This post is part of part of my
WGK2013 impressions
City Interactive's presentation, titled "Like a Boss", showcased two boss battles, from Alien Rage (an fps) and Lords of the Fallen. Michał Muk, working on AR and Tom Gop, lead for LotF, first talked about some of the processes behind designing a memorable, compelling boss - one of the key elements mentioned was dividing the battle into stages, with the bosses getting new moves, visual and sound changes etc. This both raises the challenge and gives the player a sense of progression throughhout the battle.
Then, they showed the actual battles, live, with each dev playing the other's game. On his first try against the Alien Rage boss, Tom quickly died to the large, but fast alien brute. The second try took quite long, but Tom finally found his rhythm, using environmental damage from volatile storage tanks and killed his opponent. Honestly, I thought the game looked OK, but nothing to write home about (which I am kind of doing anyway, duh).
Lords of the Fallen on the other hand, was pretty much the highlight of the day. We were first shown some footage from a simple testing prototype of the battle, with rudimentary models and environment. Gameplay-wise, it looked almost
too much like Dark Souls (if that's at all possible) with even an identical placement of interface elements and a familiar font. The proper gameplay started just before the gate to the battle area, with bodies of fallen warriors signalling what's to come. As you might know, I had some serious criticism towards the game's art style from the materials released so far. The live gameplay managed to convince me though, thanks in large part to fantastic lighting. Colorful but muted, it managed to create a sombre atmosphere, toning down the cartoonish style of the models.
As Michał entered a partly ruined gothic hall, he was faced with his opponent - the First Warden, an imposing knight clad in black armour, wielding a flaming sword and a massive shield with which he could completely block incoming blows from Michał's hammer. In comparison to the prototype, the game looked a
little bit less like DkS - interface elements shifted places, and the camera was more over-the-shoulder type it's still being tweaked though - Michał had some trouble judging the distance from his opponent, and at some point the camera was visibly struggling when he got backed into a corner. As in the Souls games, observation and timing seemed crucial, and Michał got hit quite a few times when he got too careless. Unlike the previous presentation, cheats were turned on here - always leaving Michał with a sliver of health rather than letting him die to the boss. Still, it was obvious he would have normally died about five times before the battle was over
As the fight progressed, we could see the stages mentioned - after losing a segment of his life bar, the First Warden would shed parts of his armor, take a couple of seconds recuperating (the timing is still being tweaked). Eventualy, the boss also shed his shield (losing the ability to block) and started two-handing his sword, unleashing a fearsome spinning attack, his fiery sword gracefully drawing patterns of gleaming sparks through the air - the particle effects here were truly spectacular, most likely powered by PhysX (I do know the game was running on a PC with an nvidia gpu). Dodging the whirling blade, Michał finally managed to get in the final blows and vanquish the black knight, finishing the presentation to well-deserved applause.