Goblin Commander: Unleash The Horde puts a legion of goblins in your command

by Louis Bedigian

This fall, Jaleco will unleash Goblin Commander, a unique, console-exclusive real-time strategy game.  Producer Chris Millar heightens our anticipation with new details of the game.

It came in the middle of the night.  A loud siren poured over the speaker system, indicating that danger was near.

Within minutes, we were dressed in our uniforms and ready to go.  Our guns were pre-loaded, and our aircraft carrier had plenty of F-14s for our pilots to use.  We were ready for the siren...but were we ready for what was actually coming?

Then they came.  Hundreds of vicious creatures began charging toward us!  They destroyed our tanks and slaughtered our Pikmin!  There was nothing we could do!

A fellow reviewer tapped me on the shoulder.  "What in the world are you doing?

"Reciting my lines from the company play.  Didn't you get the memo?"

"Wow, another play?  I sure hope it's as good as the one we did last year!"

"Yeah, that tribute to Metal Gear Solid was awesome.  It's a shame you got stuck playing Revolver Ocelot though..."

"My hand hasn't been the same since."

"This year we're doing a play based on Goblin Commander: Unleash The Horde, an upcoming action real-time strategy game developed specifically for game consoles."

"Who am I playing?"

"Here, take a look at the script..."

"Oh no!  It says here that I'm a member of the Stormbringer clan."

"What's so bad about that?"

"My character gets crushed by a giant boulder!"

"Well, at least you won't have to worry about that hand anymore..."

Set to unleash its horde in November, Goblin Commander was developed with inspiration from some of the finest real-time strategy games around.  To prepare for the company play and to ease our anticipation of the game's release, GameZone Online turned to the Goblin Commander’s producer, Chris Millar. 

It's great to see a top-tier RTS being developed for game consoles. What was the deciding factor in making Goblin Commander a console-exclusive?

Chris Millar: We are all very big fans of the RTS genre, yet we truly hadn't seen anything that was fun or competitive on the console, especially during the development stages of GC. It therefore made perfect sense to deliver this kind of fun and excitement to the console audience by perhaps breaking the rules in a market filled with rehashed and overdone genres.

Goblin Commander is promoted as having arcade-style action and an "easy-to-master control scheme designed specifically for console game pads." What makes this game easier to control than, say, the console version of Command & Conquer?

CM: In GC, we allow players to not only give their units point and click way-point commands like C&C, but they are able to take direct-control of their clans and get a goblins-eye view of the world. This gives the player an almost 3rd-person perspective while still controlling all of their goblins. Players can also initiate way points or Follow commands that allow players to control one clan while firing off commands for another. Imagine combining the "Follow Me" OddSpeak commands of Oddworld with the Point and Click of C&C, and you will have something very unique and still pretty easy to control. It’s hard to explain, much easier to just put a controller in your hand and let you start engaging in some goblin warfare ;)

As well as tactical commands and waypoints, players can also walk around in the giant Titans like the Stone Ogre. They hit one button, and instantly they have direct control of that unit. Then can then walk around with the Ogre and attack anything they want, like Bashing buildings with his gigantic Mace, knocking goblins off their feet with Swing attacks, or just pick up and Eat anything that can't run away fast enough.

Where does the inspiration for a game like Goblin Commander: Unleash the Horde come from?

CM: The inspiration comes from many different places, everything from the quirkiness of Pikmin, to the awesome battles of LoTR. We've all played D&D, made our character sheets, cast Lightning Bolts and Sleep at one another. Overall, the fantasy theme is one that is very accessible to people, while being a wonderful environment to build a game around. We are also huge game geeks and love to draw inspiration from games across all platforms and genres.

That is one angry-looking creature.

How long did it take for the development team to achieve the control style that they wanted? How much tweaking/beta-testing was necessary?

CM: It has taken the full length 18 months of development to evolve the ultimate control scheme for GC. The overall game went through 3 entirely different designs, which each had unique control schemes. We wanted something that took full use of the console controller, without the player every feeling like they wanted to try the game with a keyboard or mouse. The end result is a game that is quite easy to enjoy, without ever needing the use of anything more than the buttons on the controllers across the 3 consoles.

