The Croatian gaming industry has been creating titles that exceed expectations for years, and the Zagreb studio Overseer Games is one of the best examples of this creative power. After success with games like Aquatica and Patron, they are now ready to intrigue the global audience with their latest project – Kaiserpunk.
But what happens behind the closed doors of this innovative studio? What motivates the team to embark on such ambitious projects and what does everyday life look like in the development of a game that combines alternative history, grand strategy and complex logistics?
Kaiserpunk will be free for the second version of the playtest from this Friday, November 29, 2024, and applications are already open via the following link: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2012190/KAISERPUNK/
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Uz nadolazeći playtest, fromlučor smo otići "iza kulisa" i istražiti how is it došlo do ideje za Kaiserpunk, na koji način se game developsla, šta je up to sada there islo utjecaja na razvoj games te in which smjeru bi daljnji razvoj mogao da ide. Odgovore na sva ta pitanja i više we got direktno od Overseera, and in nastavku there iste prorku saznati how se taj procewith fromvio iza prisonenih vwara umjetnika iza Kaiserpunka, Aquatica i Patrona.
1. When did you first conceive the concept for Kaiserpunk? Is there a specific event, book or game that inspired you? You mentioned that Aquatico and Patron are city builder games, but you said that Kaiserpunk is the ULTIMATE city builder. What's the difference?
The original idea of what to do in the city builder genre was created even before Patron was made. The difference is actually that Kaiserpunk will be the first such game, as far as we know, that will have two genres. It's Grand strategy and City builder in the same game. It's completely two huge genres combined into one game. The idea is to be like a City builder with a very large addition in gameplay from another genre. We didn't want to start with something so big and too ambitious from the very beginning, so Patron from the City builder genre came first and we decided to approach it step-by-step. After two City builder games, we decided: Now is the time. Now we return to the foreground. Patron and Aquatico were gaining experience in this genre.
2. How did you come up with the idea for an alternate history where World War I never ended? How much did such a concept influence the game design and gameplay? Did you plan to continue Kaiserpunk as a series or go more in the direction of expansions?
Kaiserpunk is designed to be highly expandable. We plan to work on Kaiserpunk for a long time. We at Kaiserpunk have a lot of ideas for content, but we don't plan to just stick to one genre of games. Kaiserpunk would be expanded, and they would stick to the expansions rather than go in the order of Kaiserpunk 2, Kaiserpunk 3, etc. As for the alternate history, the original game will span from 1918 to 1945 approx. It doesn't have to look perfect, because it doesn't follow our history perfectly, but only until 1918, where it starts to differ a lot. The idea is that according to everyone's gameplay history can vary greatly, or players can choose to stick to history exactly. The idea is to give the players the freedom and options to determine for themselves how the period from 1918 onwards will take place, so that they have the ability to manage the territories from that period. One of the reasons for the direction of expansion would be that it would allow history to continue. Of course, in addition to how these expansions are conceived and made, they reach all the way to today and maybe even into the future.
3. Aquatico and Patron achieved great success, how did you react to that success in the development of Kaiserpunk? Have you considered using a similar template because of previous success, or have you decided to start over with a completely new concept?
There were some very good things that we wanted to bring from the previous games into Kaiserpunk, and they would be more Patron oriented than Aquatic. Aquatico is the last game to come out, but Patron is simply a far more successful game. Precisely because of this, we could get much more feedback from a much larger number of users, and then we could learn many more things from Patron. Patron and Kaiserpunk are not exactly the same genre, and we couldn't transfer some things directly, but we were able to transfer a lot of well-received City builder parts from Patron to Kaiserpunk. Also, one of the obstacles in porting those good parts is that we made Patron on our game engine, while Kaiserpunk was made in Unity. It's a very different story and we had to get used to and learn the new engine first. Despite that, we transferred a lot of good ideas and tricks from Patron because the players reacted very positively to them.
4. How much attention do you pay to player feedback at this early stage and can you single out any advice or criticism that changed your plans?
