Technical Innovation and Audio Design

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I'm Trent Custs, co founder and studio director at League of Geeks, and you're listening to the Game Maker's notebook Today I'm chatting with my pal, Greg Laouden, creative director at House Mark, and of their recent title, Saros You'll know them as the finished studio that's been around for basically forever, but of course, they developed the hit returnal too of which Greg also worked on as narrative and cinematics director We start off as we always do, He talks about his first memory and game being doom and being too young for doom essentially, but how that kind of set his brain alight for games. We talk about working in film for many years as a VFX programmer, working with names like Quaron, Miller, and Scott, what he learned from the talented leaders and storytellers that he worked with in film and took with him into games how he found that escape velocity to get himself into games, landing himself at Remedy in Finland, how a VFX programmer landed in level design at Remedy and then became their first narrative designer. before ultimately finding himself at Housemark. t the very start of Rurnal's development We talk about the challenges of Housemark's biggest swing in their more than twenty five year history at that point, how they grounded Return's rogueite loop in narrative and the challenges associated with that and the successes they had Harry Kruger, the director at the time, his important lessons that he had for Greg of moment to moment gameplay and the importance of that at House Mark And then of course, we chat about Saros, the game that's just recently come out. How Housemark built upon Returnal with a brand new IP, and how you make a spiritual successor more approachable what to keep, what to cultivate The team's focus on flow over challenge and how that expands to narrative. And you'll hear a lot about the line that the writing team came up with that ended up being the vision statement for the game and the tagline for the marketing campaign. Of course, we can't talk about Saros without talking about its star, Rahuoli, his incredible performance and Greg's relationship with him and collaborating on the game together. Greg is an incredibly accomplished storyteller, leader. He's worked his way through programming to narrative design, to level design. And now he's a creative director of one of PlayStation's biggest games of the year. And he's incredibly articulate in the way that he thinks about development, about his journey, about leadership and storytelling So without further ado is Greg Louudden, Creative Director of House Mind. Welcome to Game Makerss Notbook, a podcast featuring a series of in depth one on one conversations between game makers providing a thoughtful, intimate perspective on the business and craft of interactive entertainment The Game Maker's notebook is presented by the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences a member driven organization dedicated to the recognition and advancement of interactive entertainment Greg, welcome Ver good to be a trp Really good to be here. Thanks for hanging out. Hey do you prefer Greg or Gregory? I actually never know You can call me Greg Gregory uses the full name, but I'm an A you as well. so lets we can keep it short. Lets keep it short. Yeah, we don't want to blow the podcast out too much, right? got We're on a time schedule here. So hey,'s you know, this is really special, not only because you release this wonderful game Saros, which is absolutely kicking my ass Even though you've put all these wonderful things in there again People like me who need a little bit of help into the game It is kicking my eyes and I'm having a great time with it Do you know that an angel gets their wings every time I manage to get an Australian onto this podcast as well Wow. Yeah, so ye, thank you for that , I'm glad you enjoyiceing young angel out getting their wings But you are in so you're in Finland Yeah, so I'm Australian, but yeah based here in Finland. I've been in Finland for almost thirteen years It was supposed to be two years in Europe. turned out to be thirteen. so time flies and I've been really lucky and I've loved the games I've gotten to work on and all the projects Yeah Australian born in Sydney and u Lucky enough to move around a bit in theah you're in Helsinki Fland now working for Housemark azing A tale as old of time an Australian going abroad for a couple of years and never returning, right? Yeah Pretty standard. Yeah. I seriously thought I was going to be back, but yeah here I am No, it's good to here Awesome. All right, well, let's take it to where we always do on the podcast. I know you're familiar with how we run things around here. So tell me about your first memory in video games. and you know how we like to do it. It's the one that memory that kind of sparked the magic of video games, that joy that fused it into a real special spot somewhere in your mindscape Yeah, I'd say for me like It was actually, like I said, born in Australia, but lived in New York for a bit in London and actually I found video games when I was living in London and they had this computer course where you could go in and you could look at games and I was wayay too young, but I saw doom. And when I saw Doom, everything changed. I was like, this is the coolest thing I've ever seen. I think that just kind of elevated games beyond any other thing for me. It was kind of the fusion of like the heavier music, the kind of the action and this was I think back in the shareware version of Dooms, it was a very early time, but nonetheless, when I saw that game, I was like, I love games. and ever since then it just st meg. Not just this game, I love all games. Yeah, it's done it But seriously it was almost it was like an epiphany of everything where I was I should not have looked at that game or played that game, but it was just so immersive at the time and it really I think brought me to one to made it a passion and ever since then obviously followed all the other Rang of games afterwards, but that was yeah early. early nineties, checking out Doom and just being like, this is the coolest thing ever. And from there just it just created this wave of discovering all these other games and all these other genres and I think That is definitely the spark when I really think about it We did have a My momum had a game boy, she loved playing tetris and stuff, but that never really It didn't really capture me as much, but Doom was was really it felt like discovering like a rock and roll. It just felt like the coolest thing ever. and I think ever since then I've been riding that wave Hell yeah, quQite literally, hell ye. I also love the mum with the Game boy to play Tetris anecdote. It's kind of like the precursor to candy Crush making like billions of dollars. It's like The mum casual gamer was around for many years, like just like whipping out the game boy. My mind was the same Like she didn't have her own, but like we had Tetris and she was on it all the time, like playing on our Color Pokemon Gameboyys's classic image Also, I love the idea of because I have the same experience is I think seeing Doom as a kid when you're too young for Doom is way more affecting because we obviously get a range of peopleeople bringing it up. And know, what's your favorite game? Dooms big one for or not sorry, not favorite game. You're you know, the game you remember or your first memory or something fond And people bring it up on this podcast a lot. and you've got, you know, you your teenagers who played doom or you know, we played it a lot in college or I was in the industry and it blew me away, you know, as another professional in games. But I think really the true strongest doom experience is being a kid that is absolutely not old enough to be playing and really witnessing it for the first time. It's because that was me as well. I remember seeing it at a family friend's house and just being like Oh my Lord. if my mum knew I was playing this right now And she was like ten meters away or something at the dinner table, you know, for the dinner party and it was like contraband, essentially Yeah, but for me it was just going to this computer lab to learn how to use computers more and just seeing this game and just getting lost in it and just I think my older brother was there and he got into command in Conko. so he kind of discovered that and then I was I was purely on the sort of the doom trarain and just ever since then just really just Games became like a real passion for me and just something that I wanted to learn more and more about and just really kind of rew from there. So tell me about kind of how that evolved. It sounds like your family, you know, with the momum who plays Tetris and your older brother and stuff like that. L sounds like video games are kind of a little bit of a family thing as well. How did when you say it became like a bit of an obsession and a bigger part of your life, did you was there kind of And sort of how audo around this time as well? Was it hobbyist development, or was it just more games? And I remember I used to read We didn't have a PC I've said this on the podcast a few times. Wed never a PC that I could like play or mod games on. but I was like reading about game development in N sixty four Gamer and you know, these kind of British mags that we would get in Australia on video games And that was kind of my hobbyist element of like moreore so than just playing games, my enthusiast side. What was a v? Yeah, I'd say it was more it was just I read N sixty four Gamer as well. It was probably similar Aussie News agents and Ed and all these things. So basically And from there, I just discovered more and more games. And I'd say for the longest time it was I never really considered it as being an opportunity as work. I just saw it like Living in Australia you're so far away from so many things. So I viewed it like movies and music and TV, a lot of the TV Gring up in Austalia was obviously there's great Australian televion film And but nonetheless, a lot of the time you're looking upwards, you're looking at British, you're looking at America and you're looking at Canadians. so To me, it just felt like it was just part of development. So I was already at school through then It was just what I'd love to do on weekends, what I' love to do with friends I'd say that it really began to change into maybe this is something I could do for work from reading some of these magazines and reading interviews with people and Maybe it was sort of early early high school then I began to think that, hey, like maybe this is something I could consider doing and I could begin to learn about, but it really, I'd say came into form towards end of high school when I started to do a bit more programming and stuff and then point that's where I started to position myself for university to say, I want to I want to work in games, but from then, from doom, I just basasically played every playlaysttation Lo Nintendo loved Xbox. I had all the consoles and played all the games. I was always just trying to consume and learn from as much as possible Um and just really went from there and kind of went from just a a huge passion, like my biggest hobby was basically playing games during like Oussie Summers pulling down the curtains and just playing so It's quite strange living here in Finland when everyone goes out into the summer all the time and loves it, but I've just spent My formative year is just avoiding that and just playing inside and whenurant to go to the beach. Yeah, and ins. we had wonderful beaches and I'd be like, I'm going to play PlayStation or I'm I'm going to jump into this new game. So it was always I kind of actively just loved games and even though the weather and the environment around me was indicative of going outside and going to the beach with friends, I I just loved love to play games and love to go to cinemas and just get lost in worlds and Yeah, it's really a dream to be able to do this now because it's I spend so much time loving this medium and all these different stories and games and experiences. So that's really where it kind of started. So definitely M more of an enthusiast who just loved everything and I had a really good friend who loved it as well. so we were just trade games, talk about games all the time, spend weekends just playing games. so really was just That was a big part of my life Yeah, I had one of those mates too where it's like, you know, I guess I would say like I kind of was like one of the you know, popular or semi popular kids at school, you know, the cool kids, but like I had this dark secret that I was like a nerd gamer, essentially. And there was one kid that I had some classes with who was actually like really kind of close best friend and we would just, again, talk about games like it was contraband and, you know, really. was it's amazing as well. Back then, you know, when you and I were growing up, it's not the mainstream that it is now, you know, like that's one of the things that really blows me away the industry O obviously it'suge obviously it's mainream blah blah blah But like just the cultural kind of Ubiquity that it has now throughout Almost every generation is really profound in comparison to, you know, when you and I were growing up, for sure. and probably no doubt many other people who were listening to this podcast. Yeah, definitely. But I would say that it was something that really grew. L I felt like I was lucky that I got this experience and a lot of people I could tell caught up that in a lot of ways, I had a head start from a lot of other friends in school and otherwise there I was playing games that they didn't have access to yet or I was able to experience these things and catch up. So Nonetheless, but yeah, to your point, it's wonderful. so many people have discovered it and even flashing to today, I've been really proud that some of my wife's friends have never played a game before. L The first game was returnnal and they loved it and that just blows my mind because it's such a challenging game. but