game that we wanted people to pick up and play without feeling like they had to invest in a ton of their time to look different. We think it was the right move.

Mutators, on the other hand, did interesting things like change the rules of the game -- Giant Balls, Unlimited Boost, etc. We actually still like the concept, but it needs a lot more work before we would consider officially introducing it into the game. Plus, there's the fact that we want people to understand and have fun with the basic concept of Rocket League before adding a bunch of game-changing modifiers. We'll see where time and demand takes us on that one.

http://i.imgur.com/6qgwqJA....

-Alpha: It's surprising how much bigger Rocket League has become, despite having identical gameplay to Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars. Why do you think Battle-Cars didn't take off as well, and what do you think has made Rocket League so beloved by so many players?

Jeremy: Timing is important in just about everything in life, and the timing for the original Battle-Cars wasn't as favorable to the style of game that it was in 2008. Back then, eSports wasn't really a thing, widespread competitive multiplayer was still only limited to shooters or RTS games at that point, streamers were non-existent and YouTube was still finding its footing. PSN was still fairly early as well and the original games on the platform were often not given the sort of attention by the media that are now. Those are all important factors.

But, it should also be noted that we think Rocket League is a better game than Battle-Cars was. We have tried to improve every aspect of the game that we could -- visually, the physics, the customization, the AI, the season mode, dedicated servers, you name it.

-Alpha: The community has been seeing the potential for Rocket League to become an eSport, as the gameplay feels fun to not only play, but to watch. Is eSports a goal that you guys want to achieve?

Jeremy: Yes, eSports is definitely a goal we want to achieve. We want Rocket League players to feel like they're part of a real sport -- that their talent and passion and dedication means something. We want players to know that when they won it's because they had the skill or the experience or the intelligence to beat their opponent -- it wasn't because of some pre-determined "Best Car" or "Best Item" they used to get ahead. That's the essence of competition in sports and that's the essence of Rocket League.

-Alpha: It’s great that there is no “best item” to unlock and that customization unlocks are purely cosmetic. But how are they rewarded?

Jeremy: We wanted to keep it simple, so after every completed match -- win or lose -- you are rewarded with an item at random that you can then use in the Garage to customize your Battle-Car. It's a simple approach, but our concept on the whole is "complexity through simplicity." On the surface, our game is football -- get the ball in the goal to win. But the more you play, the more you realize how much depth is actually in there. You can jump in addition to ramming the ball with your vehicle. You can double-jump to go higher, you can demolish your opponents to delay them temporarily, you can drive on the walls and ceilings… you can even fly when you understand how to mix your rocket boost with aerials. Customization is the same thing. You get your item for playing but before you know it, you have enough items to change what car you're driving, it's paint color, it's paint type, whether or not it wears a hat, your rocket boost type, your wheels, the list goes on and on.

http://i.imgur.com/4ctEnLK....

-Alpha: How have your most dedicated fans, such as those who played Battle-Cars, reacted and been involved in developing Rocket League?

Jeremy: They have been integral, and that's no joke. We took the many years of feedback that they were giving us and used that as the base of what Rocket League became. What did they want more of? What did they like best? We took all that information and used it as the foundation. We also made sure to have lengthy alphas with experimentation, Q&As with the community, and data analysis. We KNOW that our community culture is rare and we respect their opinions and knowledge when it comes to what makes Rocket League work, and we don't want to mess that up.

-Alpha: What has Psyonix learned from Battle-Cars that was brought forward in developing Rocket League?

Jeremy: There have been different answers for this based on our different stages of development and that's probably because it was an accumulation of knowledge that was the biggest takeaway for us. Moving away from peer-to-peer and getting dedicated servers was important because it makes the game fairer and allows it to be more competitive because of our matchmaking. Our improved physics make it easier to control and means the game feels more intuitive for new players. The customization gives players the ability to do what they want with their vehicle without feeling limited… the list goes on and on.

-Alpha: When did you guys decide to start on a sequel, and what motivated you to do a sequel?

Jeremy: We started collecting feedback for use in a sequel immediately after the release of the first game, but we're actually a pretty busy studio, so Battle-Cars 2 was always looming as we took on other projects to keep our business responsible and thriving. It was only about two years ago that we decided to get really serious about building the game that we had been talking about for so long.

We're glad that it took as long as it did, though. It meant that we were able to publish it ourselves and go in the direction we wanted at the speed we wanted. Without making that choice, it's hard to know how long we could have waited for a publisher to get behind the idea.

http://i.imgur.com/K3rLAWO....

-Alpha: For such a small team, you guys have managed to work hard to include a well-rounded set of features. Can you go over some of the bells and whistles of what players can expect on launch?

Jeremy: We have definitely packed a lot in there. We have added a Garage that allows you to customize 10 different vehicles with 150+ items and more than 10 billion possible combinations. We have a new Season Mode that lets you create a team, head into a sports-like regular season, get to the play-offs and win a championship. We have a pretty cool Replay viewer that lets you import entire games and watch them from anywhere in the stadium so that you can then use something like PlayStation SHAREfactory to create and edit videos, and we have a ton of different ways that you can play the game -- 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, 4v4, plus "Unfair Mode" that lets you go 1v2, 1v3, and 1v4. We have dedicated servers that let you play public or private matches, and we have an excellent physics-based game of "SocCAR" that has 7+ years of refinement packed into it.

We will also have quite an aggressive post-release plan for support -- patches, add-ons, DLC, maps, etc. We have major plans.

-Alpha: Speaking of maps you guys have made it clear that they will remain free for all players. Thank you for deciding to not fracture the fanbase! Maps must actually be difficult to make though. Can you describe the variety of maps you have in the game, in terms of features, and design?

Jeremy: You're welcome! We are glad to do it and hope that other games will take a similar approach in the future. As for difficulty, they are certainly the most time consuming asset we have in the game. Cars, Decals, customization items, and all the other items we can create are nowhere near as complicated as a new map. But, we also know that new maps are the most impactful and interesting addition to the game, outside of a new gameplay feature, that we can make, so we take it very seriously.

Our first maps during launch are all similar in shape and design with some slight size differences, but we are intentionally keeping them analogous so that people can learn the basics of the game effectively. We are also trying to approach Rocket League as though it were a real sport, so we're trying to keep some semblance of "regulation" field types like all major sports have. But, starting with our very first add-on map, which we will talk about in the near future, we are going to start making some slight changes that will become clearer when we talk about them.

At launch, you can expect to see four major arenas -- DFH Stadium, Mannfield, Beckwith Park, and Urban Central (a re-imagining of a favorite arena from the original game) -- that will also have a few variations for some of them, like a midnight pick-up game without as many lights or stormy weather overhead.

Continue to Part 2: http://n4g.com/user/blogpos...

Day 7 | Psyonix