1 00:00:00,080 --> 00:00:06,879 Linus Tech Tips coverage of PAX 2013 is brought to you by Western Digital, 2 00:00:04,000 --> 00:00:10,800 Intel, and Steel Series. Hey guys, I'm here with Alistair from Splash Damage 3 00:00:08,720 --> 00:00:14,639 and Chris from Nexon. And I'm going to get them to give me a brief overview and 4 00:00:12,719 --> 00:00:18,800 a little bit more specifics about the game. Uh, so Extraction is a team- 5 00:00:17,119 --> 00:00:22,880 based, objective based multiplayer shooter. It's freetoplay, free to win. 6 00:00:21,119 --> 00:00:27,039 It's set in uh London in about kind of 2018, 2020. It's been irdiated. The 7 00:00:25,519 --> 00:00:30,560 streets are empty and teams of mercenaries are kind of roaming the 8 00:00:28,880 --> 00:00:34,239 streets fulfilling contracts. And the contracts generally revolve around uh 9 00:00:32,239 --> 00:00:37,920 securing uh data cores. So there are shadowy kind of backers out there who 10 00:00:35,920 --> 00:00:41,200 are either uh want secrets buried or want secrets, you know, recovered and 11 00:00:39,760 --> 00:00:44,160 they hire these teams of mercenaries or rather they kind of hire you to go out 12 00:00:42,879 --> 00:00:49,120 there and put together these teams of mercenaries to go out there and take them back. So and that's that's 13 00:00:46,960 --> 00:00:53,600 represented by uh a really fantastic objective based team-based gameplay. So 14 00:00:51,920 --> 00:00:57,760 about that objective based, team based gameplay. Um how do you progress through 15 00:00:55,760 --> 00:01:01,760 a level and how many objectives are you expecting to run into in an average 16 00:00:59,359 --> 00:01:04,960 level in this game? So it really differs uh kind of map by map. That's one of the 17 00:01:03,680 --> 00:01:09,600 things we're most excited by is every map is a different experience. So right now you guys have played Camden. You 18 00:01:07,920 --> 00:01:13,760 probably played about half of that map. There's also a map set all over London. 19 00:01:11,520 --> 00:01:19,759 So Victoria, White Chapel, Canary Warf, Waterloo, Batisy. Um uh and each map has 20 00:01:17,680 --> 00:01:23,280 a different set of objectives. So this one uh as I say the half that you played 21 00:01:21,600 --> 00:01:27,520 involved, you know, uh planting a charge and uh uh you know, hacking a terminal. 22 00:01:25,680 --> 00:01:33,520 Others involve escorting a kind of EV and extraction vehicle through the streets. Uh you know, erecting or 23 00:01:30,159 --> 00:01:35,119 destroying barricades. Um so every map's 24 00:01:33,520 --> 00:01:39,520 a different tactical challenge. Uh requires kind of, you know, a different uh understanding of the map, different 25 00:01:37,520 --> 00:01:42,159 teamwork. Different team makeups will will do kind of, you know, better or 26 00:01:40,560 --> 00:01:46,399 worse or require different strategy. So it's really uh exciting to see how the 27 00:01:43,920 --> 00:01:49,360 dynamic changes kind of uh map to map. Speaking of different team makeups, 28 00:01:48,000 --> 00:01:52,479 there's different classes in this game. Can you go over those and explain how 29 00:01:51,119 --> 00:01:55,600 they can augment the different gameplay on defense and offense? Sure. Well, one 30 00:01:54,560 --> 00:02:00,719 of the things actually that we've we've got away from is is class-based stuff. So, um, and that's that's allowed us a 31 00:01:59,840 --> 00:02:06,159 lot of freedom to come with some fantastic characters. So, really this is a character-driven game. So, the 32 00:02:04,079 --> 00:02:10,160 characters still have roles, but um, it's not rigidly adhering to kind of 33 00:02:07,920 --> 00:02:14,160 class structure. So, uh, that gives us a few really big wins. So, for example, in 34 00:02:12,480 --> 00:02:19,520 some of some games, you know, you might come to a point where there's an enemy bomb you have to disarm and you get 35 00:02:16,959 --> 00:02:22,400 there, you you wipe the enemy team and then you're out of luck because you're 36 00:02:20,640 --> 00:02:25,920 the wrong class and you have to sort of stand there. Um, we didn't want that. 37 00:02:24,560 --> 00:02:29,520 So, all of our classes can, you