Nonetheless, it's just it's great that so many more people are discovering this like wonderful medium, I think there's So many great experiences, but yeah, no it's u It's been great, but Nonetheless, yeah, I'd say it really started from there. and I think the game that really deaded me and this was in another way was actually G RNsft auto for And this was back when I was at university I started studying computer science and you work with like one of my best friends from Uni. and basically We're in class and they were like the most complex thing you can do with programming is like basically work for a bank thenen the same day I picked up my preordder from the store played GraamF auto for Im like this is the most complex thing you can do. This is like a virtual New York City with all this amazing content and everything. So at that point I was like, this is what I want to do. This is the this is the ultimate challenge. This is where I'd want to take all of my learnings from computer science and I want to work on this medium. This is the most complex. we're building We're building these huge experiences with these games with gameplays. So From that point forward, it was basically Maybe two months into my computer science course, I was like, I want to work in games. and it's took me Maybe from that point another five years to finally, maybe even longer, maybe six years to finally get my foot in the doorweting games, but it was It was kind of this passion that kind of play throughout and then point it was like a it was a clear focus point for me that this is what I'm going to do and I'm going to find a way to get there all the way from Sydney and learning more about all the game development studios and where they are and mostly in Europe and the Americas. some Aussie studios, but nonetheless, it's very Northern hemisphere centric. so heisphere I am in Helsinki, but Yeah, nonetheless, that was the other thing I'd say. so it's They're definitely two things that I'd always be thankful for. We have a mutual close friend our for listeners, our principal engineer Mackie, shout out to Mackiey is very good friends with Greg over here as well. Like you guys went to uni together or something as well? Yeah, yeah, he was in the same class. And I think he at the same point was like, I'm going to do games and I felt the same. so and we both managed to do it. So yeah, really proud of us both because in a lot ofays, everything was stacked against us because there weren't many opportunities in Australia Games was a very hard thing. We were told in every class that this is a very hard thing to do in Australia. like when you say you need to leave in regards to getting a job and making a careare of it Yeah Yeah, of course. Unfortunately there is like a really wonderful indie scing in Australia and there's so many great games even being made today. It's just, I think then it was it was tougher. There was it was the early days endly games. a great history of like, you know, exporting talent overseas and stuff like that, but it's it's u It's not like, you know, you go to the movie cinema and you see Jacob Aaudi and Marga Robbie, and you're like, oh yeah, Australians can be movie stars as well. Like folks like yourself, especially obviously, you're the game director now of you know, a huge first party Playsttation title But even on return, you know, you're kind of like behind the scenes a little bit, right? Like it's game developers aren't this visible thing. It's hard for that representation for us here in Australia to see that no, actually, we do have this wild history of like kind of exporting great talent out of Australia into the northern hemisphere. kind of like an inverse gravitational pull. that's pulling us up there So yeah, it's awesome. And so, you know, we spoke about, you know, you and Macie Go and uni together and you said it took six years to get you know, into games What was kind of happening in those six years? You like, you know, you're coding, you're working somewhere. Did you have other friends working in the industry already? kind of what was that big break that got you into games? And how did you kind of angle the moon landing, so to speak? Yeah, so yeah, went through university. so u I managed to do that and managed to learn a lot about games, I managed to program a bunch of games, did a bunch of game jams. that were really formative for me. If you've not done a game jam before and you want to work in games, it's the ultimate experience because the first one's pretty crushing you You go in there with a lot of dreams and you end with a weekend with a game you probably don't like And then every game at your first game. It is. Yeah, but it's wonderful because you go through everything, you go through all the team dynamics, you go through all the trials and tribulations, all the scoping and everything and it's basically a weekend. So I think that was very formative for me as well to actually have this experience. and I did that with Mackie and We did it twice, the first time. We weren't as happy with the game the second time, we were really happy with the game and we built something we really loved. and just having that experience of going through a production pipeline Obviously dude university projects as well, but actually My journey to Games kind of took a turn where I would say growing up, I loved cinema and I loved television and So actually the way it worked was I I began to volunteer to basically try to get a foot in the door in Sydney and I ended up getting my first step into my career at Animal Logic, which is like an Australian visual effects company. They're now Netflix animation, I believe. So Which they famously made happay feed, right? And I've also worked on the Matrix and House of Flying Daggers, her wre all these amazing movies and I basically, u I heard there was this conference in Sydney that was going to be taking in different game developers and filmmakers They had all people from Lucasts, they had a really amazing amount of people that came through. and at this event there was the CEO of Animal Logic and actually I I voluntered at this event and I got to meet him. He's like, Oh, what's your story? And I said, I've just graduated uni. He said, What uni did you go to? I said UTS, University of Technology Sydney. He's like, Oh, all of our best programmers were from there I'm your next one. Yeah. And he said, wouldould you like a job? And I was like, wow. So I basically It's crazy. So he gave me his business card, I called him up. He said that um Yeah, hey, u You should talk to this person. I called up this person. This person's like, whoo are you? And then in the end, they kept their word, they brought me in for an interview. And I got my foot in the door, but this was working in film visual effects. And this is for the company in Australia that worked on the Matrix At the time, we're working on two Zack Snyder movies Legend of the Guardians, The Ows of Goall and Sucker Punch. Yeah. And basically I managed to get my foot in the door there as a programmer So Obviously it wasn't working in games, but I could see This was also working in entertainment and it was working in An another like art form that I loved. So basically it's closer to working in games than say working at Lasian or something, right hundred percent and that was the thing. I was like, wow, I'll take this. and I loved working in visual effects. So that journey basically took me I think including university, including that it was yeah, it was basically from starting the uni course and understanding I want to work in games. It was these six years and amazing amazing opportunities to learn from university and then From animal loogic, got to work on two movies I'm really proud of and learn how Visual effects is done, got to work in feature animation and got to see how moovies are pieced together through lots of shots and frames and up to see how different film directors worked and how they worked with teams, how VFX supervisors, how seniors, principals how they do simulations. so From that experience, I managed to get my foot in the door at the next company in Australia, I worked for Dr. D, which was George Miller's Animation stududio. he wanted to have his own wet up So basically he started it and we were working on Happy Feet too So we're for those who know just for our listeners. George Miller. Dr. George Miller is the famed Australian, Absolute National Pide director of Happy fate But also Mad Max Saga and a bunch of things suuper talented. incredible creative. Yeahah. And also famously loves video games. He does and he's a he's a lovely person so was lucky enough to have a few interactions with him. he was a really nice Re wonderful and the studio there was amazing. likeike they really They got to build exactly the film they wanted they had to full. Mocaap stage there. they had dancers, choreographers, obviously happy this dancing penguins, so I've worked on twoight two bird movies. I worked on Legend of the Guardians and now happay Fig two, so So hold on for a second. A you were you part of this Al Featherek for Guardians of Gahul. was that? did you have a part in that That was next next door to where I was sitting. so I was in a. So bas that would be the whole rest of the podcast. I hope, you know, if like you were the brain the brainiact behind that Al fe I was I was not No, there was there was very smart people, but I was so there was a room of maybe thirty, forty people and I was in the room next to them. so it was basically I could see their stuff and I was blown away. and still some friends they've I still catch up with them. they did that, but basically from Hay Feet too, so I went from FX, got to support an animation team, got to learn got to work with a lot of really wonderful animators, even animators who started in traditional hand drawn animation and were moving to three D, it was really special to see these people that would like draw their stuff and then they'd have I'd have to help them occasionally to do it. It was just a wonderful experience and from that I always wanted to work in science fiction and a few of the people I worked with, they saw I was talented and They basically recommended me to move to London And they said in London, there's a lot of the amazing film visual effectses there It's where a lot of the bigger science fiction was And basically for me being a huge science fiction fan, I got to work on the dream project, which was at the time untitled Alien project, which was Prometheus So basically Yeah, it's craz razy So basically from Sydney moved to London got to work on Prometheus and got to see it all before everyone else and got to see all the Ridleyrams, all the drawings he did. W gone Ridley Grams? Ridy Grams, the way he kind of draws his storybards like these little these kind of amazing images he's done. Yeah, it was I I once saw this guy talk. He was the founder of a VFX studio called third floor, I think it was because they were like the third floor at the garage and um He once showed me well showed us, it was like a room of like twenty people that he was presented to, not me personally. he showed us these napkins Um George Lucas had given him one day that was the Camino cloning facility scene because Lucas had lunch with Spielberg and was like, Ohh, I'm blocked on this scene. I don't know how to do it. And Spielberg was like talking it through and drew out storyboards on napkins. And so basically like Spielberg Grams essentially came and just dumped these napkins out of his pockets onto his desk and he laid them out and he's like, that's the kamino thing. and then he had to put it together via previous 's really cool. Sing how these really masterful storytellers are at times incredibly efficient and effective visual communicators as well Yeah, one hundred percent. So Yeah, but similarly Like I said, these amazing storytellers and they how they work and being a fan of these films growing up, it was just amazing to get to loving Mad Max and loving Watchman and three hundred the movies and then loving Blade Runner and Alien and Black hooked downown, all these movies and getting to see how these people work in a sense and learn from them and listen and work in a very small part of India kind of, but nonetheless get to see it all And then from there, I was lucky enough to work on World War Z and got to do crowd simulations, the kind of the zombie pyramid stuff and a lot of other things. It was amazing. The team The people I got to work with were phenomenal. and really humble and welcoming and really great people. I've been so lucky across all of my experience and that goes into games as well, but I'll F fast forward 'cause w want to talk to you about games, but basically take it. We accept all forms of creativity here We don't discriminate. Yeah. But nonetheless after that, I heard in London there was another science fiction movie being madeamed and there wass a huge film fan I loved Children of Men by Alfonzso Guaron and gravity was being made. So I got to work on gravity as well So I had the interview and It was a really I think a special interview that I hk to tell the story that basically Alexis who interviewed me, he said there's there's one two thousand one There's one matrix, there's one avatar There's one gravity. If you say no to this job The door is closed. If you come, you need to give everything. And I gave everything, and I worked on that previe and it was phenomenal. And it was another thing working with an amazing storyteller and After working on this project, I kind of I realized I'd worked on so many amazing things and my career grew so quickly in film that I had a chance to consider something else. And that's where all of this passion that started back in a computer lab in London and back in UTS at UnI, I was like, I want to do games. It's I'm going try gamy now, right? to like switch tra routes. I had the opportunity. had I had a career in something and I worked on projects that I knew would keep me going forward, and I'm like, I'm in Europe There's studios here. I want to do games and that's where On a weekend, after working on gravity, I basically played