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Medal of Honor Warfighter powered by Frostbite 2.0
Medal of Honor Warfighter executive producer Greg Goodrich told Joystiq this evening that October's Danger Close game is being built using EA DICE's in-house Battlefield engine, Frostbite 2.0. This marks the second use of Frostbite 2.0 outside of its origin studio, following last year's Need for Speed: The Run.After a brief on-stage presentation of the game in action, Goodrich spoke to us about how Danger Close is attempting to distinguish the game visually, despite it being built in the same engine that powers EA's other big shooter. To us, the game didn't look dramatically different from what we've seen in DICE's work with Frostbite 2.0, via BF3."I don't think the engine dictates on what it's gonna look like," Goodrich said. "We have a wonderful art director who has a very clear vision of the type of lens he wants to tell our story through. The tech is just a canvas, and that canvas is much larger than it's ever been before."MoH Warfighter is being developed entirely in-house at Danger Close this time around, with DICE offering little more than engine support (and perhaps the occasional hearty back pat). Goodrich confirmed to us that he and his team aren't growing the same impressive beards during Warfighter's dev cycle."My wife won't let me this time," Goodrich said with a smile. "Same guys, less beard."%Gallery-149880%
Medal of Honor: Warfighter brings back real-world vets Preacher and Mother
EA is bringing back real-world veterans for Medal of Honor: Warfighter, its follow-up to 2010's Medal of Honor reboot, USA Today reports. Rather than use their knowledge to recreate the events of any single campaign -- such as killing Osama Bin Laden -- they're helping shape a game focused on a new threat called PETN.It's a recent tool of terrorism; a deadly explosive agent called pentaerythritol tetranitrate. "It's a very real world threat that the guys are faced with keeping off our shores and out of our shopping malls and train stops," says Greg Goodrich, who returns as producer at Danger Close.Warfighter will focus mostly on Preacher and Mother, two SEALs seen in the previous game. The Tier One operators who helped script the campaign are meant to humanize the soldiers, providing us a glimpse of their home lives and the repercussions of their lifestyles."It is meant to be entertaining, and we hope people really enjoy that, but in the process there's a lot of misconceptions that will be stripped and there's a lot of clichés that will be destroyed," said Nate, one of the mysterious Tier One operators and co-writers of Medal of Honor: Warfighter. "And there's a lot of humor that will be injected. But at the end of it you hope people get a sense of 'Wow this is not who I thought these guys were.' They are very likable, very approachable, very family-oriented guys."
Medal of Honor devs rename 'Taliban' to 'Opposing Force' in multiplayer mode
In a reaction to outcry from friends and families of fallen soldiers, Medal of Honor developer Danger Close and publisher EA have decided to rename the multiplayer faction in their game from "Taliban" to "Opposing Force." Executive producer Greg Goodrich announced as much on the MOH blog this morning, explaining the alteration by saying, "We are making this change for the men and women serving in the military and for the families of those who have paid the ultimate sacrifice -- this franchise will never willfully disrespect, intentionally or otherwise, your memory and service." This isn't the first such predicament Medal of Honor has faced in its development -- early last month it was revealed that GameStop stores within Army and Air Force bases wouldn't carry the game, with GameStop's internal memo naming the playable Taliban as its reasoning. Unfortunately, we're not sure we see a solution here -- considering combatant casualties in any war are "opposing forces," won't considerably more people be offended this way?
Medal of Honor campaign detailed on GameTrailers TV
If you missed the latest episode of GTTV, fret not: just past the break, we've embedded the episode, which pulls back the curtain on Medal of Honor's campaign mode. Initially, all we knew was that the game would take place in Afghanistan and you'd be among one of the beard-sporting elite known as Tier One Operators. However, thanks to executive producer Greg Goodrich, we now know a bit more -- specifically, that the campaign will be divided up into three parts and follows a team on the hunt for Al Quaeda. Goodrich also mentions the story will be told "from two different sides," implying that players will eventually be able to take up the mantle of the terrorists themselves. But, hey, why are we still gabbing on? Head on past the break and absorb this intel first-hand for yourself, including a look at two never-before-seen single-player levels. Consider it an order, soldier!
Danger Close: The story behind EA LA's new name
"It was literally an exercise of about 20 minutes because it just came up, it happened, we went with it, and there you go," new Danger Close studio head Greg Goodrich told us in an interview last night, explaining how he and two of his colleagues came up with the new name of their studio (formerly EA LA). Late last evening, EA revealed that its Los Angeles-based development house would be rebranded. The studio is now known as Danger Close, which Goodrich told Joystiq is indicative of the reborn studio's direction. "I think the core of what we're doing right now and the sort of DNA of this team and this studio is the first-person shooter genre. I can't foresee us doing anything other than that in the near future, and specifically Medal of Honor." Goodrich did add, however, that his hands aren't tied creatively in terms of what the studio is allowed to do -- be it first-person shooter or whatever else it might have in store. That said, Goodrich wasn't speaking about anything other than Medal of Honor, and he remained coy about his studio's involvement with the game post-release. He's proud of the mutliplayer component built by DICE, but he's not ruling out Danger Close getting involved in multiplayer support, say through DLC. "Personally, I think that would be something that the guys here would be very excited about doing in the future," he offered. "But, you know, we're gonna see how this one works out and see how the fans accept it, and make those decisions at a later time." Goodrich is content to leave his studio's future plans a mystery. "That's also a part of creating your own identity and starting your own future, and throwing up a website that says 'Now hiring,'" he teased. "There's intent there."
EA: 'We're going to be in the Medal of Honor business for a long time'
EA's upcoming reboot to the Medal of Honor franchise has a few major contenders, one of which EA itself created, to compete with when it arrives at retail this October. But EA Games prez Frank Gibeau remains confident in MoH, telling Gamasutra in a recent interview that, "With Medal of Honor, we're rebooting the series to get into the top 10." Gibeau lays out plans for an extensive marketing campaign first aimed at "core shooter fans," then branching out to a "true mass-market campaign." Speaking frankly, he claims "It'll be a big launch with a lot of dollars behind it. We're going to go in and we're going to compete." He believes that, between the IP's pedigree and the quality of this reboot, EA's " going to be in the Medal of Honor business for a long time." Meanwhile, executive producer Greg Goodrich and senior creative director Rich Farrelly do their best to assuage worries of internal competition between themselves at EA LA and DICE, the Battlefield: Bad Company 2 developer now working on MoH's multiplayer mode, or the ex-Infinity Ward founders' new studio that EA recently inked a deal with. Goodrich says, "Battlefield and Medal of Honor are two very different franchises. They have a certain tone, and we have a certain tone for our game. We think there's room for both, not only in the genre, but within EA." Also of note, apparently DICE has been working on MoH's multiplayer since "right after Battlefield 1943 came out" (last July), which might help to explain why we've seen such little post-launch support for the downloadable title. That said, with Medal of Honor's development assuredly nearing completion, we're holding out hope that those folks will have some time to invest in the other downloadable title we heard about recently.
