In this interview (conducted all the way back atGamescomlast year!)
It also makes a lot of sense for the story.
So the split was decided later on?
Another big decision was the delay to 2025, to avoid launching against Life is Strange: Double Exposure.
What made your mind up about needing to hold off?
Were you sad to see Life is Strange plant its release date flag in the ground first?
And for us as developers, it also gives us a bit more breathing room to polish things better.
Koch:Magical realism is definitely important in our previous games, and is important also again here.
As you saw in the trailers, the characters see something in the woods that we are hinting at.
But we’re still telling a story about a group of friends that is anchored in reality.
I wouldn’t expect some full sci-fi supernatural, high stakes power, or anything that’s too major.
So you’re not getting into the midichlorians of it all?
Koch:[Joking] Maybe we should change that… No, of course not.
I think we never did in our previous games either.
So the plan is that these characters can come back?
Or… some of them can?
What can come back to and add to the world?
I look forward to your Stephen King self-insert.
Or maybe leave that to David Cage.
And we really wanted to push that.
Koch:It is a balance, and it’s something we’ve adjusted a lot.
We have this younger designer who joined us who’s played the game and provided good feedback.
She’s said ‘oh, this is very Boomer-like, maybe you should remove it’.
But maybe sometimes you want a bit of Boomer, to show these now-adults are from a different generation.