Alum Waite's Aican Nightmare. I loved it I was like I always loved remedy, I loved Max pain. I looked up their website. They said they're in Finland and they love to drink coffee and they love snow. I don't drink coffee. I did not know much about snow. Nonetheless, I scrolled down and they had a role called the Level Designer, where you take a script and turn it into an experience. I said, that sounds amazing I clicked apply and then the following Monday, I got an email saying, Hey U You seem really great, wouldould you be interested in having a video call? had a video call, eventually, they flew me out to Helsinki and the rest is history and Here I am and that was my That was the journey g Yeah, so basically now you know if this was a dinner party conversation, it would be insufferable with the amount of name drops that you just h them. But this is a podcast. It's your time to do that. And how impressive, Dude That's crazy. Like in the pinch me moments too, man. it must have been wild like sitting there in Alfonso is talking to you about some shot and you're just like, what is happening It was wild. And I think in a lot of ways it was it was also these VFX supervisors and everyone the talent of people that worked on these projects was phenomenal. And also as you said, just the way that these storytellers they communicated and The way they could show it all. it was It was tremendous and I'm so grateful. and I love I still love visual effects. It really Yeah, it opened my mind to a lot of things, but I'm so In a way, I think when I came into games, I felt like a whole other world opened up where as soon as I joined rememedy, I realized we're not just doing visuals here. We're doing sound, we're doing story, we're doing everything. opportunity that just blew the bows out of everything. so as much as I loved my opportunities in film are just games felt like everything I wanted it to be. and that's why I'm still here and that's That's why I love games so much is the I think the profound opportunity we have to create amazing worlds and amazing experiences and gameplay But no, it's it's It's been crazy I st like. I could not see it coming. I could see it coming from Uni or anything. Just back to back all these experiences I was like, this is This is wild and I'd say it continued into games and continues today where I'm really humbled to be part of like PlayStation and get to collaborate and meet with other creators from PlayStation of people's games that I've loved S something I tell young developers, you know, when they ask for advice or something on like, o, you know, how do I, you know, move forward in my career I'm stuck in this part of it or whatever? And somethingomething I've noticed in my career and watching that of others is you know It's kind of a cycle between talk the talk and walk the walk, right? You know? L a lot of the time you'll get hired on some, you know, like you say you talk to you just walk up and start talking to the CEO of Animalologic or whatever. But then you're given the opportunity based off that kind of talk the talk. And it might be sometimes other people talking about you or some reference U And then you have to walk the walk And so many people miss that opportunity, you know, like to really impress and just actually put their face to the grindstone and have the grit to deliver and it many times, you know over deelliver. So I think look looking at it from the outside too know and seeing as many careers as I've seen and spoken the amount of people I've spoken to on this podcast. Greg, I think the obvious pattern here is like, every opportunity that you've gone through it delivered more opportunities, which says probably speaks more to your application to these jobs, right and these opportunities itself. It's not just like, oh my god, I've got this job and then you're out and you're telling everyone about it but not actually lifting your weight up the team. I'm sure these very talented people that you speak highly of would be speaking of you the same. In fact, I know a couple who do. so Yeah, no you need to your point, its it's one thing to get the opportunity. It's another thing to deliver and partarticularly it's always You need need to do to your point you need to walk the walk and it's earned and it's a lot of hard work. It sounds very easy in hindsight. It just sounds like going through an experience, but Every project was tough in different ways and every project demanded different things and Everys impossible right? medium. Yeah, yeah. but in the end, it's just with experience, you realize it's just D by day, bit by bit, and in the end you build something special. And I think the similarity between all of these amazing storytellers, whether it's a wonderful people I've gotone into work with in games or back into film or even people at Uni, as you said, it's tenacity and grit that you You have to push through. Even in Uni, like the programming course I was in it just had high attrition. Every year it was half. It was four hundred people, two hundred people, one hundred people, fifty people, twenty five people And I had to go through that. so It's I think the whole time, it's it's not a it's not a cakewalk. It's it's a lot of work, but I think the similarity between it all is I love what I do and I love the opportunity I knew it was like a Yeah, and I think it's a responsibility. being a fan of games, I always wanted to play new things, bold things and I wanted to be challenged and pushed and I think that's where I've taken that responsibility as a game developer that have the lucky enough to do this so should should help push the medium every every game and to try to make B and better experiences for players. I remember talking to the freehold guys on this podcast, you know that made Caves of Cart and they spent seventeen years developing that video game. I can't remember which one set it When I asked him, how do you how do you How do you spend seventy years making a video game? Obviously we all know how it can happen, but like How do you actually execute on that, right? You know, that's amazing And they said, you just need to have something that every day, you're motivated to spend thirty minutes at the computer, you know, like that you love it that much. And I think it's so true. I remember when I got into games and my dad was kind of bragging about it to people. He's very proud of me. And one day he said to me, is this is what you did right? Am I getting it right? You know becausecause' chatting to his made he's like telling me about it. And it was the first time I'd actually stopped and thought about all the things that I did to get into video games and kind of how hard I worked becausecause I was just so energized by it and so focused on it and so committed and you know, had the energy of what like a nineteen year old or something Um, that I just completely didn't notice all of the work that I was doing or putting in or you know, you get to the other end and you're like, oh, I'm here. Um, but it's the it's the love of the game, I guess that you know. intended the love of the game that kind of keeps you through it hundred percent, but now I've been yeah, super Super lucky, but in the end here all Pul earned and reallyally proud of everything I've gotten to take part of, but yeah, it was wasn't easy, but very rewarding. I think it's And similarity across everything Before we fly into games now because we're about to take a we're going about to leave this section of your life and go into you, starting a remedy and stuff like that M. I'm really keen to hear what it was from working in this, you know, this art form in film these incredible storytles and I'm not just talking about the obvious ones, like, you know, Miller and Ridley and You know the others U But you know, just the people around you and you said you worked with a bunch of principles and leads and stuff What were some of the things like some of the hallmarks of, I think, what you would call your own leadership style now or princiables of what you think makes a great creative or a great director or something like that that you learn through osmosis or explicit moments with these people. Do you have anything that comes to mind through that from that time in your life. Yeah, yeah, definitely. I'd say Number one is like a resound passion for quality All of these people, they would put so much attention to detail and And I think even early in my career I wouldd asked, why why are we going so far with this stuff in their life becausecause the audience deserves it, because we're trying to create something that's timeless. like peopleople notice quality and I've tried to bring that forward into games and I hope people feel it when they play Saros and Returnal and all the games have been part of is there is this resound passion for quality so that way When people experience it, even if they can't see all the detail you put in, they feel it. It's kind of there's those I think it was just a Across whether it's a director or an artist or a junior, everyone was just putting so much attention to detail into the craft work that I think it adds like a resolute sense of quality and timelessness to it all. I think the other thing was communication. I think that was a really big thing. The best leaders and I think the storytellers to your point, they sketch on napkins, they They use anything and everything to communicate their vision. and they use all different techniques in order to share it. And that's also whether it's a lead or another artist The ingenuity of some of the people I worked with even in lower levels of how they'd preanimate, prove his, prove their work, prove their simulations. it was really, really special then I think the third thing was I think it's one thing to have a vision. that's another thing to adapt your vision. So I think U The best people I worked with, they'd always have a goal of what they wanted to do, but they werere willing to change that goal if there was a better idea. So the best idea is there may be a sketch from someone that's wonderful If there's something better, they'll pivot and I'll not let ego or anything get in the way of it. They'll just say, this is the best for the audience. This is best for the player. And go that way. So yeah, I think quality communication and then B a ler that listens. I think we're the really big things. and I had moments in my career where I've seen stuff that's the opposite where there's not good communication You're not listening to the best idea. and obviously the quality isn't there. And I think in the end the game. fails and also I think you fail the audience as well. So I'd say they're the big things that I've really taken to heart and considered and tried to bring forward into my working games and share them because yeah, it's really I think in so many ways, it's about communication, but communication is a two way street. You need to listen. And if you can do that and you can deliver high quality, I think you'll build the best thing for players Yeah, I had a partner many years ago who introduced me to like a woman who became my communications mentor And she once said to me, The greatest gift you can ever give anyone is your attention And my partner at the time had been working with her for a number of years. She run her own business and everything as well And I that partner had a particular superpower for like making people feel like the most important person in the room And when my communications mentor, who'd worked with her as well, said this, I realized that that was actually the superpower. And so I started You know, someone who's generally, I can be quite monkey minded sometimes. I started just trying to make it a proper effort towards ively listening all the time to people because it's not something that most people do, like being very present with people that you talk to, whether it's bump into them a conference or a friend or someone on your team or whatever and like the impact was immediate and profound to the point where I just like completely integrated it and now I kind of do it seamlessly and it's become one of the hallmarks of my leadership that people talk about all the time. L And it's very clear, especially in a creative vocational setting, you know, that's high pressure where people care a lot about the product that you're making, the experience that you're making, especially like just giving someone your absolute attention and being completely present with them and actively listening It's not well's it can be hard to do. If you're you know, monkey mind, it can be hard to get yourself into that habit. But once you've learned that reflexively m it's just immensely impactful on your team and your peers and your working relationship with everyone. it's huge. Areed agreed. I think active listening is it's definitely, I think it's It's needative, particularly when you work on bigger and bigger projects because you have so many people that want to contribute. and if you don't listen, you you may miss out on one of the best ideas for the game and players. so you need to need to know where you're going, but also need to stay open to the. the team and the feedback. So yeah, theyd be the three things, but it's been u Yeah, so many smart people and like wonderful people that really I feel I am where I am now because I got to work with these people and got to learn from them and they supported me and I did my best to support them Yeah, what's the quote I've seen father before I stand on the shoulders of giants, right? It's like Yeah no, one hundred percent. That's how I feel. And it goes into games as well. L from my experience working in games I got to work with amazing people and even being part of the Finnish development scene, like working for House Markets, the oldest studio 's worked with PlayStation since two thousand six so twenty years this year. So it's been Getting to work with these amazing people that have done so much and I'm lucky enough to be to be where I am now working with them and taking that Legacy forwards. it's Definitely What a segue, Greg. Let's do it. Tell us about rolling into remedy because I think