Back in 2014, there was a lane-pushing game that blended League of Legends with the design thinking behind Heroes of the Storm — one of very few games which have done so.
If you haven't heard of TOME: Immortal Arena, now is a great time to learn about it — through this enriching conversation I shared with its lead designer Joe Ryan!
I'm pleased to share a recent interview I did with Brett Belanger from Intrinsic Interactive, who are working on an upcoming "MOBA RPG" called Avengard.
Brett is the Game Director, and shares his thoughts about the team's extensive plans for character customisation, supporting both top-down and third-person cameras, and how the MOBA and RPG genres can entwine.
We're back with Part 2 of my interview with Ambitious Games, where we continue to talk about their third-person MOBA shooter REVN: covering community goals, development challenges, and what future features might be coming to the game.
If you haven't read it yet, do check out Part 1.
Today, I'm delighted to share an interview with the team at Ambitious Games, who are working on the third-person MOBA shooter REVN.
This game has a really interesting story of being developed as a blend of other genres for several years before pivoting to become a lane-pushing game.
I spoke with Silas, Creative Director at Ambitious Games, to learn more about how that happened...
Hello everyone,
I was recently interviewed by the Esports Research Network on the topic of Lane-Pushing Games and also my work on Causeway.
You can find the podcast on YouTube, Spotify, Google, Apple, or Stitcher.
I'm sure some of you might find it an interesting watch. Do check out some of the other episodes as they're full of smart takes on esports with some very interesting guests.
Ethereal: Clash of Souls started development in mid-2018 as an Unreal Engine project that would be a 3D MOBA, not using the Paragon assets and declaring some significant changes in gameplay.
Following a number of early trailers and character reveals, updates on the game have been sparse. I spent some time chatting with Undying Games founder Luke to get a closer look at what the team has been working on:
Project CORE by Metabuff Studios was announced in November 2018. Initial videos shared concept art, a furnished level, and the essentials of working gameplay. Further trailers followed in early 2019, before an extended period of internally-focused production.
In August 2020, the team announced a change in direction: committing to development of original IP and art assets. I caught up with one of the Metabuff founders opolisprime to find out more about the team's journey so far and what's coming up next.
In late 2019, Fault was announced after a year of work behind the scenes. The first of its paid-access alpha tests followed only a few weeks later in December 2019, with several more alpha weekends in the months that followed. In July 2020, Fault launched via early access on Steam.
I caught up with Ryan Red, Community Manager at Strange Matter Studios, to find out more:
Predecessor by Omeda Studios was one of the earliest announced projects to make use of the Paragon assets. "Omeda" is a nod to a location of the same name in Paragon's lore!
The team started out with a transparent process featuring regular development streams. This changed after its first closed alpha in March 2019, when the game transitioned behind closed doors for a while — eventually re-emerging in July 2020 with a series of closed alpha weekends.
I caught up with rgsace, one of the Omeda Studios founders, to learn more about the project: