GDC10: Our chat with Echo Bazaar's Alexis Kennedy, Part 2

By Beau Hindman

Alexis talked about the possibility of the game being pushed into a fully realized 3-D MMO, something that "the thought of sends chills down my spine." It would be interesting to see such a game make it into the market, being that "a lot of MMOs are the same thing with a different skin. If the industry had been born from a different game we might all be playing different games now. I would like to see a game where whole areas could be built around seducing people, or being engaged in a writing or art project. Echo Bazaar or not I would play that MMO in a heartbeat."

"I would like to see a game where whole areas could be built around seducing people, or being engaged in a writing or art project. Echo Bazaar or not I would play that MMO in a heartbeat."

Predictably, even the mention of "Facebook game" or "social gaming" tends to pull the haters out of the woodwork. And Alexis admits that most of the social games are "click, grind, stupid." He also talked about how a lot of the time the games are designed to do two things: to be completely sporadic so that players can play for 2 minutes a day, and to extract money. Fortunately, though, he didn't think the situation needed to remain so.

"The things that social games can give you that MMOs have a hard time giving you is if you want an interesting story, and if you want to craft with other people and socialize with other people, you can do it without spending 30 hours a week and arranging a raid with large groups of people." He went on to compare many of the social games to a game like EVE Online, a game in which many players admit to never leaving the station. And a social game does what a lot of MMOs do not, which is "Respect players time, and I'm all about that."

Players can advance through the game using fate, a type of in-game currency. While many casual games/Facebook games rely heavily on cash-shop purchases in order for players to advance, Echo Bazaar allows a player to play through the entire game without making a single purchase. "If something is free to play but you have to pay to get the good stuff, it's a bit shady. At least in principle, every part of our game is accessible without spending a cent. Now, in practice it can be really hard. But you can, given enough time and effort, build up enough fate to get into any restricted portion of the game."

So, why should someone play Echo Bazaar? "Because they have never seen a story like it. There's nothing else quite like it in the world." That's a pretty bold claim, but the game's success shows that he might not be that far off the mark.

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