A Plague Tale: Innocence was one of many sport trade’s shock hits of 2019. Asobo Studio jumped into the single-player journey style dominated by the likes of Naughty Dog and delivered one thing contemporary and completely different. The studio combined collectively a wholesome quantity of historic authenticity, an otherworldly rat plague, and a honest solid of teenage heroes—and the outcome was one thing distinctive and particular in a style outlined by run-and-gun gameplay.

The title would go on to promote a million copies in a few yr, and a sequel, titled A Plague Tale: Requiem, was introduced in 2021. Though the primary sport left some plot threads hanging (the rat plague’s supernatural origins, how Amicia and Hugo de Rune would survive a brand new life on the transfer), it was price asking—how may Asobo high the primary sport’s freshness in a sequel? 

What technical or gameplay enhancements may very well be made in a sport that had such a centered gameplay loop? How may the hordes of rats be made any extra terrifying? In a dialog with Game Developer, sport director Kevin Choteau broke down what Asobo’s objectives had been for the sequel, and defined how the workforce took inspiration from the wealthy historical past of Southern France.

A Plague Tale: Requiem is a “story first” sequel

The enterprise of online game studios makes it very troublesome to cease with one profitable single-player sport. If you’ve got acquired successful in your fingers, your studio wants sequels or successors to maintain the lights on. Asobo at the least has the good thing about being buoyed by Microsoft Flight Simulator, however you would be forgiven for assuming the corporate would pursue a Plague Tale sequel out of sheer monetary want.

To hear Choteau describe it, A Plague Tale: Requiem was solely ever going to occur if the event workforce may discover a story they wished to inform for Amicia, Hugo, and their family and friends. 

“More than something, the very first thing we labored on the story,” he stated. “Plague Tale is actually in regards to the story. If we hadn’t discovered a very good story, it could have been a ‘no-go’ for us.”

With Requiem, Choteau stated the workforce discovered one thing they “wished to speak about,” after which pivoted to what may very well be improved on the gameplay facet. He defined that one key adverse suggestions the workforce noticed from critics and gamers was that the gameplay was “too slender.” “You’d have only one alternative, one approach to do issues, and it is one thing we wished to handle,” he stated.

That led Asobo to construct bigger areas for Amicia to navigate, with extra instruments for getting previous rats or the assorted troopers blocking her means.

In the ultimate product, there are some neat improvements that Asobo’s give you. There’s an enormous effort to reduce the person interface, giving gamers an open and uncluttered have a look at the detailed environments. The sport’s talent tree additionally borrows from The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. Instead of getting gamers earn factors and selecting the way to make investments them, the sport tracks how the participant navigates sure environments and rewards them by granting skills from that tree. 

So if a participant needs advantages in utilizing stealth, they will need to be as sneaky as doable. But in the event that they make a mistake and survive a fight encounter (fight continues to be fast and harmful—Amicia shouldn’t be able to go toe-to-toe with murderous assholes), they will be rewarded with fight expertise. 

Choteau referred to as it “a extra systemic world” that also incorporates the diegetic puzzles of the primary sport (Requiem actually leans into the thought of a secret historic order that thought it was so sensible it may put puzzles in every single place to maintain its secrets and techniques secure).

Drowning in a whole lot of 1000’s of rats

In A Plague Tale: Innocence, Asobo was capable of put 5,000 rats onscreen directly, every powered by an AI system that might act independently if a rat navigated away from the horde. Choteau defined that in Requiem, the sport is ready to generate as much as 300,000 of the murderous little buggers, who’ve now realized the way to climb up the partitions and function on a number of flooring on the similar time oh god.

But regardless of the very seen proven fact that there are complete cities’ price of rats now onscreen, Choteau famous that in growth, the enhancements weren’t tremendous seen to the participant. The variety of rats onscreen in Innocence was “already fairly spectacular,” Choteau famous. 

So Asobo turned to creating the rats deadlier. Requiem‘s rats are significantly better at avoiding the sunshine (which is deadly to them), which reduces the quantity of room for error the participant has when navigating by means of the dense hordes. In Innocence, casting a lightweight despatched the majority of the hoard away, and particular person little rats caught within the open weren’t a menace to the participant.

Now, in case you information Amicia too near the sting of the sunshine…a fortunate few hundred rats have their starvation sated (and the participant has to reload the final checkpoint).

One large spoiler from the top of Innocence was the truth that Amicia’s little brother Hugo had a very shut connection to the rat hordes because of an historic supernatural drive referred to as The Macula. In the ultimate hours of the sport, he positive factors the facility to regulate them in a restricted capability. Asobo did little to cover this reality in advertising and marketing Requiem, displaying off sequences the place the participant works with Hugo to regulate the rats. It lets them sense enemy positions and naturally, direct them in for the kill. 

It’s a strong weapon that dangers getting away from the grounded tone of the primary sport, the place Amicia and Hugo are simply as weak to the horde because the Inquisition that hunts them. Preserving that stress in Requiem was nonetheless a significant job. Asobo was capable of preserve that stress with two straightforward instruments: limiting what number of rats Hugo may management (he is not a full rat archwizard or one thing, he is actually a toddler), and creating narrative causes for Hugo to not be with Amicia.

Because Hugo is not with Amicia on a regular basis, Asobo discovered itself in some difficult spots when it got here to fight design. There are particular sequences the place the participant may have entry to Hugo’s powers and ones the place they will not. That means the extent and AI design wanted to be versatile sufficient to assist these setpieces in addition to ones the place Amicia is extra remoted and weak. 

Choteau stated that Asobo “updates” its degree and fight design based mostly on whether or not or not the participant has entry to these rat powers, encouraging gamers to wield them with gusto once they do, and making them yearn for these instruments once they do not have them.

In observe, this philosophy denies gamers entry to Hugo’s powers for a big, significant chunk of gameplay. Amicia’s first encounter with the rat horde in Requiem is not with Hugo, however with Lucas: an alchemist’s apprentice who caught with the de Rune household after Innocence. With no supernatural energy at their facet, the pair should navigate a condemned slum constructed contained in the ruins of a Roman area. 

Feeding again into the story’s narrative, Choteau defined that the workforce wished to discover the truth that Hugo and Amicia at the moment are each distinctive killers—however they’re nonetheless simply kids. Amicia begins the sport exhausted and terrified on the notion of extra violence, and Choteau teased that for Hugo’s half, there’ll come a time when he thinks he has management over the rats—however letting that management slip may have main penalties.

Exploring southern France

The Plague Tale video games profit enormously from real-world inspiration. Though there are many fantasy titles that do wonders with the aesthetics of Medieval Europe, Asobo Studio will get to play in a particular place and time: the 14th century. Innocence delivered to life a extra conventional northern/central France that gamers could be conversant in, however Requiem heads to the areas’ southern areas that border the Mediterranean sea. 

Choteau identified that the area is usually unexplored on this planet of sport design, and that heading south meant an general shift within the collection’ coloration palette and environmental path. He stated it was “humorous” to construct up such a distinction. The environments are sometimes sunnier, the buildings brighter and extra colourful, however nonetheless crammed with demise and destruction because the Macula plague rears its head.

He grinned whereas describing a area largely outlined by photogenic postcards and work. “And then we’ll smash it,” he joked.

An attention-grabbing problem for any sport designer working with actual historical past is when historic information conflict with the favored notion of a given time and place. While researching the town of Bordeaux (the place Asobo is positioned), Choteau stated that the workforce at Asobo realized {that a} “traditionally correct” recreation of the town at the moment would have meant the town’s streets had been crammed with trash, with some piles as tall as a one-story constructing.

“You could not enter by means of the entrance door as a result of it was stuffed with trash—you’d enter by the window on the primary ground,” Choteau stated. Asobo selected to not depict that historic actuality as a result of they anxious gamers would assume they had been overselling the grossness and filth of a rat-ridden metropolis. 

Choteau’s different favourite historic proven fact that the workforce dug up: when the actual Black Plague struck France, there was a monastery not removed from Asobo’s workplace that instantly shut its doorways. “It’s the church, you are not likely supposed to do this!” he exclaimed. It’s the type of real-life story that fuels the collection’ suspicion of highly effective spiritual organizations. 

A Plague Tale Requiem, similar to its predecessor, mixes a wholesome quantity of horror and earnestness to discover a setting few video games get to take advantage of. It’s thrilling to see builders discover these sorts of fairytale-like adventures that mix historic occasions with supernatural circumstances.