[b]
Joe Lewis:[/b] Exactly! And Geometry Wars was a good inspiration, because it is basically Asteroids done in a different way. In much the same way that Geon is basically Pac-Man done in a different way.
At the time when we started developing this, most of the other XBLA developers were doing ports of classic arcade titles, or puzzle games and stuff like that. So the fact that this was originally born on the PSP also made a bit of a difference, really. Plus, we're all big fans of old school arcade gaming, so we wanted to develop an idea that included one of the mechanics out of Pac-Man, but adding in a bit of a sport element, with goals and whatnot. WipEout was also another major influence here - in terms of the feeling of flow, of speed and the colours and high definition psychedelia!
SPOnG: Okay, so the running around a maze bit collecting pellets is the Pac-Man videogame staple here. But what’s new in Geon?
[b]
Joe Lewis:[/b] So, the unique selling point (USP) about the game is that while you are running around collecting pellets, the other player is on the other side of the grid doing the same, and you can attack them through the grid using the various power-ups. Some of the power-ups are aggressive power-ups, such as ‘jump-bash’ which, when you trigger it, causes your cube to jump up and bash the grid and if the other player is within a set radius they take a hit and lose pellets.
Some of the power-ups are more devious, so you can set traps, for example, which cause your opponent to fall into a pit (of despair) when they roll over the trap. Other power-ups are more basic ones, so they might cause you to speed up, or there is ‘obscure’ which causes you to temporarily lose sight of where the other player is on the other side of the grid.
SPOnG:[/b] Can you play two-player on one screen?
Joe Lewis: Yes, two-player and four-player split-screen. As well as up to four players over LIVE.
In single-player mode you have a tutorial to explain the main tactics of the game. You also have duel mode, where you select your character’s emotion and then you play through the levels against an AI character and, if you lose, then you lose access to that emotion and you have to select a new emotion to play with. In ‘time attack’ you are basically playing against the clock to get a faster time on each level. Then there is also a bunch of mini-games that are unlocked as you play through the duel mode.
SPOnG: What are the various multiplayer modes and what do the various character emotions mean?
Dan Marchant: Duel mode, where you are playing against another player and ‘Team Geon’ so you can have two-players versus two-players or ‘Last Man Standing’ which is basically musical chairs. Everyone is playing for themselves, so the last person to score a goal is out and the game starts again until there is a winner.
Geon doesn’t claim to have an immense amount of depth. We wanted to make a pick-up-and-play game, something that you would want to play a few quick games with your mates on. The levels are pretty quick to play – anywhere from two minutes to ten minutes, depending on how brutal it gets!
Joe Lewis: Each level contains eight maps, with the first set of eight maps on the initial level unlocked and subsequent maps becoming unlocked as you play the game. There are forty maps in total, and they get increasingly more complicated – so as you move further through the levels you find moving platforms, loop-the-loops, half-pipes, see-saws, helixes and other stuff to break up the play a little bit.
There are different power-ups on each level, which also depend upon the emotion of the cube that you choose to play with. You can choose from eight different emotions. Depending on which one you choose you get different power-ups – so, for example, Rage uses the ‘jump-bash’ emotion because it is aggressive.
Passion uses the ‘powerslide’ which allows you to slide along in a straight line very quickly. Bliss creates a snake-like trail or stream behind you, which if the other player rolls over causes him to lose pellets. Envy has a vortex, which enables you to suck in pellets from a further distance as your cube moves across the grid. Courage has a shield, handy for use against rage. Fear uses 'obscure', which hides what you are doing from the opponent. Rapture has a speed-up, which is incredibly fast. And Melancholy creates what we call a ‘pit of despair’ – a trap which you leave on a particular square that the player cannot see on the other side of the grid, but when they fall into it they have to bash themselves out of it with the B-button.
SPOnG:[/b] There are a lot of variables. I’m glad it has a tutorial!
Dan Marchant: Ha! See, it sounds complicated when we try to explain it to you, but it’s really very simple. It’s basically ‘pick up, power up and bash the living shit out of the other player!!’
Joe Lewis: It’s basically Pac-Man: collect as many pellets as you can as quick as you can, when you’ve filled up your pellet-collecting-bar you explode into an energy charge and roll up to the edge to flip over to your opponent’s side of the grid and dump them into his goal while avoiding getting nobbled, with the element of racing to be first to score five goals.
Controls-wise, it’s simple. Jump is (X), to execute a power-ball is (A) and to eject a power-ball is (B). You can also use the (Y) button to pull out the camera to view the whole grid and the shoulder-buttons to change the camera view.
Each level has a particular set of enemies which you can unleash on your opponent’s grid by mixing up power-balls, with six different types of enemies – so you have shooters, blockers, asteroids and more. A top tip is to always make sure that you are holding a power-ball, as that gives you a 30 per cent speed boost.
SPOnG: How much will it cost on LIVE?
Dan Marchant: 800 Microsoft Points, so around a fiver in normal money! Let’s have a play through the tutorial and see what you think.
[Half an hour later]
SPOnG: Shall we just have one more go?