Are there multiple level difficulties so that players of all skills can enjoy this game? Is there a tutorial mode?

CM: The difficulty of GC ramps as the player makes their way through the single player campaigns. We don't have a Tutorial Mode, we have the first two missions of the Stonekrusher campaign that teach the player how to play while they advance through the first few missions of the game. There is also a context-sensitive help for absolutely anything in the game, should players forget where they placed their manual or want to instantly know about something while playing.

How do players increase their armies in the game? In Pikmin (another console-exclusive RTS) the collects seeds, returns them to their ship, and new Pikmin would sprout instantly. I would assume that Goblin Commander has its own unique way of building an army.

CM: Yes, the army building in GC is quite unique. Players must harvest souls in order to build more Goblins. This is accomplished by either killing other goblins, or capturing Soul Fountains. Once the player has gathered enough souls, they are able to purchase new units in the Clanshrine. If they go out into the world and begin breaking structures and buildings, they can amass gold to upgrade their units or unlock new ones. It’s a very streamlined method of resource management and pretty easy to get into the game and start building your troops.

Approximately how many goblins can the player control at one time? How many goblins can be displayed on-screen simultaneously?

CM: There are 3 clans in your control at any one time, with a maximum of 10 goblins from each clan. Players can there for control up to 30 goblins, with the addition of 1 gigantic titan. However, in multiplayer levels there are some enemy NPC units, including the 30 goblins from each player. It is possible then, to have a massive battle on a map with much more than 60 units fighting to the death on screen.

Like a Quizno’s sub, he’s quite toasty.

That’s what you get for messing with us! 

Is the story a big part of the game, or is it just used to get the ball rolling and drive player action?

CM: Both.

Each of the five clans in Goblin Commander inhabit an area of Ogriss and are working on collecting materials for a massive machine that their human wizard master Fraziel is putting together. Each clan is essentially a specialized working force that is harvesting their area of land for a resource, or resources, needed to complete the great machine. Each clan has a single commander who, through the use of magic, projects themselves in spiritual form to watch over and control the hordes of workers in their jurisdiction. This same magic is used to visit Fraziel every so many moons to give a progress report.

One fine day... something happens to Fraziel and the Goblin lands are cut off from him and each other. Chaos ensues as each clan blames the other for his disappearance and the clans begin to fight amongst themselves and each other. The game begins with the player in control of Grommel, the Skullkrusher commander who must unite the clans and find out what happened to Fraziel.

Of course we have much bigger plans for the story and overall player experience, but we don't want to give too much away before you sit down to play this goblin saga ;)

Little has been revealed about Goblin Commander's sound. Could you break the silence and tell our readers what they'll hear when the game is released?

CM: Actually, Mike Smith, our Audio director, is right here.  I'll let him take this one.....Mike?

Mike Smith: Goblin Commander has a pretty extensive soundtrack - most of it in a dark, ambient vein. As you progress through the maps, you unlock more music scores. I think we have around 50 pieces of music that can be unlocked. With the sound effects, we tried to take a fairly minimalist approach. Since you can have so many units fighting at one time, it was a real challenge to keep the battle sounds from getting overwhelming without resorting to voice culling and so forth. With the voice-overs, our writer, Chris Zirpoli, came up with dialects for each of the clans and wrote out a basic script for each. We brought in seven or eight voice actors to perform each of the parts. I think the dialog does a good job of pulling you into the goblin world and conveying what each clan is about.

On the tech side, we expanded upon our Sonica audio engine that we began developing for another game last year. It allowed us to get a lot more ambitious than I think a lot of titles get with respect to audio. Being able to unlock scores dynamically, stream all kinds of material from the disc, and work extensively in Dolby 5.1(tm) (for the Xbox) really enabled us to do some fun stuff.

Something tells me it won’t be easy to live through this battle.

