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Games Entertainment

Designer Warren Spector Has Two Games in the Works 52

Eurogamer had the chance to speak with well known game designer Warren Spector (Deus Ex, Thief) about current plans for his new studio, Junction Point. In a detailed interview, Spector discusses the studio's current slate of two titles. He also makes some bold proclamations about his future in the industry: "He now wants to shake a bit of life back into the world of games, a market he believes is still too niche and enclosed, by delivering something new and original rather than a rehash of old experiences. He'd rather 'fail spectacularly' than create another sports game or driving simulation. 'I think that most of what passes for a game, even now, just sucks. It's hard for me not to talk, but I've seen the dangers of doing that. I'm hoping that in the next couple of months we'll have something to say.'"
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Designer Warren Spector Has Two Games in the Works

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  • Deus Ex (Score:3, Insightful)

    by p0tat03 ( 985078 ) on Thursday March 15, 2007 @03:00PM (#18366833)

    I don't mind rehashing old experiences as long as they're good ones. Hey Warren Spector, how's about a *non-crappy* sequel to Deus Ex this time?

    • Deus Ex: Invisible War is a great example of "failing spectacularly". Please, Spector, don't put us through that again.
      • by OK PC ( 857190 )
        Hopefully he's actually working on these games, rather than what he did with Invisible War where he just let Harvey Smith do what he wanted. In fact, he even encouraged Smith to do crazy things with it
    • by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
      IW wasn't Spector's fault. He was opposed to "great" ideas like the unified ammo system but the team overruled him.
    • My only experience with DeusEx 2 was:
      I really enjoyed DeusEx, it's non-linear endings etc, so I really was eagerly waiting for years for a sequel. In the meantime, I've been playing all FPP games, mainly Counter Strike like crazy.
      So as soon as I started playing DeusEx 2, I sneaked like a pro, carefully aimed, and while crouching, quickly fired three consecutive shots straight in the back of the guards cranial area from a point blank distance. I've seen his brain literally getting blown out, but after a se
  • Designer Warren Spector Has Two Games in the Works


    Pardon me, but when I hear vaporware phrase like this, I generally think , "...but neither is expected to ship."
    • by robson ( 60067 )

      Designer Warren Spector Has Two Games in the Works


      Pardon me, but when I hear vaporware phrase like this, I generally think , "...but neither is expected to ship."

      Warren Spector's record for shipping games he's announced is pretty clean. And that aside, your statement just doesn't make any sense -- it's impossible for a company to successfully work on two projects at a time?
      • Warren Spector's record for shipping games he's announced is pretty clean.

        I'm not picking on Warren - I'm still not sure who he is or what he does. (I suppose I could read TFA, or even the stuff beneath the headline, but that's too much work.)

        It's just that when a PR piece like this pops out, you generally want it to say something like "X has just shipped (buy it now) and Y is just around the corner (plan to buy it next year)." The "plan to buy 2 things next year" thing in this PR piece is a strange marke

        • by robson ( 60067 )
          I'm not picking on Warren - I'm still not sure who he is or what he does. (I suppose I could read TFA, or even the stuff beneath the headline, but that's too much work.)

          I don't even know how to respond to this. :D

          Your mistake here is company!=designer. Sure, a company can work on multiple projects, but I doubt a single designer can work part-time on two completely separate new games and ensure both are top shelf. (If he is, he's likely just lending a brand name to the project or otherwise off-shoring t
  • sshock3 (Score:4, Interesting)

    by thhamm ( 764787 ) on Thursday March 15, 2007 @03:13PM (#18367029)
    how about a 'real' system shock 3? with shodan and stuff. why do you resist 'the many', warren?
    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by kalirion ( 728907 )
      how about a 'real' system shock 3? with shodan and stuff. why do you resist 'the many', warren?

      Not even The Many can compete with intellectual property laws....
    • Resisting 'the many'... why that almost sounds like Electronic Arts,.. erm, EA(tm). I mean they gobble up coders and studios like resources, only for them to be destroyed and absorbed into the 'greater biological mechanism'.

      Back to SS3 though, I just wonder how well EA Redwood Shores will do with it! I mean, Irrational and Warren Spector are known for their depth in immersion and storytelling, and I'd rather have them be able to do it. But anyway, I'll just have to wait until Bioshock comes out in the mea
      • they gobble up coders and studios like resources, only for them to be destroyed and absorbed into the 'greater biological mechanism'.

        And you get this information from where?

    • how about a 'real' system shock 3? with shodan and stuff. why do you resist 'the many', warren?

      I really don't get it. Why do gamers only want sequels? Why are you so afraid to try something new? Bioshock is in essence the next SSH game anyway, why not buy that.

