00:15La storia principale avviene durante molte sezioni.
00:21La storia che si tratta in Paris non è finita in Japan.
00:26Al contrario, è davvero solo l'inizio.
00:29Mi vedo l'inizio prima come un overture,
00:33o Act 1, se vuoi.
00:35E' molto sottile.
00:38La storia principale è più di una presenza per l'inizio 1.
00:42Ma credo che sia facile da dire,
00:45che abbiamo cambiato l'inizio all'inizio
00:46e costruire qualcosa di spettacolare.
00:52Sì, no, I completely agree.
00:54The first few episodes of the season
00:57are mainly just about
01:00that we're back in so many ways with the game,
01:04with 1847, with classic hit missions.
01:08And we knew we wanted to
01:11just be at a point in time where 47 and Diana
01:14are doing their jobs, right?
01:17Basically, they're just on missions.
01:19and for a little while they don't really suspect
01:24that something has changed
01:26or that something is happening behind the scenes.
01:29But as we already indicated
01:31with the trailers we've been doing,
01:33also the open cinematic,
01:35which is also in the game,
01:36is this shadow client, right?
01:38Who is not pleased with the state of things.
01:42I think we can say that.
01:44And he will change things, right?
01:47I think it makes sense.
01:48It's something you can do when you go episodic
01:49and you have multiple seasons ahead of you
01:51where you can introduce story and characters slowly
01:54without getting in the way of gameplay.
01:56And players can get to know the world
01:58without us throwing a whole bunch of narrative stuff
02:01in their faces from the get-go.
02:04Oh, absolutely.
02:05And we don't have this demand that, you know,
02:0747 has to come under pressure.
02:09It has to change.
02:10and all these things that we were,
02:11I wouldn't say slaves to,
02:12but at least we had to really fight.
02:15That's sort of not really there now.
02:17It's much more about unveiling different characters
02:20and their motivations.
02:22And there are a few that actually come to life in season one.
02:25Yeah.
02:26And that do not die in season one,
02:28I think we can say as much.
02:30Or at least that we have this ambition
02:31of expanding sort of the set of characters
02:34or the ensemble around 47
02:35to create these cool sort of tensions
02:38and story drivers, if you will.
02:42And at the same time,
02:43without spoiling anything,
02:44there is obviously a conclusion
02:45to season one's sort of story arc.
02:48Not meaning that it ends the seasons,
02:51but it's just a small little poetic sort of ending.
02:55There's also a framing narrative,
02:57but it's definitely a huge cliffhanger, I'd say.
03:01Oh, yeah.
03:01We spent most of season one introducing
03:03the new long-term main story cast
03:06and set up the mystery
03:08and the central conflict and all that.
03:10Oh, yeah.
03:12Well, that's the point, right?
03:14I mean, we literally thought about seasons
03:17when we talked about the main story.
03:20And as a rule of thumb,
03:22it's obviously very nice to know
03:23where you want to go,
03:25where you want roughly things to end
03:27at what point in time.
03:28So I think we have some pretty strong ideas
03:30about where this is going to go.
03:32Oh, yeah.
03:33But it felt also very nice to temper
03:35that whole thing into season one,
03:38which is, it feels just like arriving
03:40or just beginning, right?
03:42As you said, it's an overture.
03:43It's very nice to be out of the cinematic model.
03:46Yeah.
03:47It feels good.
03:48Yeah, it really does.
03:53I think Hitman is perfect for episodic releases.
03:58Each mission is a little self-contained universe in a way.
04:02It feels like an ending when you complete a mission.
04:04It's not like some arbitrary part of a storyline.
04:08Even more importantly,
04:10it's based on replayability.
04:12And you can kill your targets in so many different ways.
04:16Some are unique and scripted and spectacular,
04:18and others are more systemic and improvised.
04:20But it's the same with narrative.
04:23I mean, you have to play it continuously
04:25to unlock all the story stuff,
04:27to get the back stories and the characters
04:30and the plot and the main story links and all that.
04:32Yeah.
04:34I love how the games are always about replay, right?
04:37And it's funny because when we get a level design in here,
04:42they typically have to rethink their craft
04:45because they can't really rely on, you know,
04:49knowing what the player is doing.