Can you divulge any exciting details on the Goblin Commander's multiplayer mode?

CM: During the development process, we didn't believe that a split-screen multiplayer would work well for a strategy game on the console. However, after playing the game against each other til the wee hours of the morning, we realized just how much fun multiplayer was becoming. We then added more and more maps, and kept on playing, each time picking new clans and trying different strategies. We are very excited to have this feature, and very glad that we didn't make the mistake of trying to ship without it. During Skirmish maps, Players can choose any 3 out of the 5 clans to battle with against someone else. Each map has different Runestones, Moongates and resource allocations which allow of many different types of game play experiences.

The Plaguespitter and Nighthorde clans have yet to be revealed. Is there any info – even the tiniest of tidbits – that you can reveal about them?

CM: The Plaguespitter clan has the ability to be upgraded into the fastest moving clan on the map, they are also very powerful with their acid-based attacks that eat through armor and lower enemy HP. Nighthorde are the most mysterious of all the clans. This dark and brooding group of scavengers and cannibals can steal souls from your units, or money from the destruction of buildings; giving them a bonus when harvesting resources to build up their armies. That’s all I can say for now, more information will be revealed soon on www.goblincommander.com in the coming weeks.

Who was responsible for designing Goblin Commander's characters? Was it a collaborative effort?

CM: Goblin Commander is the collaborative effort of the Art Team working hard to develop a fantasy game that has a look and feel all of its own. They continued to evolve the look of the goblins through the length of the project while maintaining a standard look for each goblin across all clans. We have a very large and talented art staff, who have provided countless concepts, ideas and styles for GC which have all merged into the end product. We will be uploading numerous concept art images to the web-site in the near future.

Aside from the various abilities that each clan has, what other resources are at your disposal?

CM: As the player makes their way through the campaign, we begin to give them more and more things to use against the enemy. There are Runestones, which are e spells that the player can initiate at any time during the game that can be purchased in Alchemist shops or found in secret areas scattered among the world. Runestones can range from items that can heal your troops to an earth-shattering Firestorm that rains down on the enemy. There are also Moonstones,similiar to Runestones, however these mysterious stones can power up the clan of that color for a set amount of time. There are countless other resources to help you wage war, but that will be covered in each of the clan pages on the home site.

I've noticed that the screenshots show the gameplay from at least two different angles. Does the camera change on its own, or does the player have full control over it?

CM: In Commander-mode, the player has a top-down strategic perspective of the map. The player can zip quickly across large expanses of terrain, or warp to Home Markers that have been placed on the battlefield. This allows the player to have a consistent point of reference when looking for resource nodes and enemy location on the map.

In direct-control-mode, the player takes Direct-Control of Goblins and Titans. In this mode, the player has full control of the camera like a 3rd person action adventure and can Zoom In/Out, Rotate, and see the battle from high above the trees, or right down over the shoulder of their goblins. In this mode, we also change the Fog-of-War, to allow the player to see further across the terrain without revealing enemies that may still exist out of the sight range of that unit.

The top-down view in action.

Is it harder to create great-looking graphics for an RTS (which has smaller characters and a wide-open view of the environments) than it is to create them for other games?

CM: In an FPS or 3rd Person Action-Adventure title, you have much more restricted camera than in Goblin Commander. You can therefore predict where the player will be looking, or what they should be able to see. Since you also have a more fixed viewpoint, you can create environments that are seen relatively close-up and can guide the player with almost cinematic scenes. MGS does a fantastic job of making every scene look almost cinematic, because they can restrict the camera to almost always give the player the best-viewpoint while also setting up a scene to look the best it possibly can.

In Goblin Commander, the player can see a goblin as big as the screen, or as small as an ant. This relatively large change in camera perspective makes it very difficult to make both units and environments that look great from either a close-in over the shoulder camera to an aerial strategic camera, each without showing too much repetition, tiling or compromising the quality of the units. This was just one of the few challenges in creating the various styles of GC.

Thank you Chris for all of the exciting details.

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