Hello, I’m very glad to talk with you, thank you. First, could you introduce yourself to our readers ? What is exactly your job at Rare studios ?

George Andreas (Rare) : My official title is Senior Games Designer.

How long have you been working for Kameo : Elements of Power ? Did you work for the GameCube version ?

Kameo : Elements of Power has been in development for nearly 5 years now. I was working on the game since the beginning and was part of the original GameCube team.

Is the game finished now ?

Game content wise, yes, the game is finished. We're just putting the finishing touches to the game and ironing out any last remaining bugs. We're about to go into certification any day now.



What was the main problem for you during the developement of the game ?

The main problem really was having to develop 10 great playable warrior characters. It's hard enough trying to come up with one good playable character that every one can enjoy and like playing with. But to then come up with nine others that all offer enough variety to keep the player engaged - that's the really hard part! The warriors also represent the players moves to help them get around the game world and we tried to make sure that the combat moves would also be used to help open up new areas of the game world. Kameo : Elements of Power is very unique in this respect. And of course, providing the warriors with enough cool and varied upgrades was also a big challenge.

Moving from GameCube to Xbox, and then to Xbox 360 actually gave us the time we needed to really evolve the characters as much as we could. It also meant we could really flesh out other parts of the game that we always wanted to do, but didn't have the power to do justice to.

It would have been very easy for us to simply port the game from one machine to the next, but we took our time and made sure we evolved the game in the right areas when we moved from platform to the next. The final Xbox 360 version is a very different beast to the first GameCube version. Kameo : Elements of Power has definitely matured very well as a game.

We saw that many improvements were made since E3, Kameo : Elements of Power looks amazing now, could you tell us on which aspect of the game your team has been working lately ?

What we showed at E3 was running on Beta kits. Not final hardware. And so the impact for both our Xbox 360 games (Kameo : Elements of Power and Perfect Dark) was not as overwhelming as some people might have expected. But we did stress at the time that ALL Xbox 360 games will look and feel so much better when the final hardware became available. Both Kameo : Elements of Power and Perfect Dark have really befitted from the extra power the final hardware provides. In Kameo : Elements of Power we have all sorts of fantastic visual effects that we didn't have at E3 - so things like self shadowing, depth of field and a more realistic lighting system that really helps bring the game world alive. Also, out artists and programmers have really began to understand what can and can't be achieved in a very small space of time and this helps us focus our efforts on the things we know we could do really well. Like having thousands of characters on screen for example!

We saw many videos of Kameo : Elements of Power on the web, but we still don’t know its story, could you give us some elements about it ?

Without wanting to give too much away, the story centers around Kameo : Elements of Power, her sister Kalus and their Ancestors. The Troll King Thorn has been released from a spell the Elves placed on him many, many years ago and he takes the Ancestors because they have something he needs. Kameo : Elements of Power has to fight her way through the game in an effort to rescue all of her ancestors and ultimately her own mother from Kalus and Thorn. There are more than a few surprises in store for those that follow the storyline, and things aren't always as they seem...

The atmosphere of the game is really special. What was your inspiration to create the world of Kameo : Elements of Power ?

The whole team wanted to create a believable fairy tale, but one that always had a bit of an edge to it. We wanted to make sure Kameo : Elements of Power's world always had a balance between light and dark, good and evil. And the way the world is depicted really highlights this. For example, the first level is set in Thorns Castle which has a very ominous and dark feel to it. And the very next area they player is treated to is the Enchanted Kingdom which is bright and mystical. From that moment on the mood is set and the two extremes of the Kameo : Elements of Power game world help establish the good and the bad - but both belong in the same universe. The world's surrounding these areas are part inspired by the Elemental Warriors. Their look and style also dictates the world in which they live and exist in. We also have a great concept artist who's also really good at tuning into what we want. We ask him to draw up several designs based on a few parameters, and he then goes away and comes up with some really amazing stuff. Sometimes he'll go way off the rails and draw something completely unlike what we discussed, but when we see these, sometimes we much prefer them so we get him to embellish them some more. It's a very organic and creative process.