it's worth putting a point on this too for those of you who haven't picked up on it in what Greg's saying Greg was a programmer who then went into VFX and you know, working in storytelling and VFX and stuff. and now you've applied for a level design role in a different medium as well. obbviously the place where you want to be, Tell us about, you know, any kind of culture shock. You're also moving to Finland as well, right? Like tellell us about getting into games, getting into Finland and into remedy at such a histored and you respected studio Yeah, so u go back to it a bit. like I loved all these games growing up, but one thing I loved as well, particularly was Nordic games. so A bit like how you go on I always lo going on IMDB and I love going on Moby games and kind of looking at all the different where the studios are, whoo are the people? whereere are they from I started to notice a trend that a lot of games I loved were Nordic. There were games from Finland, from Sweden, from Denmark, In particular, there were these three regions that were creating these games that I loved. I loved Io Interactive, I loved Kanan Lynch and Hitman, I loved Max Payne, Allan W deep cut I loved Chronicles of Riddick and the Darkness. I love these Nordic sort of cinematic U It kind of felt like games really inspired by like seventy cinema and this type of aesthetic. so That's why Remedy was on the map to me was I lo I love these games that theyve worked on. and At point it was also clear to rememedy that I applied for a role that I wasn' didn't necessarily have all the experience for. os once again to like, I think Yando, who was my lead at the time, he actually He gave me the opportunity. He said that Back then for rememedy, they were looking at how do they do something that's next gen? and this was for quantum break. It was after Alan Wake and it was before It was announced, of course and everything, but they viewed visual effects as being a way to kind of deliver something new for players. And because of my experience, basically, they said We'll see how you doing in this, but you can basically be a VFX level designer, which basically meant I did visual effects and then it'd maybe give me a chance to do it. And in the end I I worked on this scene, which was a ship crashing into a bridge for quantum brereak. It was kind of at like the Xbox I think it was the Xox One reveal And basically it was huge. Yeah Yeah, yeah, ye because it kind of worked on that stuff. and and from there managed to And being such a fan and just understanding and seeing what remedy was that it wasn't just working on a visual effects, it was everything. It felt like closer to working in feature animation that I had experience with before, whereas visual effects on Live action was very specific and very specialized. This was much broader And from there, I started to work on level design and I started to got to work with a lot of amazing people at Remedy and got to work closer and closer with Sam Llake and got to learn how he worked. And basically at that point U peopleeople started to notice that I cared a lot about story and some of the other level designers just cared about combat and they cared about level flows and They could see I was more holistic And at that point, they said What do you think about finding someone else to do visual effects and youre just working on the story levels for the game? So you can kind of work on these experiences and I said Hell yeah, I'd love to do that. you're like Oh tws my arm. Yeah. No but but it felt like it felt like a new a new thing to learn and I basically started to do that. and and basically worked on the opening of the game and From that experience became what was Remedy's first narrative design So basically the bridge between level design and the story team, which is traditionally more kind of wriders and then there was level designers and And basically tried to tried to hedge the gap between there. so And yeah, just love the opportunity roll for a studio that's so known for their narrative as well, right? It's like, okay Yeah, you're out the story buddy. Let's go. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, but they once again, to your point had to walk the walk. It wasn't just luck, it was You seem to be good at this, you care about this We trust you with this. It was And trust is trust is owned, not given. So in the end, I think there was that type of journey of it all, but basically yeah, I got to work on g and got to learn from a lot of amazing people on the project and still a lot of friends here in Finland today and a huge fan of Remedy on their games. So nonetheless basically worked on that project, got to u got to work on all the different scripting and how we told the story and got to do a lot of reviews and basically work across the full project in a lot of ways and to And at that point, We continued on to the early days of control Th then I got to start on that project Um, By that point it was actually and I'll give you a shout out. I started to see the indie scene and I listened to, I think it was you at the GCP, you were kind of giving talks about like creating games that are critically, commercially and culturally successful. That's me the three ses Yeah it on my forehead. Yeah, that's it. Yeah, yeah. basically at that point I was like, wow, I have all this experience and I'm really inspired by the indie scene that I'd love to an indie game. at that point I was still a narrative designer and I kind of felt like I had all this experience. I felt like I could try to build my own game. I could take all my experience from university, from visual effects and I actually started my own little Aussie independent games company. and I think that's when I first started to to you and otherwise about it. Yeah. ye, exactly. so ended up leaving Remedy that was very tough and took my savings and built my own little indie game company and built two games that I'm crazy proud of, Stone and Burn these two very story driven character studies that really go into two different characters and who they are and one of them is incredibly Australian It's like you play it's like In, right? Yeah, it's a koala. It's inspired by like Thomas Pinchin and Charles Purkowski. It's like this Bically quuite twisted, dark story game and 's not he's not a well behaved koala, let's say that. No, no, it's very, very mature. It was basically me wanting to kind of explore what you could do in games outside of the traditional mechanics. both games didn't have any violence. they were purely just story and One of them was more interactive, one of them more of a visual novel reallyally proud of the games, but they weren't the most commercial projects. And I think at that point, I realized that I was still here in Finland at the time I was here with my now wife and decided that I wanted to try. I wanted to try Working on your own and doing this, I realized that I wanted to do something with a team again I missed all the experience from Uni and I missed all the experience from film and from remedy and at that point I was lucky enough that I saw Housemark was hiring. and The new chapter began where basically I joined Housemark and I really I loved Rezo Gun and I love so many housemart games. and And basically got the opportunity from Harry Kruger, the game director of Rurnnal to join him and with him on returnal And it was just phenomenal. It was such a special project. and I learnt so much from Harry and Housemark. I think a love Remedy Yeah, I learn't so much about I'd say storytelling and production value and Um and just how to make great levels that flow at Remedy. But I'd say from House Mark, I really learnnt about the second to second gameplay and the manager of House Mark is Gameplay first, and that's where I've been championing now in my role, but just It really opened my eyes and changed me. and I'd even say the type of games I play and who I am as a gamer like howousemart really opened my mind to Arcade sensibility is gameplay first and all these different aspects. So U and Harry kind of pitched reteturnnal to me in this interview that we had. And I thought it was sounded really great, but I also felt like I't It was clear how smmart did not have the expertise in order to kind of pull off this type of experience yet and I basically said I'd be happy to join I joined and then got the amazing experience of working with PlayStation and had the support of PlayStation, had the vision that Harry built and worked on the vision with him together and we delivered reteturnal. and I got to bring all my experience from film visual effects from working at Remedy notot underestimate my experience for being an indie developer going from zero to shiing game. up multiple platforms and everything. so I had all that experience and I brought it to Housemark and I think yeah, the rest is history from there from returnnal to now Saros and yeah it's been quite a ite Yeah The Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences is excited to announce our upcoming DIice Athens confonerence, hosted at the Athens Marriott Hotel on september twenty first j twenty third This three day executive retreat will provide attendees with a one of a kind experience, featuring unforgettable networking events and thought provoking programming about the business and craft of games. Early bird pricing ends on august third. Gamemakers's notbook listeners can use the code Dice Athens one eight seven for an exclusive ten percent discount Register now before tickets sell out at dice Europe. org Game Maker's skketchbook, a celebration of artistry and interactive entertainment is backed with official game art selections for its fifth annual showcase. The selected artwork includes games like Pragmata Kingdom come deelliverance too Absalom Borderlands four, and many more You can preorder the high quality prints through the IM eight bit store until june twenty fifth. Every purchase directly supports nonprofit initiatives led by Day of the Devs and the AIAS Foundation View the winners and secure your prints at Game Maker Setchbooks All right, well let let's h on return a little bit because I mean Obviously PlayStation has some die hard fans, right? you know in the gaming community But returnal is like a special one as well. Oviously like huge success critically, commercially, but culturally as well. likeike it's this, it almost feels like this like deep cut first party game as well. Like it's just so gameplay forward as you say, it's dark. It's it was kind of like the dark horse, you know, that like came up and you know, nominated for Game of the Ye, right? Like It's at the Dice Awards, you know, it's just incredible. like what's what it's what it's achieved. So tell me a little bit about your journey with returnal. And when you came in, where was it kind of at? Was it still in kind of concept phases or pre production Yeah, so when I joined it was in pre production, We had the We had roughly the beginning and the end of the game It was super ambitious. We had the gameplay prototype and the thing that struck me and I think a really important thing from Housemark and I In my role I really dried into everyone to protect is the game was fun Like from the prototype it was like, this is amazing. Straight away from tight Right away. it was just like, this is amazing. That was like a good Yeah. So joining I was like, okay, so this is this is already in a very good place. And my role was I was the narrative director and cinematic director. so I had to lookook into all the storytelling and focus on that, but I knew the game was good. and I knew that that was sorted, but The story wise, we did not have who the character was, we did not have the casting, we did not have the full story sketched out. We did not have how the story was told, We didn't know how we were going to do cinematics. We didn't know how we were going to do the howouse sequences. It was just It was like an idea map of things. and then for me it was executing. So how do we bring this vision together? and how do I team up with Harry and how do I pull pull ideas from him and contribute ideas and come up with the best game we can. but Soo your point, I think, the thing that I loved working with Harry and chatting about it and we've brought Thord. brought forward into Saros is the idea that we want to push the medium was We felt the responsibility of being like a PlayStation five, kind of launch window title and helping to define what the future of games can be and we wanted it to be Gameplay first, as you said, dark, mysterious and haunting. We wanted amazing gameplay. We wanted to not compromise on Iither. We were going to do a story that hadn't been told before with've gameplay, you haven't played before And we just wanted to push in all aspects. And it was incredibly ambitious. and I Remember after the interview, I went home and I told my wife, Wow, this game is going to be amazing or it's going to be and it's going to be incredibly tough to build. It's like it was I saw it. I knew it from the experience, but I I love challenge and I love the vision and We aligned on a lot of the same sensibilities in terms of the films we were talking about and the games we were talking about and our aspirations for Housemark and And from there it was just it was yeah, I'd say the first Ram project. And then after that, I'd say it continued with Saros into what we built from there. But yeah, it was roion and it was just a matter of pulling all the assets together and working with an amazing team there. And it was a very small team as well. I think when I joined House Mark it was forty, forty people? Well, this is the the game that we' building I to say, right? is like this was I think you said it in, you know the realization even in your interview, like this was a huge swing for Housemark. And I mean, Housemark wasn't like some small player, you know, like they'd been around as you say the sort of finished studio, you know, Larry and Harry found it many years ago and had some great names to Great games to its name. obbviously like much loved but This was like a big next step. Yeah, it was it was huge and