Interview with Gameforge, the publishers of 'Kingdom Under Fire 2'

KuF2 interview.png
Last week we had the opportunity to attend the pre-launch press event for Kingdom Under Fire 2. The latter, which releases today, is an MMORPG-RTS hybrid developed by Blueside and published by Gameforge. During the event we had exclusive hands-on time with the game ahead of its release and also interviewed two Gameforge representatives, namely Noemi Feller who is the Lead Product Manager and game designer Martin Fischer, who gave us more details about the game's development from an insider point of view. Note that more specific questions about the game itself couldn't be asked as our playthrough session happened after the interview was scheduled.

INTERVIEW START

[GBAtemp] Hey there! Thanks for the interview opportunity! So Kingdom Under Fire 2 was announced back in 2008 and with such an ambitious game, it’s understandable that you’d face some challenges, but fans would likely ask: what took so long? Any challenges you’d like to highlight?

Naomi Feller: What you will experience when you play the game for the first time is you’ll see how immersive it is. It very smoothly switches between MMO and RTS, so you can basically play the same missions in two different genres and styles. Combining these two, it’s like you develop one MMO and have to put a whole RTS system on top of it, is what made it so difficult. In addition, balancing the troops made it so difficult and time consuming to develop.

Martin Fischer: The pure development of an MMORPG is a couple of years and an RTS is also a couple of years. What [the developers] are doing is fusing it together into a perfect mix to transition smoothly from one part to the other. You can adapt your playstyle to how you would like to play the game. The game does not tell you how to basically play the missions. If we have people who completely ignore the MMO part and just play every mission in the commander RTS view, that is possible. The game gives you that option, and if you consider how many unique elements are in the game, like you have 80 troops that’s so many individual animations, graphics, skills, everything balanced around each other, I can imagine that takes quite some time.

Naomi: Also related to this question is that they had to develop their own engine which is also very time consuming.

[GBAtemp] With Kingdom Under Fire 2 you are blending the real-time strategy (RTS) and massively multiplayer online (MMO) genres. Do you have a specific demographic you are targeting with this game or you want to appeal to both fans of RTS and MMO?

Naomi Feller: We would like to, of course, appeal to both of them. If this is realistic, it will show after release. This is gonna be interesting but as you can really choose how to play the missions, I think it would probably be something that could attract both. And also due its very interesting mix [of both genres], I think it’s enough to explore for everyone, but time will tell.

Martin Fischer: I personally think that it caters to more than just those two groups. We decided not to list the individual genres that the game contains. The big part are the MMO and RTS but if you go in standing in the front lines of your Berserker, slaying through hundreds of enemies - that’s not MMO and that’s not RTS, that’s just pure action gameplay. I believe the game is interesting for a wide variety of people who are interested in a unique experience that you will not find somewhere in the market currently. And the game gives you the freedom to play as you want. For example, if you completely want to ignore the RTS part, you theoretically could do that. The game gets harder because you are missing a tactical element but you can still solve it. Then let’s say you just want to participate with your troops a little bit, you have three hotkeys (troops are aggressive, troops are passive, troops follow), which means you don’t have to go out in the Commander View and move them around. Then if you want to master [the game] you can switch in and out [between modes]. There are so many ways you can play the game.

Naomi Feller: I think it could be an interesting starting point for someone who has never tapped into RTS before because you get introduced very smoothly into RTS. It trains you very smoothly from the beginning - you get one unit first and then if you are very beginner at RTS you have three simple hotkeys. As you get more experience and learn how to control additional units, you can go into more tactical view where you actually select each single one of them and use specific skills. So I think it’s a good starting point for players who want to tap into RTS.

Martin Fischer: I watched someone during one of the play sessions who actually played the whole mission by never going into the Hero view, just through the RTS view. That’s theoretically also possible. So each individual element is designed so players can play the game how they want - that’s the big freedom Kingdom Under Fire 2 will give you. So I think it caters to a lot of players

[GBAtemp] Are there any plans to bring the game to consoles at this point?

Naomi Feller: We are always open [to such suggestions] but have nothing to share at this point. We will definitely think about it.

Martin Fischer: It’s such a frequently asked question and it would be strange not to think about it.

[GBAtemp] So this is something of a tradition by now with our interviews at GBAtemp, and we’d like to ask you: Who or what is your favorite video game character?

Naomi Feller: It’s Mario!

Martin Fischer: I don’t know if I should reveal mine but… it’s Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII!

Naomi Feller: Oh, Squall from Final Fantasy VIII! I changed my answer to Squall. I had a crush on him back then when I played the game!

Martin Fischer: I can still hear the theme song for Sephiroth!

INTERVIEW END

That was it for the latest entry in our interview series! We would like to thank Gameforge for inviting us to the pre-launch event and for setting up the interview opportunity. Below you will find some exclusive screenshots taken during our pre-launch playthrough:

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ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_16_37_13.jpg ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_16_50_27.jpg ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_16_50_32.jpg ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_16_52_28.jpg ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_16_52_33.jpg ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_16_53_43.jpg ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_16_56_59.jpg ScreenShot_678058_2019_11_5_17_8_8.jpg

Kingdom Under Fire 2 releases today, November 14th, as a pay-to-play title with packages starting from €29.99. Find out more about the game and the different packages available via the link below!

:arrow: Official Kingdom Under Fire 2 website
 

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Even if the game is subpar, I applaud them for the effort put in advertising.
I hope they succeed.
 

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