know, they can hack, they can disarm, they can plant bombs. They've got different 38 00:02:28,480 --> 00:02:34,319 strengths and weaknesses. So, for example, Proxy, who you might play today, uh, she's got an engineering 39 00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:36,560 background. So, her character is, um, particularly fast at hacking, 40 00:02:35,440 --> 00:02:40,800 particularly fast at disarming and planting, but everyone can have a go. Everyone can try it. And uh that's part 41 00:02:39,519 --> 00:02:44,640 of the strengths and weaknesses of each character along with you know the weapons they have and the special 42 00:02:43,120 --> 00:02:50,000 abilities they have whether it's Vaseline's heartbeat sensor or whether 43 00:02:46,800 --> 00:02:52,800 it's Arty's air strike. So there's no 44 00:02:50,000 --> 00:02:56,560 rigid adherence to classes. Um it also means that in the kind of full game you 45 00:02:54,640 --> 00:02:59,760 won't have to you don't have to have a team that that always consists of there 46 00:02:58,560 --> 00:03:04,879 has to be one medic in the team, there has to be one engineer in the team. No, you just bring in five of your favorite 47 00:03:03,200 --> 00:03:08,080 characters or you know whatever they may be. Uh the other thing it gives us is it 48 00:03:06,800 --> 00:03:12,640 frees us up to come up with some really creative kind of character combinations 49 00:03:09,840 --> 00:03:14,400 because if we want a guy uh because you don't have to have a medic and he 50 00:03:13,599 --> 00:03:19,360 doesn't always have to have shock paddles and always have to have uh uh medkits. You know, you might have a guy 51 00:03:17,760 --> 00:03:23,040 who can whatever, I don't know, revive guys at a distance but doesn't have any 52 00:03:20,879 --> 00:03:26,480 healing packs and uses a scout sniper rifle or something. You know what? You 53 00:03:25,040 --> 00:03:31,280 couldn't really fit him into a class uh before. You couldn't really pigeon hole them. Um so it lets us create kind of 54 00:03:30,080 --> 00:03:34,879 crazy characters like that if we want to. So, it's um it's really let us be 55 00:03:33,280 --> 00:03:38,879 very creative and come up with the most exciting characters that we uh we can in 56 00:03:37,120 --> 00:03:42,879 terms of how they work on on offense and defense. Um, one of the other really fun 57 00:03:41,680 --> 00:03:47,599 things about both the characters and the maps is how much uh mastery there is to be had. It's really important to us that 58 00:03:46,159 --> 00:03:51,680 this is a game that has depth and can be played, you know, really competitively at a high level, but at the same time be 59 00:03:50,480 --> 00:03:55,440 really easy and fun to pick up. And one of the things that's been great about packs over the last four days is that, 60 00:03:54,480 --> 00:03:59,360 you know, people have come to it completely fresh and they've been, you know, having a blast. There's lots of 61 00:03:58,080 --> 00:04:04,080 whooping and hollering and high five and everyone's having a a really good time. They're able to pick out very quickly. 62 00:04:02,480 --> 00:04:08,080 Now, he definitely has a point with everyone getting psyched and a lot of the communication and high level play 63 00:04:06,720 --> 00:04:12,400 and all that kind of stuff. My friends and I played in the tournament here and 64 00:04:10,159 --> 00:04:15,760 one thing we noticed is that it it you can fall behind. Definitely you can fall 65 00:04:14,560 --> 00:04:20,799 behind. Say you're on the attacking team, but as long as you're able to group back up and get to back together 66 00:04:18,720 --> 00:04:23,759 on one of those spawn waves, you as long as you have the right communication, 67 00:04:22,320 --> 00:04:27,120 even if you were doing poorly before, you can come back together, solve that 68 00:04:25,600 --> 00:04:31,360 objective, hack whatever point you have to do, plant whatever bomb, and still get out there. Now, this is probably 69 00:04:30,000 --> 00:04:35,840 more for him and sorry for maybe bringing this up, but coming splash 70 00:04:33,840 --> 00:04:40,560 damage coming from creating Brink. As a Brink player, what would someone