um Kos to PlayStation, they loved the vision and they loved. they knew I knew that Housemark could deliver amazing games. I played When I played Rzo Gun, I was like, this is amazing. And I think the thing that really glwed my mind was playing that prototype and thinking of Rzo Gun and being like, if we could add a really compelling special story on top of this, this game would be unstoppable. It would just be It would be incredible. and I think after my experience of being an indie and working more solo for a long time and wanting to work with a team and just seeing the dynamics. I just and also my experience from remedy and visual effects, I was like, let's go. And from there it was just bit by bit, day by day, building the game, building division findinding who Celine was, even pulling the name Celinee out of Harry. Harry's actually he's a He's Australian. We have Greek heritage, so We kind of chatted to him about and I pulled it out of him and kind of actually really went into that with him saying that I think this is a special thing to explore Basilian Vasos and found out who she was and then found the middle of the game and found out the idea of her finding herself in the world and the idea of How can we tell a story with not the biggest team and really using the constraints to think about it and there was an original idea to have multiple characters and I told Harry, let's just do one character very well. It's really difficult. We'll just try to do oneis, you know And for sure a way for you to be able to then branch out with Saros, right? It's like one hundred percent. You know as a studio too, you swing for something that's so ambitious, like just focusing everything on Zelinee is huge. And especially you know the genre as well doesn't take kindly to narrative anyway as well. It's like I think that's one of Returnal's greatest achievements is like You know, obviously Super Giants had some success with it as well, some success. But you know, like Rpp to really u What's the word for it like cohesive narrative that doesn't fall into that, you know Excuse me for a moment, but that kind of loudo narrative dissonance of where the gameplays completely disconnected, but the narrative helps ground that loop, you know, that you get in a roogueelide experience Tell us a little bit about that and about how you and Harry kind of approached, you know rounding this rogueite loop in narrative Yeah, so there was there was Harry and I. there was also Luke and Heavy. they kind of worked of us on the story as well, but it it started, I'd say it really started from the And then once we have the character, we We went more deeply into like we kind of had the beginning and the end and I went swlden for people that haven't played it yet, but we had a very clear idea about the kind of the origin and the destination and we had the character and it was about plotdting her along this journey and then figuring out how we could tell the story. And the big thing that became very clear to me was we needed to protect how smart game playay. We needed to knock it in the way. How smart games were about flow you could say they're about challenge, but in the end, they're really about getting lost in the gameplay and the music and the experience and It really hard phrase of how you use bullet ballet, is it Ballet Yeahah, exactly, exactly. it's so true. It's it feels it, you know, that's what it's thispl playing. Yeah. Yeah, it's this dance that you really get lost in and it's the same for Eternal, but knew we had to protect that. And then in terms of grounding, it was this idea of Um, And I'd say Kudos to Harry and like the team early on, they had this even had this vision of like the idea of the loop that she's in a loop and she keeps going out of it. So there was this grounding of the of the story that was there, but how it was told, where it went and everything, that was really developed There was also the rough idea of having these story sequences that took place in their home, but with very little It was just like a sketch and then from there, how can we do this? and It really just evolved in the deepest way and The moment when we had the middle and we had the character of Celine, like we knew that and Celine would get off the planet, but she really couldn't leave. At that point when we had it, we knew, I think we had something special and it was just the nature of just Date by dayate. I think when we put in the first audio log in the game, that also felt like the story really connected. but too your point, the cohesiveness of the vision that just I think that's what happens when you have a good vision. It goes back to listening to Harry and the team that they were listening to people like Luke, Eveie and I that we could all contribute into this game and bit by bit it just became better and better and better and leveled up And I'd even say actually the The middle twist idea came from our art director. He just kind of threw out an idea, but what if this happened? I was like, this is amazing. And we took it so ideas Yeah. Yeah. And then it was, how do we do this? We don't really have the We don't really have the budget, and it was just, well, what if we do a montage? and how can we show someone's life in thirty seconds and just experience it and How could we put you in the shoes of Selenine in a very intimate and personal space. It's like, let's use first person. so it was just It was just, I think that's the great thing if you have a strong vision and a great team. And I think that's been the strength of remedy and the strength of house markery was we have amazing people that work on the game and they all just contribute and level up the experience. So I think to your question, it was just an evolution day by day that kept getting better. and it's the same for Saros where It just There's the vision you set out on and the game you build and they can be inspired by the vision. But in the end, it's a huge teamwork that you really push through and then You have a captain who's basically steering if it's the right direction or the wrong direction. and if the direction's right, you just keep building on it. And in the end you get a game like returnal. And yeah, so proud of it. so proud of the team because it was to your point, a big swing and a big jump that We pulled it off and we built a game where super proud of Do you have any moments where, you know, irect you went down some kind of dead ends, you know, whether it's like, you know, how you made the story like I can imagine you're designing some kindort of narrative experience in this way and then you're like, oh, it's not really coming together or the players aren't ggaging with it. or even if it's just gameplay related, any kind of like really significant dead ends that you went down that you kind of had to walk back or anything through the game? I'd say with returnal like something that after working in linear storytelling So all these other games, I learearning how to tell a story within the sort of the rogue setup was It was difficult and it actually just took me to really get back to what games are best at, which is being interactive. so We tried to plot it in a more linear way and actually it's the same in Saros that There are these gates that you get through based on challenge and reward. If you can overcome the boss, you get a bit further. but actuallyually the story in between is old different for every player. So the fact in returnal that when you play some players will get a log within the first hour. someome players will get it within three hours. It's basically everyone gets a different narrative that they're piecing together and At first as a storyteller, I was like, I didn't want to lose that control because you can greatite stories so much, but actually letting go and watching the sparks fly, it was really special to even see things that were unintended that were just emergent storytelling. So I think A lot of ways both for Returnal and Saros so maybe viewed in the way actually they're consumed that they're incredibly You really piece it together because you're getting the story in different ways and different moments. like it's very optional. You can choose to go into the house. When you go into the house is going to change your experience with the story because you may have may not had that log or you may have had this There are general trends that players follow, but No experience is actually similar because everyone's piecing it together and at first I was like, this was horrifying becausecause you're trying to tell like a complex story with ambiguity that you don't want to be too confusing, but In the end, actually, the result of watching even other colleagues play and I remember there was a log where I think Celine and have to give a shout out to Jane. Her performance was amazing, but Basically, u, Selaine talks about basically dying to this horrible creature and then Because of the rogue like setup, you go into a room and there's a horrible creature in a fort. I was like, you could try to script that, but it's even cooler that it's not. That's just emergent Yeah, emergent story that's consumed by every player differently. So I think I wouldn't necessarily say it was the wrong way to go, but going for the wrong way was to try to do linear, the right way was to actually let go and let players piece together the story and actually piece it together in their own speed. So similarly in Saros, you can choose when you want to do things, who you want to talk to. So It's not a game that Athing just baked in.s it's really You can decide in Saras not to talk to the NPCs and you lose quite a lot and it's quite a selfish act a bit like Arjen in the game. So I think in the end it's like you can you can really piece together the story and I think it does beg you to replay and I think that's why even Rurnal Story and even Saros Tay are beginning to be pieced together online because peopleople want the full cohesion. They want the linear all the gaps are filled, but actually every person's experience with it is a tiny bit different. and obviously your personal experience you bring into it will change your experience with the game as well. So I'd say that was the big thing of just letting go and having the big beats, but then letting the player experience the story as they want. I thought that was very special and I loved Even today, I love watching people stream the game and watching them ignore that log and then get another log or Talk to that character, not talk to that character. G into the house, donon't go into the house. It's just I think it's really special to see how people can actually understand the story Working with Jane, was this the first time, I mean, because you're the narrative director and the cinematics director. So I imagine you worked very closely with her. Was this the first time that you'd kind of worked one on one with a you know, a performance capture actor Yeah, so actually did did a yeah, did a little bit on remedy. So basically jumped in was sort of like script supervisor on a few sessions with some of the actors which was a great experience, but in a lot of ways, yeah, it was them the first opportunity to work with Jane and really get to work with her. and we had We had a great voice overver director, who I worked with as well. basically I could talk about the vision But in the end, it was yeah, working together with Jane, myself and then Damen we We kind of worked on it and we kind of found a character together and it was a true collaboration and in the end, even I had to jump in and do some directing sometimes Dam and it really was a a bit of a dance between everyone to find it and I wouldn't underestimate Jane as well. She really put everything into it. and to me having the script that we wrote and also being okay to cross it out and where Jane wanted to go so it was It was a really special part and I think it brought so much to the game and the authenticity of it all was performance and her voice alone was just special. So yeah, but no, it was Somet that I really loved. and then when we went towards Saros, I obviously took it forward in my stead and started out without voiceover directors. In the end, got some amazing help. so people could help me because that was a much, much bigger cast. But in the end it it's wonderful. I think it's such a great part of storytelling was lucky enough to get the opportunity in return and have him look back with Saros. Now something else that I think is really affecting about Returnal. you kind of touched on it before. I mean, it's a big swing already, right? Like as we've mentioned for Housemark and the ambition of this project and you know the pressures on the VS five reveal and everything like that. somethingomet that u really, I think stands out for the game when you play it. A these moments when you like when you switch things up, you know, you mentioned the first person sequence, stuff like that. It's like Talk to me about how you as a team kind of came about the idea of those sort of format breaks. let's call them I'm a big fan of the formatak. for what it's worth And so how do you, you know, the game is so free and the reason why I'm really into this as well, what you did with Eternal is because I love I love in games, right? Like things that are tight where it is like just like the simplest amount of kind of systems that there could be. And look, returnal feels like a really tight game, right? But then it also has these wonderful format breaks where you're like, o, let's do this thing Talk with me through like those moments on the team where, you know, you and Harry or Harry and others are like We want to do this thing and it's already we're already swinging for the fences, you know. How do you kind of justify one of those things that's, you know, kind of completely left a field Yeah, and I'd say it's not even just in format breaks. I think even in the music and the sound design, like we really mix it up where the music is so ambient and how we use haptics, That was a big thing. How can we bring you into the physical experience? So in a game that's all about jumping and shooting