We had the first version of the Playtest at the Demo fest, where we presented only about 30% of the entire game. We had over 40,000 players at the Demo Fest, which is a very large feedback pool. The first impressions were very good considering that it was a very unfinished version of the game, but the feedback was still very good. The thing to which we had the most positive reactions from both players and journalists was precisely the merging of the 2 great genres of City Builder and Grand Strategy. The game was talked about in the sense that Kaiserpunk could be a genre-defining game, at least we hope it will be. What was changing was that we expected to get much more feedback from players from the City builder genre than from Grand strategy games. In the end, it turned out that we received much more criticism from Grand strategy players, maybe because there are far fewer of them at the moment, so regardless of the fact that it is only part of the Grand strategy game, we received much more feedback. Precisely because of this feedback, there was a direct change in the development of the game in the direction that the Grand strategy part is now much bolder and expanded than was originally intended. Grand strategy was supposed to be much easier, and now it's almost the goal of the game. At first it was meant to be 80% City builder and 20% Grand strategy, and now it's close to 50-50.
5. If you wanted players to pay attention to one part of Kaiserpunk, what would you want it to be? Openness, mechanics, graphics, story, or some detail that means a lot to you and players could predict it quite easily.
Zapravo there ismo dvije stvari na koje bi voljeli da gameči obware malo više pozornosti jer su nama bile veoma important. The first stvar su detalji u grafici, kad zoomaš u gradove, htjeli smo napraviti what lifeniji grad. Znači ne samo da je to samo as presentation grada, already kad zoomaš within grada, količina detalja like auta iz tog doba, pa razina tehnologije who se slaže uz vremenski period i how se tehnologija mijenja how vrijeme prolazi, how su zgrade građene, šta ljudi rade po cesti... Znači detalje koji prezentiparadiseu life tog vremena koje smo pokušali what vjernije prenijeti, da se baš dobije osjećaj tog doba. Druga stvar koju bi very voljeli da gameči primjeand it isste koliko je teško bilo napraviti upravo taj link between ta 2 žanra, City buildera i Grand stwaregya. Game ne funkcionira na način da gameš City builder pa malo odeš na mapu newhat raditi. WITHve what se po svim dijehuntingthere is svijeta dešava, i u tvom lokalnom dijelu, sva politika i progress which ofrediš, to se sve dešava paralelno i non-stop se moraš prebacivati iz lokalne mape u globalnu i rješavati questove na svim nivothere is paralelno. To uistinu nije bilo lako napraviti i zbilja ondamo da će gameči upravo to i primjetiti how budu gameli.
6. Je li neka ideja bila "previše luda" za Kaiserpunk pa is andpak niste implementirali? Iland even newhat what ste u početku mislor implementiwari pa ste se predomislor, iland even ostavor za neku drugu igru?
Yes, we had one very crazy idea that we didn't decide to implement because it would simply be too much for Kaiserpunk. That idea was to not only stop at 2 genres, but to add a third one, which was RTS (Real-Time Strategy). It means that when some battles take place, say between 2 territories, that you can directly join the battle and manage that aspect of the game. Although it sounds too good, and we would love to be able to implement it, it would simply be too much for one game and if they were to go with that, the game would not be out for maybe 5-10 years. The idea was presented, and we would have liked to have been able to include it in addition to the existing 2 genres, but the current version was also quite a large project and we are very satisfied with it. Maybe someday in another game they would combine, for example, Grand strategy and RTS, but for Kaiserpunk it will remain just an idea.
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Overseer Games studio gave us a very clear and detailed insight into their process, their ideas, their actions as well as the possible future of Kaiserpunk. Now they are ready to deliver these plans and ideas to the small screen from Friday, November 29, 2024, and as for the release of the full version, it is planned for February 27, 2025.
Follow Virus.hr for a full review of Kaiserpunk when it is available, where you will have the opportunity to hear the first impressions of the full-release.