04:50And I think that also goes for the storytelling.
04:52Yeah.
04:53I've noticed that point where a new level designer joins,
04:55that point where they realize what the game is actually about
04:57and they go completely pale.
05:00And I think that embracing that for story
05:03has been a big part of this version of Hitman.
05:12So one of the interesting things when we think about the game
05:16is that we obviously said that we are able to adjust gameplay
05:21and tweak and sort of integrate how people are playing the game
05:27and actually learn from that.
05:29And I think to some extent this is also true for the story.
05:32It's not in the sense that we change sort of overarching major beats
05:36in the story.
05:38But knowing you, Michael, I know already that you are sort of keenly aware
05:41of what people are already saying about the beta,
05:44how they take in the characters, what they're thinking about them.
05:47And obviously this will inform how they, if we take Diana and 47,
05:52how are they actually talking together or what subplots are likely
05:55to sort of surface in the levels.
05:57We are still writing levels for season one.
06:00And obviously we haven't really started by anything but top level ideas for season two.
06:05So obviously these, when people start interpreting and say,
06:08I think this guy is this guy or I think this is related to this that way.
06:12You're sort of, it's sort of, it does something to you, right?
06:15And then you can't do it because people will think you got it off the forums.
06:18But everything, that's what TV series do all the time.
06:23Yeah.
06:23It's very natural for an episodic medium.
06:26I mean, it's very rare, I think, for a long running TV show
06:32to actually know the entire storyline from the beginning.
06:34They might claim they do, but they usually don't.
06:37No, I also don't think it makes for the best sort of story necessarily.
06:42No, we have sort of some key beats.
06:45We know we arrive at some point.
06:47Yeah.
06:48Not exactly how they will play out, but roughly what happens.
06:51And I think it's going to be exciting to see how people start, you know,
06:56interpreting the characters we're creating.
06:58And yeah, I can't wait for how it affects sort of also,
07:01there's so much nuance in each level, right?
07:04And what gets talked about.
07:06And you spend so much time sort of creating these small links
07:10between the factions in the world and the different characters.
07:13So for the people who really are sensible to that stuff
07:16or can actually take it in, there's a lot of stuff there.
07:24Well, to me, this installment is a spy thriller.
07:27There's definitely some Mission Impossible and some James Bond
07:31and some Michael Mann.
07:34Yeah, yeah.
07:35No, and I think that became also a thing, right?
07:37Like we wanted, we know, we needed globe-trotting.
07:40It's a big promise of playing Hitman, I think, from the sort of the legacy of the series
07:45that, you know, you're an agent, you travel the world.
07:49But then also pick inspirations from different, I mean, even within the spy thriller,
07:53you can go very dry or you can go overly dramatic and very tongue-in-cheek.
07:58and I think we have many ends of that spectrum in the different missions.
08:08A lot of the stories you tell in the levels, they simply require that people actually play more than once.
08:13Oh, yeah.
08:14And they are not likely to find everything.
08:17And I also think it requires for the players to actually want to do that.
08:21I don't think every player in the world will want to, you know, dig out every detail,
08:26much like it is with the gameplay.
08:27But for those who are actually interested, there's just so many layers of story around the main targets, typically.
08:34Oh, yeah. And then we tie the best gameplay and the best story content together with the opportunities.
08:39So you are rewarded for following the subplots and the storylines.
08:44Because that leads to the most interesting action and kills.
08:48Yeah, and I mean, the whole setup around Iago and becoming the male model in Paris
08:53and phoning Dahlia Margolis and this whole trying to understand the inner workings of Iago
08:58and finally meeting Dahlia and having this sort of one-on-one with her as, you know,
09:04where 47 is disguised as Helmut Kruger, the sort of the supermodel who is also a part spy
09:10and sort of seeing Agent 47 step into that role and sort of, what do you call that, outmaneuver Dahlia,
09:17I would say.
09:17That's pure story gold, but it also feels like a gameplay reward.
09:22Definitely.
09:23Absolutely.
09:34Thank you.
09:36Thank you.
09:37Thank you.
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