Chronos is one of the earliest games out and ready for the Oculus Rift. We had the opportunity to chat with Gunfire Games President and Game Director David Adams about Chronos to learn more about the game and much more.
MMORPG: Give us a history of the project Chronos. What started the game concept?
David Adams: We worked with Oculus for several months on a GearVR title called Herobound: Spirit Champion, and towards the end of that process we pitched Chronos to them. I think one of the first things that came to mind when thinking about VR was an RPG game. Obviously, there is a lot of love for RPGs over here, but on top of that the idea of experiencing a cool fantasy world in VR was very appealing to us.
MMORPG: You chose to bring the game into Virtual Reality. Tell us about that process.
DA: We pretty much tackled the entire project from the perspective of it being a VR game. We also wanted to make sure it was a REAL game, and not a glorified demo. These two factors really drove a lot of the decisions during development.
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MMORPG: A huge choice by your team was to make the game in a third person viewpoint rather than the normal first person views in VR. Can you tell us why you made this choice?
DA: We actually tried quite a few camera angles, and the 3rd person solution we came up with was the best solution as it related to the actual gameplay. One important consideration for us on this game was comfort. We wanted a game that 100% of the people could play without any discomfort. Most forms of non-player-driven locomotion in VR will make some people uncomfortable.
With that decision being made first – that we never wanted to move the camera outside of the player’s control (players are still free to move their head, or physically walk around if they want to) – it followed pretty quickly that we wanted to do 3rd person.
MMORPG: We really like your leveling system in the game. What made you go in the direction of aging the character almost like a real person?
DA: There is something really appealing to the idea that this character has devoted their entire life to this quest. It adds an interesting intensity to the experience. When you die you don’t just go back to some spawn point and try again, but your character is physically aging – a process you are witness to as you see your character get visually older. There are, of course, systematic effects of getting older (physical attributes are harder to attain, magical ones easier), but there is something emotionally captivating about the idea of your character actually growing older.
MMORPG: The story focuses on the Labyrinth, but what are some other aspects in the world of Chronos that players will learn?
DA: I think one of the big things – and this is something you learn right away so it’s not much of a spoiler – is that the game is actually anchored in the real world. Something has happened, causing mankind to devolve to a more medieval level of technology, but you as a player are tasked with going into the “old world” to destroy an evil that plagues your land. This is all given in simple terms because human culture is now simple, and their notion of what happened is equally simple. However, what is ACTUALLY happening is far from simple. But I’ll leave the rest to those who play the game.
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MMORPG: How did you handle combat and magic in the game using the new VR systems?
DA: Because we adopted a third person camera, we were able to use more traditional control for both combat and magic. If you have played Darksiders, Dark Souls – or similar action RPGS – you should be familiar with how the game controls.
MMORPG: The game is available on the Oculus now, what has the player feedback been? Can we expect more dives into this world?
DA: So far feedback has been great. We love the IP and the World of Chronos, and we would love to return to it. As for when – I honestly don’t know. Just have to wait and see.
