We learned last year that Gunzilla Games recruited Neill Blomkamp, director of District 9, Elysium and Chappieto play the role of supervisor on his first video game, a next gen shooter under UnrealEngine. It has just been presented this week by a first teaser kinematics, under the name of Off the Grid.
It will bea “Battle Royale Cyberpunk 2.0” where we will shape the gameplay and history. On a dystopian tropical island, we will follow a war between 3 big companies who hire mercenaries to assert their power, in the course of missions of assassination and sabotage. We will embody a customizable character of the faction of our choice, but the way in which we will be able to influence the scenario and the dynamics of the parties remains unclear. Without saying too much, Neill Blomkamp nevertheless exposed his vision of the project at GameSpot.
The approach is to try to deliver the story in a way where players have the option to directly engage in the battle royale or have the option to dive into the story and story missions, almost like a campaign you would play to follow a narrative.
We’re trying to decide the best way to do it [les factions]. But I think the idea of a larger story that’s told from different points of view is definitely a key pillar. And I think one of the really interesting things is creating a situation where you have “mirror missions” where [différentes factions] are against each other. So players can choose missions where your faction can be directly opposed to an opposing faction’s mission, both of which tie into the narrative on a much larger scale. And you do it in an environment where a battle is taking place. So you’re kind of fending off attacks from two different directions and trying to fulfill, if you care, whatever narrative obligations you have.
I think with [le scénariste] Richard Morgan, one of the things that really comes to the surface is this idea of creating an incredibly deep narrative and kind of a story about how this place came to be. So on this island you have sabotage and corporate espionage and things that happen that result in assassins being hired – that’s basically the players that you play – and by doing that you can see how this world of refugees, contractors, mercenaries for hire and elites all create this really interesting bubbling powder keg, conflicts and layers upon layers of characters and stories that you can get into in different ways .
The launch is already planned for 2023 on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X|S. Off The Grid will it be a future reference of next gen shooters online, or will it become yet another failed attempt to shake up the big names in the genre? Case to follow!
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