Shack: And the frontline is used in every gametype?

Joe Halper: Yes. One of the maps is a small contained urban area, maybe seven or eight blocks, which makes it an assault infantry map. The frontline works well because it keeps that assault focused instead of scattered about, even over seven blocks. But in Oil Field, it's vehicle centric--as you move the vehicles across the terrain you could have two objectives to secure, four objectives to secure, whatever you want. When you're playing a game, you don't know if you want to defend the objective you just took or go try and get a new one. It's cool to see people hesitate and decide.

Shack: How does it affect single-player?

Joe Halper: It works in the same way. In single-player, you still secure these objectives any which way you want, and [the frontline] keeps it centralized. The enemies don't necessarily take it back from you, it's just something that you push for to get to the final objective of each map.

Shack: But as you do that, what's happening to the enemy? Are they getting demoralized, or...?

Joe Halper: The enemy actually increases and intensifies, but what you find is that as you secure these objectives you get other abilities, and there's a lot of replay value. There'll be one objective you can take out with an assault rifle, but there's another objective with some people who can help you take that first objective in a different way. There's a lot of gameplay variance. A lot of testers want to go back and do it faster or better. It enhances each campaign, with how to use the vehicles, how to use specific weapons. The AI is very reactive. We actually focused on the single-player first when we started the studio. We knew we could do multiplayer, but we wanted a good single-player that wasn't just a bot war. We wanted the exciting, immersive action that happens in single-player, but without the linear, "go here, do that" part.