During the latest episode of the Game Informer Show, DICE's Design Director Eric Holmes was interviewed via Skype. Holmes, who is a 20-year old veteran in the industry who previously worked on games such as State of Emergency, Hulk, Prototype, Infinity Blade and Batman: Arkham origins, was asked about his first impressions when joining DICE.
Apparently, the Swedish team is constantly striving to push the envelope in every area regardless of their accomplishments.
DICE is a pretty phenomenal studio in a lot of ways. I think the thing that really impressed me is, they're not really a studio that rests on their laurels. They're very humble as a studio and they're very hard on themselves. I think that's a wonderful quality because that means you're always reaching and aspiring and trying to do better.
Nothing's ever good enough, which is great as a developer because otherwise you might relax. Instead, even the stuff that I think DICE is the best at, they're always pushing to go further. To do better vehicles, to do better firearms, to do better maps. That is where you break new ground, I think.
A good example would be faces. Now, I think DICE does magnificent faces, they work very very hard to make those characters look believable and real.
Holmes worked specifically on Battlefield 1's single player campaign, which received lots of praise when compared to previous Battlefield campaigns. The first level is particularly striking in that the game switches perspective in a battle with no escape, watching soldier by soldier inevitably dying. He revealed a bit more on that level:
That was the last level we finished. We did prototypes for that relatively early. It's game development, you always have more plans than you realize.
That whole section there was, I think, empowered by the fact that we trimmed it down because we did plan for it to be much larger originally. Instead, because of the power of the idea and the fact that it was the beginning of the game so we were relentless in polishing it, it was very concentrated and I think that's what granted it the power. It is compressed down, instead of stretched over half an hour or so. I think you wouldn't have the same emotional reaction if that was the case.
I would definitely agree with him in that the campaign's beginning was better off this way. Battlefield 1 is available now for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One and it will get a classic mode soon, while the Russian Empire has been just confirmed to be added to multiplayer factions in one of the upcoming DLC packs.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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