expect 71 00:04:37,680 --> 00:04:44,000 to change when they come to this game? I think one of the biggest changes is this 72 00:04:41,919 --> 00:04:47,199 move into to a character-based system. So, we're going to have a a ton of 73 00:04:45,600 --> 00:04:51,280 characters. So, we got about uh you saw five today. Um we probably got about 74 00:04:48,960 --> 00:04:54,320 2025 ready to go back at the office. So I guess one way to think about it is 75 00:04:52,639 --> 00:04:58,160 almost um almost that kind of League of Legends or Dota type experience where 76 00:04:55,840 --> 00:05:00,560 you bring a character who has uh you know there's a lot to learn about that 77 00:04:59,520 --> 00:05:06,080 character, a lot to master. They have their own strengths and weaknesses. Understanding uh which mixture of 78 00:05:04,080 --> 00:05:09,440 characters makes for the best team is really important. So that's uh that's a 79 00:05:07,440 --> 00:05:12,160 big change um for us and it's something that people seem to be really connected 80 00:05:10,880 --> 00:05:15,039 uh uh you know really connecting with and getting really excited about. Um so 81 00:05:14,160 --> 00:05:18,960 that's probably one of the biggest changes. The other thing is after Brink 82 00:05:17,360 --> 00:05:22,080 we created uh a kind of sister company almost called fire team to handle all of 83 00:05:20,400 --> 00:05:25,440 our online services. So we wanted to make sure we had you know smooth lagfree 84 00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:29,039 connections great matchmaking all of that stuff was handled uh uh really 85 00:05:27,280 --> 00:05:32,160 well. So we were kind of looked at other solutions and none of them were quite 86 00:05:30,320 --> 00:05:35,120 right for us. So we created fire team and not only did they handle all of that 87 00:05:33,600 --> 00:05:38,560 but one of the reasons that the game's in uh you know even though it's alpha now it's people are having a really good 88 00:05:37,520 --> 00:05:44,400 fun with it. People are saying it's really polished and we've got some great feedback. Um one of the reasons uh it is 89 00:05:42,720 --> 00:05:48,479 in that state is because um we have a tool called Echo which gathers uh a kind 90 00:05:46,560 --> 00:05:51,600 of metrics and telemetry from the games. So what we mean by that is every kind of 91 00:05:49,840 --> 00:05:55,039 gunshot, every footstep, every cricket back to the face from proxy um is 92 00:05:53,600 --> 00:05:57,919 recorded even from these matches out there and we use that to balance the 93 00:05:56,639 --> 00:06:02,400 maps, to balance the characters, to balance the weapons. Um and on top of 94 00:06:00,160 --> 00:06:05,680 that, we've had um fans able to play the game for a while now. So we started to 95 00:06:03,680 --> 00:06:10,720 let fans in a kind of inner circle of sort of VIPs. Um they've been playing 96 00:06:08,000 --> 00:06:14,400 since 12 1212 and they've been giving us uh forum feedback and they've also been 97 00:06:12,479 --> 00:06:19,680 um of course gathering you know helping us gather these stats definitely. Um so 98 00:06:17,759 --> 00:06:23,520 balance is incredibly important for us. You know we want this to make we want to 99 00:06:20,800 --> 00:06:26,400 make sure this is uh a really uh you know competitive game that you can you 100 00:06:24,880 --> 00:06:31,360 can play at high levels if you want to. We also want to make sure it's really fair. Um Venice is important for a 101 00:06:29,840 --> 00:06:36,080 couple of reasons. So I think I said at the top you know this is a free-to-play game. It's also a freeto-in game. We 102 00:06:34,560 --> 00:06:38,880 really want to avoid I say we it's Nex on and splash damage. We're not 103 00:06:37,680 --> 00:06:42,000 interested in pay to win. You know, we know that that uh a lot of players uh 104 00:06:40,880 --> 00:06:46,080 you know aren't interested in that. They want a balanced playing field. They just want to have fun. So, you know, we 105 00:06:44,960 --> 00:06:50,160 haven't even got a storefront in the game yet. We've just been focusing on making a really fun core experience that 106 00:06:48,800 --> 00:06:54,479 people can get into. And