Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser has given his perspective on why the studio’s open-world spy recreation Agent by no means received off the bottom.
For the uninitiated, Agent was first teased manner again in 2007 and introduced in 2009 as a PS3 unique, and though it was reportedly in improvement at Rockstar North for quite a few years, Rockstar and writer Take Two ultimately went quiet on it, abandoning the trademark fully in 2018. Weirdly, the corporate by no means formally, publicly canceled the sport, and even right this moment, has by no means given a proof or express affirmation that it’s canceled.
Houser left Rockstar in 2020, and so cannot himself present that affirmation, however he did clarify in an interview with Lex Fridman why it, in his phrases, did not work.
“[Those spy films] are very, very frenetic … you gotta go right here and save the world, you gotta go there and cease that particular person being killed, after which save the world,” stated Houser. “And an open world recreation does have moments like that when the story comes collectively, however for giant parts it is lots looser, and also you’re simply hanging out. And also you’re simply doing what you need. I would like freedom, and I need to go over right here and do what I would like, and I need to go over and do what you need.
“And that is why it really works whereas being a legal [in GTA], since you essentially haven’t got anybody telling you what to do. And we tried to create this exterior company by way of these individuals sort of forcing you into the story at instances, however as a spy, that does not actually work, as a result of you need to be in opposition to the clock. So I believe for me, I query in the event you may even make an excellent open world spy recreation.”
Truthfully, though I might nonetheless like to get my fingers on a Rockstar-developed spy recreation, Houser’s reasoning is legitimate. Quite a lot of the very best moments in GTA or Pink Lifeless Redemption are the relaxed minutes and hours in-between motion scenes, and it will be exhausting to ship on the promise of an exhilarating espionage story whereas staying true to Rockstar’s open world roots.
IOI’s Hitman collection, for instance, confines the participant to massive, self contained sandboxes and possibly would not work at multi functional interconnected open world map.
Dan Houser says Rockstar Video games solely tried GTA London as soon as in 26 years as a result of the collection is “a lot about America” that “it would not actually have labored in the identical manner elsewhere”