and avoiding energy projectiles the fact we could just bring you into the world and m and basically let you feel rain it was another format break we did, but but yeah, but definitely I'd say It always started from wanting to ground you in Celinee shoes. So it was it early early idea that u Harry and I we kind of chatted about together of what if we use first person for some of these moments Um We actually even had a little mode that we unfortunately removed where you could push up on Depad and you could be the first person in Selenine's helmet and you could just look around o right But basically, but we ended up not doing that, but it started from the first cinematic. So the first cinematic, we decided we wanted you to be in Celenine's shoes and we wanted you to feel as Celine felt. Um, So I'd say it really started from there and it also started where we knew the responsibility we had and we knew we wanted to lift the production value where we knew our beginning middle and end. so we worked with PlayStation to have a really wonderful opening, Ciney, which basically explained the story and it's wordless. where essentially you see Helios the shipp arrive, you see the stars. We worked with Bobby Krillich, our composer, amazing composer So we were really, really lucky to work with him. Like I was a huge midsummer fan and the fact we got to work with him and got to do the music for our game and he crushed it was special. but Basically we We kind of had the ship crash and land and then the first ciney, we put you in Selinee shoes and you look up And you have the rain and you have the moon that she's looking at You have the moon being a bit cracked. This was stuff we had in the script and basically You experience Jane's performance is very visceral. You hear her breathing, but it was about really to your point of format break, bringing you into her shoes. And what is the ultimate way to do that? We could do that in third person, but we wanted to do it in u In first in this case So once we had that and we had that experience, then it came into We want to do these house sequences. So how could we tell them? It was like, well, let's put you inside of her shoes. let's put you inside of that experience and let you be as her and really Um, really have that experience with her. So it was a lot more scope. and as you said, it was already a big swing for the studios. We had to do third person controls, plus first person controls, plus the transitions from third to first and figure out how all that worked. but it was I think brilliant in the like the through line is placing you in her shoes. Like of course, now they make sense, right? when I think about them Yeah, wonderful stuff. All right, well, let's do it. Let's dive into Saros. I've been playing it. like I'm not like a Titch gamer And like but this game, man, it's like it got me. I was in there. So let's, I mean, we've spoken about returnal and everything already, but I kind of like to do this for our listeners who are kind of just here for the game deev stories and may not know every single game that obviously or the person that we're interviewing. So just for our listeners, why don't you kind of break down for everyone what Saros is, you know, the elevator pitch, so to speak So Saros is the story of Arjun Devraj who's a Sultarian forcer. He's essentially this sort of soldier type who goes to this planet looking for someone planet's name is Carcoso. and it's haunted by this sort of ominous eclipse and he's there to find someone and he knows that they're here and he'll find them. So it's essentially a story of a stranger in a strange land and It's a haunting dark science fiction adventure that explores like Loss and personersal growth. so Yeah, if you love Paternal, you're going to love Saros. It's really us. in many ways, it's a spiritual successor to what we built. We loved what we built of it. We knew we wanted to create something new. and the difference between Saros and Returnnal is there's multiple characters and u The tagline of the game has come back stronger, so if you found Rurnal a bit too tough In this g, you can upgrade yourself and really push through the adversity It's such a good tagline because it works on so many levels, which you're obviously aware of. But like notot just the comeback stronger in regards to you know retaining resources and being out tograde your skillter and keep your gun and all the great stuff that you did and built on from returnal this time around and make it more accessible, but also like come backack from the last game into this game stronger. W, Chef's kiss. Really good. But let's talk about your studio coming back stronger into this game. which is you know, now all of a sudden, because I mean, had Harry departed at this point in time or was there kind of was there a seed of Saros happening before Harry left and you were kind of handed the reins? Tell me about the initial and also I think it's worth noting for people too Sarorus is not a sequel, right? It's a kind of spiritual successor, but it's a completely standalone story and world and all that sort of stuff, right So do to about how it came about within the studio and that decision and you know how that germinated Sure. So yeah, after returnnal we We we loveved the game and we felt we bu something really, really special, but It was immediately from the beginning for Harry and I and some others, we didn't want to we wanted to do something new. We wanted to do a new IP, but we wanted to take a lot of the elements that we loved in Returnal and essentially evolved them. So the initial statement was refinement, not reinvention or As I said later on, it's evolution, not revolution. It's really about evolving everything that made returnal special and essentially creating this amazing game to follow up with Saros So yeah, the way it started was we knew we didn't want to continue, but we knew we wanted to explore cosmic horror. We wanted to do dark sci fi again We wanted to almost explore another side. So and We had Selinee as a character, We knew we didn't want to repeat ourselves fully. so we basically we decided we wanted to have a different character, a different company, a different setup, a different planet And when we were exploring cosmic horror, we wanted to go deeper into cosmic horror. So essentially we actually went even to the reference of like Lovecraftty in Mythos, We went down to Robert W. Chambers and the King in Yellow, which is like the initial point like a real reference is great. Yeah. So we go even deeper into cosmic hura. and then we knew we wanted to evolve the whole experience and escalate it for players. So that was the idea of the eclipse. So this was A small group of directors, including Harry and myself We essentially began to create the vision for Saros And this was started basasically twenty twenty one. So returnal came out in twenty twenty one Re after reteturnal Ascension, we added the tower of Syphus and co op for reteturnal Basically it was twenty twenty two when we had the full team there And essentially we just started to build the game and started to build the world and started to brring across our technologies and basically shift from Unreligion four to Unrelgion five and bring everything across into that experience and bring our proprietary V effects everything and just try to create the ultimate house mark game. That was really the vision. and We had the story of the game pretty early. We actually had the beginning middle and end of Saros already kind of in, worked with Harry and others in order to kind of really frame that up. So we had the We had kind of the core pillars of it all And we had a lot of the details. and then from there It was just really off to the races and knowing that we built something great that people loved and wanting to build something that was even ideally even better for them. I think that's the that's Saros that you played today. I'm super proud of the game. I think it takes everything we put into Enal and just evolves it And it's really leveled up the team. It's been amazing. And when I think of The team we have, the opportunity we've been given like the cast, we got to work with, everything it's just I think it's a really epic and bold game. so can't wait for everyone to jump in if you haven't already Comeback Stronger is really interesting tagline because it's also the game is that I like to use as like approachable, right? Like it feels from a systemic point of view, like it's a lot more approachable or you could say accessible, I guess, another other kind of taxonomies that how did you and the team kind of define the areas that you wanted to quote unquote, simplify or make more approachable or you know, smooth the edges on. And how did you identify the elements that you're like, no, this is kind of core to what You know, reteturnal is and what made reteturnal great and you know, we don't want to throw the baby out the bike. be doing so in this regard What was that process like? and you, what were the inputs for these decisions? Yeah, it was a difficult process because we love the game, but to your point, we also knew we wanted even more people to love the game. We wanted to make it more approachable. So Comeback Stronger was actually it was one of the it wasn't just a tagline, It was a vision statement. It was actually something we had in the story when I think kind of worked with our writing team. and when I saw it, I underlined it, like this feels special. And when we eventually got to work with marketing, I'm like, I think we have the tagline They managed to follow it and they they wanted to team. Yeah yeah. they saw the they saw the deepness of it all. So u But nonetheless, yeah,, it was an initial vision statement and we knew we wanted permanent progression systems. It was clear. We wanted to reward We basically kind of a phrase we had was make every death rewarding basically maybe I'm just gonna to get you to actually explain to our listeners the difference between the progression systems from reteturnal and SRO and precisely what you did in regards to making it more approachable 'causeuse I think they're quite meaningful and the impact is felt immediately. I love Yeahah. Yeah For sure. So basically the big difference in returnal, the biggest You do have basasically growth in terms of weapon traits, but byy and large and you have EFO, but basic by and large, when you die you you You lose progression. You don't get to keep the weapon that you have. you don't get to you don't get to keep your progress. you don't level up your character basically Every time in Returnal it's a pure player knowledge mastery where you start from zero to hero. So if you're struggling with the game, you're going be zero, you're going be zero, going to be zero, going to be zero. And that was unfortunately for many players, that was their experience. And that's where We knew that Housemart games are about flow. and we wanted to allow more players to get out of that beginning kind of dire brutality and gap them towards the players that love Rurnal, which is where you go from zero to twenty five, twenty five to fifty. You basically gliding through the experience and in flow and loving it. so For Saros, the immediate thing we had in the vision from the beginning was we're going to let you keep your growth and you'll be able to level up your character. so On the first de, you'll go from zero to one, one to two, two to three and basically just keep upgrading your character So that way you can make every death valuable and you can essentially build up yourself and really overcome it. Another thing we added which I think goes back to the sort of arcade sensibilities of like Ne Warkener and Rezogun and Stardust. Um was essentially second chance. So in Rurnal we had the what we called the astronaut figurine where if you had that You were good. You had a second chance to get through We decided to make that a system for you as well you can unlock that pretty early. So if you did bounce off reteturnal. Sarus is really for you. Like you're going to love it because you'll be able to upgrade yourself I think to the point you've mentioned even before, you're kind of you finding it challenging, but you're still pushing through. and that was not absolute where We want it to be challenging and rewarding, but it's not a challenge you can't overcome. It's a challenge you can. So it kind of gives a reason Well. If you know that there's like slow incremental build like that Exactly. we're gonna we're gonna like flog this tagline to death on this podcast and marketing teable will love it. But you know, like you literally are coming back stronger every time around and that is it's really reassuring Because sometimes obviously you'll go into a run, you'll go into a cycle and things just don't go your way. You're not playing as sharply as you were maybe earlier. It's probably late at night, you're in that classic zone where you gott to go to bed and try again in the morning. But at least with every death, you are You're bringing something home, you know and you get that beautiful kind of dopamine hit immediately of being like, all well, before I log off, I'm going to go straight to my skill tree and dump some, you know, some points into there and unlock stuff. The you know what is also a beautiful touch, Greg is the gun likeike it's just, I don't know why maybe you have some kind of more mechanical meaning to it, but I think it's just like a literal sentimental thing or something or just this is the kind of gun I like because I was using it and now I get to keep it in the next run The cleverness of kind of just like knocking its level back down to base, but you keep the same gun type that you died with aiful Yeah ye Yeah, definitely. And I'd say that was something as well that we realized and it was just I think there was a frustration because it is, we want to really motivate you and push you through the game was the fact that you couldn't actually just Ke the weapon you had. you had to You went back to the sidearm. Some people loved it, but others in returnal they didn't. So it was just a way for us. and even for me, I found it