you know, we've got ideas about how we can monetize it, but it's all still, you know, early 107 00:06:52,960 --> 00:06:58,080 right now. Definitely. And talking bouncing back to the polished comment 108 00:06:56,080 --> 00:07:02,960 you had. Like I said, I have already played this game more than once and for 109 00:07:00,560 --> 00:07:07,039 a alpha or even pre-alpha game, it is very polished. which I do have to echo 110 00:07:05,039 --> 00:07:11,520 that comment that you previously said. Now, to give a throw out to Nexon as 111 00:07:08,960 --> 00:07:15,199 well, the the free-to-play and free to win motion, that's actually very cool 112 00:07:13,440 --> 00:07:19,280 because this is a really polished, good-looking, wellplaying game that will 113 00:07:17,599 --> 00:07:23,120 be free to play. A lot of free-to-play games, especially shooters that people 114 00:07:20,639 --> 00:07:27,120 run into are not usually that polished on average are not usually that polished 115 00:07:25,199 --> 00:07:31,199 or not that wellought out. This is a really well thoughtout game. So, how 116 00:07:28,800 --> 00:07:36,000 exactly is the shop going to work? Well, we haven't really made any decisions at 117 00:07:33,919 --> 00:07:40,400 all about how the shop will work. Uh, like he said, they haven't even 118 00:07:37,759 --> 00:07:46,319 programmed in a storefront into a build yet because, you know, with with Nexon, 119 00:07:44,080 --> 00:07:51,039 we've always tried to make our games free to play, free to win. And with 120 00:07:49,199 --> 00:07:55,280 this, you know, we took our time looking for the right title, and we wanted to 121 00:07:53,120 --> 00:08:00,160 make sure that, you know, freeto play has changed a lot, especially in the 122 00:07:56,960 --> 00:08:02,400 last couple years. And I think players 123 00:08:00,160 --> 00:08:06,000 are expecting higher quality games, whether they're free or not, than they 124 00:08:03,840 --> 00:08:10,080 used to. We wanted to make sure that we had a true AAA game. And we looked at a 125 00:08:08,400 --> 00:08:14,160 lot of different titles. Likewise, Splash Damage looked at a lot of 126 00:08:11,599 --> 00:08:18,160 different publishers. And uh eventually when the two met, we were like, this is 127 00:08:16,160 --> 00:08:22,240 a match made in heaven. I mean, we were always really impressed with their with 128 00:08:19,919 --> 00:08:26,240 their pedigree for giving quality multiplayer shooter experiences. And I 129 00:08:24,639 --> 00:08:29,840 think I can speak for them saying they were impressed with our pedigree for 130 00:08:28,240 --> 00:08:35,519 making free-to-play games. So it was just a good fit. And um so right now I 131 00:08:33,279 --> 00:08:39,839 mean while we are of course looking at at microtransaction options, we're more 132 00:08:38,080 --> 00:08:44,240 concerned with making the best game we can make. Cool. And then the players 133 00:08:42,479 --> 00:08:48,560 will enjoy it. And if the players enjoy it, they'll want to pay. Yeah. You know, 134 00:08:46,480 --> 00:08:52,959 and that but we want to make it a great experience for whether you're a free 135 00:08:50,720 --> 00:08:57,399 player or a paid player. we want you both to be able to have a great time 136 00:08:54,560 --> 00:09:00,880 playing the game. That's a great like preemptive statement because they're 137 00:08:59,440 --> 00:09:04,800 basically saying you won't have to invest anything in this game if you 138 00:09:02,640 --> 00:09:08,240 don't want to or don't need to. So once you grow an attachment to the game, you 139 00:09:06,720 --> 00:09:12,160 can deck out your character, you can get skins for different things, I'm assuming. Whatever comes down the line, 140 00:09:10,959 --> 00:09:17,360 I don't know. I'm just throwing that out there. I hope I didn't break anything. Um, so if you're interested in a 141 00:09:16,080 --> 00:09:22,399 free-to-play shooter that's well polished and might have some customization options down the future, 142 00:09:20,399 --> 00:09:25,040 you should definitely check it out. If you like our content on this, if you 143 00:09:23,680 --> 00:09:28,240 like any of our packs content, be sure to subscribe to Line of Tech Tips.