I heard some awesome music of Kameo : Elements of Power available on your official website, who created those music ?

All the music in Kameo : Elements of Power is written and composed by Steven Burke - this is his first project but he's done a fantastic job creating the right moods and really stamping his own unique style to the game. All the sound effects you hear in the game have been generated by one of our more experienced sound engineers, Eveline Novakovic. Together they make a very strong audio team. Bu great sounds and music could be destroyed by poor implementation, and thankfully software engineer Andy Patrick made sure that everything went in as specified and to a very high standard.

The hero can change into many different warriors ? Where did you get that idea ?

Tim Stamper came up with a part of the original idea/concept. And that was that the lead character could use monsters/ warriors to help further the adventure. But at that time, there was no Kameo : Elements of Power, no warriors, no real idea that the player would morph into characters and actually become them - just that the player would use them in some way. There was also a lot more to the original concept that involved ideas like catching the young monsters, evolving them when they were young and then standing back and unleashing them into battles. But fairly soon after development started, we really had to focus on areas we thought we could do justice to and what the team thought was possible given the small amount of people we had on the project at the time. So we went for an experience that would challenge the players skill more and made Kameo : Elements of Power a more dynamic player experience.

Who is your favorite warrior ?

Actually, I have two, sorry. Flex and Thermite. Flex because he's just so different looking and so amazing to use when you get use to him. And Thermite because he's so damn powerful when you know how to use him at his best.

What is the real challenge for the gamer ?

The main challenge is really getting to grips with so many new and unique warriors and using them all to progress through the game world. When you first start playing, you think that the warriors may feel a little limited in some way because there are only two buttons to access the attacks. But then when you learn how to combine some of the warriors moves together and then learn about the upgrades and warrior focus, you start getting more and more out of them. And that's when the game really hits you hard. It's like uncovering and discovering many layers of gameplay - it all suddenly clicks. And then there's the really competitive and unique scoring element. For those that really invest time and effort to learn about how to score millions of points, then there's a whole new game waiting to be played right there. I thought I knew all the best ways of achieving huge scores, but then I saw what some of the testers and other members of the team were scoring I thought they were cheating in some way so had to go and watch what they did - and they totally blew me away! There are so many ways and tricks to achieving high scores that it's going to be very interesting seeing people compete for top spots on the live leaderborads in the coming months.

Also I think split screen co-op (system link and live co op will be available shortly after the game is released) is another challenge for the gamer as it's the first game of its type to offer this function. For me, playing the game co-operatively has no real equal. It's amazing fun trying to 'help' your friend beat up on some trolls, but accidentally spearing them in the head with one of Chilla's Ice shards. I've lost count the amount of times I've said 'sorry...' but then fell about laughing while my friend tries to run away as I 'accidently' keep throwing more spears at them!

How intelligent are the ennemies in the game ?

As intelligent as they need to be for this type of action game. The trolls make up the bulk of the enemies and the trolls can hear, they see, they have many different types of awareness. They can even react to the players moves. So if the player likes to pick the trolls off with Chilla's Ice Spears, they will eventually learn to try and avoid this. Also, they can be scared into running for cover in given situations. So the trolls display a good level of overall player awareness.

Could you tell us a little bit more about the bonus we can unlock in Kameo : Elements of Power, what kind ?

There are too many cool features to list. The higher you score, the more you unlock. But an example is the alternative warrior skins. Running around with a different looking Chilla or Flex is brilliant. Especially when others around you don't know how to unlock it!

So what is now your next project ?

If Kameo : Elements of Power does well, then we're sure they'll be call for a sequel. We have some good ideas about what to do with a sequel, but we are not working on Kameo : Elements of Power 2 right now. We also have several other ideas and plans for new projects, but we can't really talk too much about those yet.

Any chance to see a new Banjo game soon ?

As with all things related to future projects at Rare, you'll know about them when the time is right.

One last word for our readers ?

We really hope you‘ll enjoy Kameo : Elements of Power as much as we enjoyed making it!

Thank you very much.