Eurogamer Expo Sessions: Maxx Kaufman presents Hunted

We actually have an animated book that we're going to put out that talks about how they grew up and how they came together. But basically they were doing individual jobs and they kind of bumped into each other going for the same goal. They didn't plan on it, and then they were like, "Hey, you know what? We've got good complementary abilities and moods to make this work." When you're playing the game they've been together for years.

Haha, I like that. Exactly!

Yes we are.

Yes definitely.

Was he in Snatch?

Well, the demo we have on the show floor is actually part of the tutorial - we kind of ripped it out of the tutorial and added some elements. Really the idea of the demo on the show floor is to give an idea of the combat. It's to show the combat because the combat's different.

Unfortunately with the limited time we have we can't really show off the depth of the game - we can't show a lot of the differences. For example, we have some very challenging puzzles and exploration. To just throw that into a short demo didn't seem logical. You really need to sit down and get an hour's worth of gameplay out of it. So the demo is geared towards 15 minutes of giving you an idea of the combat, the action that you'll encounter, and some of the visuals.

The presentation we're doing shows off more of the diversity. Again it doesn't go too deep into the exploration, but I think between the two it's a good snapshot.

They will. They can either play co-operatively, or sometimes we have chaperones that go along with them, so they're still playing co-operatively but it gives you an idea of the co-op experience.

Haha, I'd rather patrol the floor and see people's reactions and see what they're doing. For us it's so important to get to a stage where we can put the game in front of people who have never seen it and see where it's falling short. Some of the most successful games of all time have been built on this iteration and seeing how people react. Half-Life is one of my favourite games of all time and they really took that as far as they could - and the results are amazing. I think any game you create, you need to almost complete and then put it in front of as many people as you can.

It makes such a difference. Like, somebody gets lost in an area. You go, "Well, I could put a pick-up item towards the exit to catch their eye." I think that iterative process is so huge and we're battling towards that now. We're almost at beta. We're getting the game together and we'll do as much time as possible getting people in front of it.

You know, we've talked about it and it's gone up and down. There's good things and bad things. Development-wise obviously it takes more time. I think at this point it's really up to Bethesda. I don't know that I feel either way - I just want people to understand the game and get the depth, and a playable demo would accomplish that. It's on the table for sure, just hasn't been decided.

It's putting all these pieces together. It's a game right now that has all the elements, and 95-98 per cent of the elements are done - it's just putting them in the right spots and cleaning up the sloppiness. If you looked at it right now it would have areas that are really good and areas that are really sloppy, so it's just pulling everything together. It takes time. You know, these games these days are so big that it's a lot of effort, a lot of work and a lot of people working.