frustrating was like, let's just let you keep that. and then push forward. and it's really about just getting you into the flow of the experience and letting you push forward, but no, glad you Glad you loved it. and yeah, that's the thing we find. anyyone who jumps into Saros, they just love it It's the same for eternal. peopleeople who love it They get it, but for Saros, it's about getting more people to really understand their game and get lost in it and then get lost in the world. from there, but yeah, know, it's Yeah, super proud of the team. I also think I'm proud of the narrative that the way that Basically, Sultari has come to this planet for Lucinite and essentially they're using it, but also Lucinite is what you're using to upgradeing. So there is this sort of your point once again, the narrative goes deeper into the mechanics and doesn't get in the way it just reinforces deepens the world building. Yeah, no, I think in a lot of ways it's a great symphony The optional player hub, right? Like sorry, character hub, right? whichich is different I guess the player hub as well. But you know, the base that you're on, right? which was a big addition for this game too. You know, Greg, it kind of reeks of narrative director now gets to call the shots on the next game. So I love it too. It's like, right, but it's beautiful because you were the one that said, let's just keep it to one character on the last game. So talk to me about You obviously felt the studios' confidence now and skill set was ready to branch out into these multiple characters, not just yourself, but other people working obviously across the team. Talk to me about the challenges involved in and I'm interested not just in the production challenges, you know, and bringing on more actors and you know, branching narrative and all these different things. but I'm interested in just tension between this like rogue like game where you want to get back into the loop, but then you you're placing more content there in the narrative for people to chew through U I mean, I guess it is that really huge experience that you're talking what's it called an exercise in just leaning into the interive interactivity of the experience. but Talk to me talkal to me about that big, that next big swing for Osaros of like expanding the u the character set for the game Yeah, so that was actually it's something that was there at the beM in the vision as well was we wanted multiple characters. We wanted to add more viewpoints to the world, we wanted to add more people for you to love and lose. so It was it was there right from the beginning, but we also knew that we wanted to protect the flow. We wanted to protect the action. so Hence the idea of where do we these characters. It's Ivo the beginning of the run or it's towards the end and we decided we wanted them to be there at the beginning. so In Burnnal, every time you die, you wake up at the crash side and it's I think it's beautifully lonely. so you're kind of there's a sense of melancholy and the music really reaps it in. and then you go off into the harsh world. simimilar to how we wanted you to come back stronger in terms of mechanics and how you upgrade yourself, we wanted to give you more story So it kind of made sense that Every time you die, there's always a bit more story for you to learn. There's a bit more world building. and I'm really proud of the narrative team that we have all these ambient conversations. so you don't even need to walk over and talk to them just as you As Arjun comes back and is reconstructed, he essentially goes back out and you can listen to Stack and Kaylor and Sheridan essentially talk and you can get a bit more atmosphere and learn about them. and if you want walk over, push triangle and interact, but other always continues. so It was our way of just pulling giving even more story early so we could kind of for players that wanted story, they could get it for players that don't You can just run out the door, run down to the teleport to get out of there. So it was It felt like a tasteful way to add more narrative and once again, add more viewpoints so we could kind of make the world feel much larger and richer and give you more perspectives of the eclipse and what it does to people Everyone who comes to Carcosa as part of the Echelon four, they all go there with different dreams and desires. and carcosa takes it from them. so you get to see them unravel as it's taken away. So it felt like a great sort of dark sci fi premise of You start with a wide cast and unfortunately by the end it goes to a much smaller one. And it's really kind of goes back to the isolation Kind of brings it kind of ups the stakes when you're doing those runs, you know, and I'm thinking about the second cycle Sorry, not the second of the second world, right? whereere you're You know, you've got one of these characters on the other end of the line who's, you know, it's if you're feeling that time pressure of getting to them. It's Oh yeah, really bring something to the game for sure Yeah, and I'm really, really proud of Ben's performance there Ben Pnd I guess. So it was cool to get an Aussie aussy voice in there as well. Very authentic, Ouszie. so yeah out of his role. And it was authentic O the accent. definitely. Yeah It was great. So when I chatted to him, obviously you got to meet all the actors and talk to them all and Yeah, he was asking, what do we want and And he could tell I'm arained. I'm like, authenticity, that's the goal for everything. The goal for Rahul. I think Rahul gave such a tremendous performance in this game and He askks like, what accent do you want? I'm like, No, Rahul, I want you and I want British London I haven't really heard this in a game before. I think you sound amazing. There's a great voice there, like just bring it. let's do that And for every for Jane Perry, who we get to work with again from Rurnnal, she got cast as Sheridan. She's a Canadian. I said, let's go Canadian. It was just about having the most authentic, truthful and real experience because the science fiction Stories that I love, they feel real to me going back to obviously I was luck enough to work on Prometheus, but alien really struck me because it felt so real. It felt like almost a documentary that you're watching these people. and then there's this hostile allleated invasion into that world. so similarly for the cast of The Echelon four, these are all people and they're all authentically who they are. and it's just about them providing these really naturalist performances and then unfortunately watching them unravel and making ideally really pull you into the world pull you closer to Ajan Yeah, well, I had Rahul on a note here. that's all it says. So let's talk about that, right? Like obviously huge get, a mainstream actor Classically games adjacent as well. it's no secret that he's a huge gamer Big fan of the medium Uh, and I even I've heard rumors that like There is concept art in the studio of him before he was even approved. Like the studio is set on Rahul, right? So tell me about that get and working with him. Obviously, you worked very closely, no doubt throughout the process Yeah, I what was it like that? He brings so much to I I'm asking as well because he brings so much to the game. It's just absolutely huge performance and justust wonderful Yeah, I think it really goes off having such a great collaboration with Janeerry on reteturnal and wantning a collaboration to push and build a game even better for players was Um yeah, wanting Oer now character to be really special and Rahul came straight to mind, like we loved his work it would be a dream to work with him to your point. Yes, we did like early sketches of concept art thinking of and it just seemed to suit. he seemed to suit the kind of the enforcer outfit, L he just had this demeanor, his face, everything, his voice, it just felt perfect. so. Yeah. I'm sure you didn't struggle to make him look like an absolute badass for sure. No, exactly. was he was just so perfectly suited. And it was really it was a dream. and we experiment with lots of things and then we obviously we make our final vision and we usually throw a lot of stuff away. but nonetheless with that, we didn't have to because we were fortunate enough When we started casting PlayStation connected us with Rahul And basically went on the call with Harry and myself Um We basically were about to introduceselves and he's just like, Hey, before you say anything, I'm in I love Returnnal, I love Housemark, I love Playsttation. I want to do this game. So before you tell me what the game is, I want you to know I'm in What do you want to do And I was like, well, who was this person? And that was so true. That is exactly who he is. He is phenomenal actor, but also a really passionate and driven person. so We talked we basically we had the beginning, middle and end of Saros, we talked about the character of Ajun He he loved it I think he found a character He really wanted the opportunity in the challenge of it. He's like, this is a really interesting character. I've never played this type of character in a game before And similar to returnal, it's what we set out to do. We wanted to be bold and we wanted to push the medium. We wanted to have character you haven't played in a world and an experience and And basically From that day forward, Rahul was just being the biggest champion of the game.'s brought him to Helsinki. He came and played the game. He was really, really good at the game. so My first experience was him just being like just being so direct. the second experience with him just owning our game and saying I love it. I was like, wow, this guy's good. And then just every conversation and his passion for the performance and the character was just monumental. L every voiceover session, every performance capture was just He put everything into it. It's actually, I think in a lot of ways, it's his first lead role and he took it as like the huge thing that it was and the responsibility And he's just been tremendous. I think Like Celinee is not Celinee without Jane and Arjun's not Arjun without Rahul Rahhul contributed a lot to A lot of our voice over sessions where I think in a lot of ways, you hear that as much as I'd read every script and I know the game back to front and I knew in the end, Rahul put so much work into who Arjan was, where at times he would push back and just say, I don't think this is what Arjen would say. It's not where he was. For me once again, being a good active listener, it was, yeah, you're right Sometimes they did have to say and I hear you and I agree, but we need to keep this because of this, this and this and Robber be like yeah, yeah, I get it So it was very respectful, but nonetheless, it was always And it's something that I asked of every actor. We're not looking for actors, we're looking for collaborators. We're looking for people to contribute. We're looking for storytellers. and every I'd say everyone we cast, they all brought themselves and they got to contribute and it made the game better. the same way that every person at House markark, I Ver openly for me as a leader and a director, I always try to say game is the game because of you, like it's Everyone's contributing, everyone pushes. The more you contribute, the more you get in. So it really just snowballs and creates this momentum and Yeah, Rahul was tremendous and his performance. I don't want to spoil it. He is just out of control. in the arc, he goes on The authenticity, it's just amazing. and watching him on the P cap was special, but also He put so much, he told me, I want the voiceover in gameplay to be as good as the performance capture. So he really just push the quality. There's no like, this is the B lines and this is the A lines. It was just everything has to be amazing quality. even to the point actually at the end, We were doing our final pickup sessions. and he said, Greg, is it okay if you just send me the game? And I just want to watch some videos and I gave him captures of the game work in progress. I had my pickup list. He sent back and said, Gre, could I pick up these lines? And my good news, I have them as well. But nonetheless, he also spotted some things I didn't. so it was just this was more than just a normal just come into the booth. It was a true collaborator who put everything into it. and he's super proud of the game and Yeah it's trying to. Iet any ons it at Dice, funnily enough, the conference at Oh cool podcast. Absolutely. Met him just briefly, abbsolute gent of a man. so wonderful Tuly was wonderful All right, I got two kind of I know're not we need a wrap up soon. you got you're a very busy man, got meetings to get to, but I got two topics that I wanted to hit you on is and they're kind of They're kind of like quite specific. One is adaptive triggers and your use of them in this game. It's just like one of those moments where you're like This is whoever designed them on the PlayStation hardware team. like this is the game that they kind of had in their mind, essentially or this is the kind of usage that maybe they didn't even foresee was possible. and it comes so flawlessly to the game. So maybe just tell our listeners how Saros utilizes the adaptive triggers on the Playsttation five U and then talk to me about how that came about and, you know, any of the tech behind it or whatever, what if you feel is worth sharing? because it's just so cool Yeah, no, great shout out and it's something that it goes back to Housemark and I love to do slides with big text and I always have pushing the hardware since nineteen ninety five. like that's been That's been Housemark's like message is we always want to show off what you can do. so The adaptive triggers in Saros, yeah, I think they're super cool as well. Essentially, if you pull the adaptive trigger all the way through resistance Ajun's arm transforms into what we call a power weapon. And essentially you can blast out eclipse driven weaponry. So already it's like ultimate power fantasy. If you have this and essentially the way you charge it is you collect projectiles using your Sultari shield. These are two