Q&As// The Club's Nick Davies and Matt Cavanagh

SPOnG: What kinds of guns and weapons will we be able to use to shoot some fools up in The Club?

Nick Davies: Big ones and lots of them, but definitely in the realms of the contemporary setting in which it’s based.

Matt Cavanagh: That's not to say our weapons are run-of-the mill. There are some crazy real-world weapons out there, and we have some of them in the club.

SPOnG: You’ve touched upon online leaderboards for high scores, but what other online and multiplayer modes do you have planned for the game? Could we see an online co-op or team matches with Prey vs Hunters, with spectators able to fritter their cash like Moneymen?

Nick Davies: Multiplayer is one area we aren’t talking about too much, there will definitely be a mix of the expected game modes that everyone wants to see, and a variety of modes more unique to The Club and its mechanics. Of that I will say no more.

Matt Cavanagh: Neither will I.


SPOnG: The Club focuses on fast-paced action on top of all the madcap shooting – what were the reasons behind this?

Nick Davies: I think we got bored of sneaking around corners, and hiding behind cover, it’s fun for a while but eventually you just want to kick the door down, run in and kill everyone as fast as you can. That’s what Arnie would do…

To be honest there aren’t a lot of really fast paced character games around at the moment and we didn’t see a good reason as to why not, it’s very Hollywood, people seem to like Hollywood so we thought we’d give it a blast, as it were…

Matt Cavanagh: Yep we wanted to make a game where players could really prove their level of skill both on the single player leaderboards, and in the multi player arenas.

In these days of MOCAP many games are much slower paced. We put gameplay above realism, not the other way around. Fast fluid controls, that's where we live.


SPOnG: What kinds of thugs can we expect to encounter as Hunters? Any hints as to any massive bosses packing heat?

Nick Davies: A variety of bad guys, each carrying bigger and better firepower than the last, it’s not really a game of bosses, more a continuous stream of bad guys from start to finish.


SPOnG: You say the main bulk of the replayability will come from trying to get a better score in the levels – will there be different hidden methods of trying to obtain higher scores to encourage exploration of the stages?

Nick Davies: Definitely, from hidden items to shoot to boost your score, to setting off various explosions to multiply it, right down to smashing into secret areas to find a bigger and better weapon, you’ll need to use the whole environment in order to max out your score, and there will always be a way of just scraping out another few points if you take a shot from a different angle or distance.

Matt Cavanagh: There are so many factors involved in maxing out your score, that players should be discovering ways to increase their level scores for a long time.


SPOnG: Having worked primarily on the XBOX 360 for the last few years, how does developing for the PlayStation 3 match up? Is the game a PlayStation 3 exclusive?

Nick Davies: Aside from Xbox and Xbox360 we’ve worked on a variety of platforms in the past, from Dreamcast, PS2 and PC through to Game Boy Advance.

Developing for a variety of platforms isn’t something new for us, neither is working on new, next-gen consoles, so although the process isn’t seamless, it’s certainly something we can handle.

The game isn’t a PS3 exclusive, we’re releasing on 360 and on PC as well.