      Fantastic news from Warren anyway. Once you get past all the negativity, I think the PC gaming market is stronger now than in a long time. There are so many good games out right now I don't have time to play half of those I want to. I will definitely
      • I really don't get it. Why do gamers only want sequels? Why are you so afraid to try something new?

        System Shock used to be new. By your logic nobody would have tried it because they were scared. People don't want SS3 because they have a phobia towards new games, they want SS3 because System Shock is a fantastic series and we don't get enough cyberpunk games.
      • by thhamm ( 764787 )
        I really don't get it. Why do gamers only want sequels? Why are you so afraid to try something new?

        i'm not afraid of anything, and i will play bioshock. a real system shock sequel would be cool too.
  • Thief 4! (except for make it a bit more like 1 and 2 and not as much like 3)
    • But give us another Shalebridge Cradle
    • I guess I don't really understand why people didn't like 3. In my opinion, it was the best of the series. Instead of hopping from mission to mission, you actually got to walk around the town and explore. You had the opportunity to go mug random strangers and break into houses all while avoiding guard patrols. The "mission structure" was still intact as well, you just had to get to the starting point instead of instantly appearing there.
      • I didn't mind the mission structure that much. One of the things I didn't like was the third person aspect you sometimes had to use. I felt it was awkward. I can understand where some others may not feel the same.

        Also, it just seemed that some of the overall feel of the first two was lost in the third. I don't know if it was updates to the graphics or the idea that they made it with porting it to the Xbox in mind that caused the new feel and look of the game.

        And don't get me wrong, if they make a T4 on th
    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by ShadowsHawk ( 916454 )
      I must be the only PC gamer that actually enjoyed 3. I agree it suffered from consolitis, but it really wasn't a bad game. If you could accept the MANY loading points, there really wasn't too many faults with the game. Unlike a lot of thief fans, I actually appreciate the 'shine' effect. A real thief would be able to tell a gold mug from a tin mug, but I never could. The cradle still scares the crap out of me...
      • The cradle still scares the crap out of me...

        That's what rocks about Thief, even beyond the gameplay itself. There are so many points in the game where I was simply terrified. One of my most memorable gaming moments was the first time I ran into one of the undead knights. I swear every hair on my head stood on end and I was looking over my shoulder IRL for fear. It was fantastic.

        "Join us! Join us! Join us NOW!" Great!
  • Missing close tag (Score:2, Informative)

    by HTH NE1 ( 675604 )

    Eurogamer had the chance to speak with well known game designer Warren Spector (<em>Deus Ex, <em>Thief</em>)

    That should read:

    Eurogamer had the chance to speak with well known game designer Warren Spector (<i> Deus Ex,</i> <i> Thief</i> )

    Not only is the italic <I> tag not deprecated in HTML 4.01 Strict, but abusing <em> to get a presentational effect at odds with its semantic meaning (for emphasis) is wrong. That's the same kind of abuse as using <t

    • Holy syntax nazi Batman!
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by tsalaroth ( 798327 )
      I learned a long time ago that stressing about other people's HTML/markup leads to ulcers.
      • Agreed, unless, of course, it is a project you happen to be working on. Then it might be worth stressing over.

        OTOH, the standards may say one thing, but the browsers do another. Until there are browsers that conform completely to the standards, I won't be either. It just makes more sense to do things that actually work cross-platform than worry about conforming to the standards. If it's easier and faster (and works the same in most browsers) to lay out a page using tables, you better damn well believe I'm g
        • by Pope ( 17780 )
          Ah yes, but when the standards themselves are disorganized and vague, how can any browser be 100% compliant?
    • And I screwed it up to boot:

      Eurogamer had the chance to speak with well known game designer Warren Spector (Deus Ex, Thief)

      It would be better if we could say <span class=title>Deus Ex</span> where title applies an italic style in story submissions. Generally allow Slashdot-approved class references.

      I'm only being obsessive about saying the italic tag is legal in Strict as it was a previous point of contention [slashdot.org].

    • by Dorceon ( 928997 )
      Slashdot's CSS renders <i> as display: block, meaning that what you suggested would look like:

      Eurogamer had the chance to speak with well known game designer Warren Spector (

      Deus Ex,

      Thief
      )
      I claim this is a bigger problem than using <em>to emphasize things. Would you have complained if it was <cite>?
      • Slashdot's CSS renders <i> as display: block

        You are right about that, and what the final result would look like. Still, that's a pretty bad rule to change an inline tag into a block. Surely its better to reserve such things to class rules, not tag rules. It's probably why many submissions I've seen on the Firehose have looked similarly broken.

        My guess is that, since "From the article:" sections were historically wrapped with the italic tag, the redesigner decided that they needed to be called out b

  • This qualifies as a detailed interview? This is a two minute bump segment for PR, with no real information.
    Wake me up when he startes NAMING the IPs he's working with and detailing gameplay mechanics, please.

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