new things from Rurnal and I think they makeake the game F more approachable, way more kind of over the top and even more power fantasy, which I love Yeah, the shield to absorb the power is really neat. It's very. I thought it was such a beautiful design thing of like where projectiles went from being obstacles in returnal to opportunities in Saraps. It just felt like changingry you and seeking them outactly Something I thought about is it felt similar to kind of the, you know the From software' Dark Souls to Bloodborne switch up of, you know, that vampiric attacks like that put you on the front foot, being not trying to get like health back It kind of changed up play my behavior in assimil way a bloodborne from dark souls, you know, this was like ex hors fromr reteturnal to Sarus. Yeah. Yeah, and that's the thing. in a lot of ways, you can simplify what it is, but in a lot of ways, it's I think it's an evolution. and the goal is that if you play Saros and you haven't played Rurnal, you go back and you have this other thing to experience. But adaptive trigger wise, the other thing we added was if you halfway pull, we wanted to add even more range the weapons, we have ult fire. So essentially your primary weapon can also have different fire modes. like I think a fan favorite is the smart rifle that pull the right trigger, you're kind of shooting, what we do Little haptic pulses to make you feel every round and for it to feel really powerful But if you ult fire, it becomes a smart weapon where the bullets can wp around and take out stuff. So if you're stuck, you can just use that and run around and shoot, but But the adaptive trigger stuff it came from I'd say even from early days of returnal where we had the responsibility of being One of the launch window titles and It was actually Hardy Tickenen and Henry Marcus, like two other people on our team, they actually they had a prototype of the adaptive trigger. And this is the co founder. so since nineteen ninety five, literally pushing the hardw. he's like in. What if we use it for this? And I was like, whoa, this is amazing. And I would say that its split the team. Some people like don't do that. otherther people like do it. I was definitely like, we should do this. this is amazing And It was similar for the haptics, I'd say I was probably one of the biggest champions banging the drums, saying that we should do this. This is amazing. And I think we pushed it even further with Saros with the Duel sense. So as soon as the game starts, you have a Sltari terminal and we make it like a typewriter where you feel that Um But essentially the haptics was a similar thing where I'd say some of the team at the time. They were like, No, this is too much. It feels bit like a gimmick, but I'm like, no, this pulls you into the world and this is new like this is what This is what we should do. We have the responsibility. let's create and let let's push and By and large, I think everyone seems to love it. So justish And I think for the listeners too who haven't played Saros like I really want to stress that when you pull in that left trigger There's no resistance, but you kind of hit like a wall. It's almost like the trigger is kind of like seventy percent shorter or something And only I can feel if you pull on it, there's Probably more resistance than I've ever felt in a game before on a PS five game, right? But then you have this like kind of, you can break through at moment. and then so they just went in that no resistance zone You're, you know, using your allt fire for your primary weapon. and then when you boom, when you break through so that power weapon is just like it's such a great use of it. It's really cool. It's just one of those like Re game feelly, technical Brilliant little flourishes that I love. The other thing I'd say Yeah, please J was the game It was the gameplay programmers in a lot of way. They really just founded and I'd say the thing that we really put so much attention to detail for is game field. So our controls like vision stamlers as soon as you pick up the dual stents, you know you're playing a housemark game Just the controls alone, how tight it feels, how the camera feels, it's fun to move. and E that trigger. countless iterations, but When it felt right, it's good Game feels good, move on. What's the next challenge? but yeah, jump in The next challenge that I'm going to throw at you in regards to a question is Like talk about pushing the hardware to its limits, I think another thing that Housemark games are known for is all the bloody VFX on screen, right? And like there are moments where I was like literally upstairs in my kind of loft where I play video games, just squealing, almost, like running and not knowing where to put my character or myself as Arjun, as there's just literal seas of like yellow and blue orbs like coming towards me in all these different incredibly mesmerizing patterns As a former VFX programmer yourself Tal to me what's going on there under the hood? Like tellell me about the tech that's happening or the challenges that you approach there. It's obviously huge visual hallmark of the game as well. and you know, not just in regards to aesthetics, but the design, pattern language and you know, inflencing player behavior and everything Yeah, definitely. No, it's been and actually the technology that you're seeing,'s the same tech that's been used since I think even Rzoan or earlier, it's proprietary So the same little cubes that you see that blocked, those cubes became tentacles in reteturnnal They became the bullets. And then obviously in this game, we have full on fog simulations. We have volume metrics, we have light liquids. You haven't seen it yet, but at the end there's a beach and that's the best looking water simulation you've ever seen. but this is And amazingly I think it's in the second world that's like just a volumetric fog and you can kind of like it looks like it's chained up or sitting there or something is Insane. I was like wild And this is all real time just walking around that thing looking at it. Yeah, this is real time sixty frames per second. like running. And the thing was And I'm really proud of the team. like we didn't want to leave anyone behind. On PS five, the game is exceptional If you have a PS five pro, we push it even further. so already just on PS five, Rock solid sixty. technical showcase, amazing VFects, but yeah, to go back to the technology so started in Rzergun It was all about voxalization. It's a custom particle system, GPU driven wild wild graphics. and that goes back to once again hing the Hway since ninety five House Mark was proudly part of like the F finish demo scene in the early days and these just graphics There's always demo scene history behind these like stories For sure. Yeah's like's on. why are your graphics so good? It's like I we were in the demo scene in the nineties. It's like ure. sameame. And these are people that are just looved doing the most crazy stuff you could do graphically with the least memory and just show off. so The show off continues and this is a lot of the same people that are being here since Rzoggun that are just mastering their craft, building the technology and taking every challenge and just crushing them So actually with Saros, we've decided to kind of help give it a bit of a name for this technology, which is rendering plus the VFX, so it's called graphite. as this thing and yet it's like this rock solid team that just crushes it. And to your point, like doing the art direction for the projectiles and all this visual effects was quite a challenge for our art team. And I think they did tremendously to make it very readable. So despite it being so overwhelming You do generally, There is some understanding you can get from it all, but yeah, it's just ical work they do and it really The way that we I've love working with them is it's almost going back to how My experience working in film Visual effects is actually involving them in the creative. so A lot of the stories of great films is Films use visual effects when they're ready. so actually the VFX team, they often have a lot of demos and it's about pulling Even in Retonal, I saw a demo of this fehere that they did and I was like, we need to put this in the game. I don't know where it goes. We're going to find a way and we did it similar to the fog. It was just almost giving them a pedestal to really show off their work and let them do it. But the cool man. The most important thing is the is the interaction. So I think the explosions, the weapons I think it was a good lesson that with the weapons after Ratono, we went a bit more subtle And we went then after a while, it's like, they don't feel as good, they don't sound as good we just push it to eleven. Everything in this game is just ridiculous in the best way. So I think It feels incredibly powerful. I would want to give a shout out to the sound and music in Saros as well. I think it's. as much as there's the visuals, I think the soundscape and the atmosphere and It adds so much to the game feel of the game. So there with the music and without the music, it's You know, I gottaest the audio is the first thing I noticed because I play games for for the sake of neighbors. I live an apartment building. I play games with headphones on quite decent headphones and When I put the cans on, the game was already going and I was just like I was like it was like I transported to Carcosa we were so dark. And it's, you know, even the start of the game and how boots up and you get the player going It's really, really immersive. It's's I mean it's a, you know, it's a done to death word, but like it's not often that you have that kind of experience video games. It felt like full three D immersion It was crazy Yeah. and that's been something that yeah, brought forward from all the experience. And I think also the fact of just starting in visuals and not having audio and realizing how important audio was To me directing and even a narrative, I was working super closely with the music and the sound because I think it's such a huge way to communicate the world and the story and the atmosphere. that Yeah, and I think these are the same people we worked with on Returnal, PlayStation Creative Arts and tremendous, amazing sound designers and They've told me every time. They love working on sci fi because everything's new And everything's tremendous. so U yeah, I think the sound and music Claudio, our producer has just put in the text box here that reminded us that Returnnal actually won audio design and music at the Dice Awards in I think it was the twenty fifth Dice Awards, right? Like yeah, when you came out, so I was huge lucky enough to be the nominations, but yeah, well yeah No. And I think the sound and music in Saros in a lot of ways, we wanted to push even further. and I think musically something to not underestimate with the game was we even pretty wild was we even set out to create a new type of music. so We wanted to do dark electronic meut drone metal and that doesn't exist. And we wanted to say, how could we It should int take that It should and it does now. Thankks to Saros and thanks to Sam Slater's amazing music. but in the end it was this idea of we have the dark electronic score that gives you the ambience and the atmosphere of Carcosa, but then How can we change the music in an interactive medium when there's a eclipse? So actually the whole soundscape changes And almost basically at that point we we add in drone metal, we add drone guitars. And so we worked with Sam, so Sam inccredible composer, incredible producer. He's worked on amazing projects. We worked on Chernobyl withith his wife, the television show worked on Jok of the film And I also love that he worked on Mandy with your hand, your handsome. Y. It's amazing. So basically And we had a lot of the same collaborators who worked on Mandy to do the drone medals. So basically when the world washes over in red from the eclipse, drone metal washes over the world as well and reverberates in three D sounds. so it's just this so c. I'm so proud. I't notice that but yeah, you're totally right. I'm realizing it now as you saying it. Yeahah. And it just fits it's like a type of That's the best compliment, right? Unfortunately for a soundtrack is that you don't you don't notice it. you just you' done it, right? Yeah. But it just you wouldn't think that when you see an eclipse coming, but it just felt like the most perfect way to Um communicate the world and communicate the gameplay and I think music for us at Housemark as well goes down to the arcade sensibilities. It's all about gameplay. it's about flow So in the bosses, we actually We turn down the sound effects, we escalate the music. So the pressure and the flow and the excitement it's just a full on rock concert and we really just pull you into it. Yeah. Anyways, a quick shout out for music as well, but I think so proud of so many aspects of this game. I think our team really pushed and really elevated every craft, every person who worked on the game really did amazing work. So yeah, lucky to represent everyone, that really proud of the game and I every like loving it as much as we loved it. You know, congrats on, you know, Helman helelming it, you know, really, really exciting and, you know, it's such a Such a brilliant spiritual success at a returnal. It's just such such a wonderful game. I've having, you know, I'm going to go upstairs and play it tonight, you know, it's of six PM here at Melbourne. so I'm going to go I'm going to take on that second boss Hey, Greg, I can talk to you all night, but I know you have meetings to get to and it's been an absolute pleasure chatting with you, man. Again, congrats to you, all the team on your success and Looking forward to seeing what you're all up to next Thank you. And yeah, it's been a great chat and yeah, I hope everyone enjoys Saros as much as we enjoyed making it Thank you for joining us for the Gay Maker's Notebook For more information on the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences, our podcasts and our other initiatives, please visit www. interactive. org