GGMania got a chance to talk with Alexander Jorias, the Managing Director of Massive Development and one the programmers on AquaNox2: Revelation. He provided us with pretty interesting information about this upcoming underwater first person shooter sequel. AquaNox2: Revelation is slated for release in November 2002.


GGMania: Please start off by introducing yourself and giving us an idea of your involvement with AquaNox2: Revelation.
Alexander Jorias: My name is Alexander Jorias, I'm the Managing Director of Massive Development and one the programmers on AquaNox2: evelation


GGMania: For new gamers to AquaNox2: Revelation, can you introduce the core development team. Also the original AquaNox was developed in 2001, is this the same core team with which you produced the original?

Alexander Jorias: The core team consists more or less of the same people. Plus we added some very skilful guys over the course of the last year.




GGMania: How much continuity is there from AquaNox? What can you tell us about the actual plotline of AquaNox2: Revelation?

Alexander Jorias: There isn't continuity storywise: the plot takes place at the same time the story in AquaNox played with mostly different characters and but weakly tied to the AquaNox plotline. But there's total continuity when it comes to the consistency of the world Aqua.
There's continuity when it comes to our claim of creating intense action gameplay with an immersive storyline, high-end technology and the best graphical representation of an outdoor 3D-environment possible today.


GGMania: Is AquaNox2: Revelation a mission-disk belonging to AquaNox?

Alexander Jorias: No, it's a stand-alone product, a full sequel on its own ights.


GGMania: What makes AquaNox2: Revelation different to AquaNox?

Alexander Jorias: We improved nearly the entire game. Apart from the obvious differences in story and characters we improved the game controls, the way the story is presented, the interface the AI, the graphics engine, the graphics themselves. We now offer a multitude of different control settings, a wider variety of tactical options during the missions and a much deeper relationship between story and missions.


GGMania: What are the main locations where the action takes place this time?

Alexander Jorias: The main locations are all over the Atlantic and Western Pacific Ocean. Thus the player from time to time will strand in the habitats located there: Atacama City, El Topo's Asylum and others. But the most of the missions take place in the open sea.


GGMania: What sort of new ships will be available for use in the game?


Alexander Jorias: We reduced the number of ships and focussed on tactical differences, so that the very first ships will come in handy again later in the game. A very new feature is that you don't have to trade one ship for the other anymore. You can keep them. Up to four ships will serve the player at the same time.




GGMania: What new weapons we can expect in the sequel?
Alexander Jorias: Weapon's technology is always top secret in Aqua (C). Since the story plays at the same time as the story in AquaNox a whole bunch of new weapons would disturb the suspension of disbelief. We have new weapons, but not too many. Changes have been made mostly in terms of balancing, effects and weapon modes.


GGMania: Compared to AquaNox , are there any significant differences in the way you are designing and implementing the AI?


Alexander Jorias: Yes, definitely. AquaNox was based on a civil war scenario. Thus we had a big couple of big battles - and AI had to match the needs for big battles. AquaNox2: Revelation tells a more private story, the story of a treasure hunt, the story of the personal development of William Drake. In such a story you cannot find arguments for big battles that often. So we had to make the single enemy stronger, more human like. We developed typical behaviours for a number of NPCs like guard behaviour, snipers, dogfight behaviour etc.


GGMania: How many missions will there be, and how varied will they be?

Alexander Jorias: We have 30 Missions varying between battle scenes, stealth missions and under water races. They are very different indeed. Also each of the missions has a couple of bonus targets. Each bonus target you reach will support you with a booty: guns, torpedoes, buzzers, even extra missions. Since reaching some of the bonus targets is depending on the way you play the game this will have a deep impact on the way you experience it.


GGMania: How many hours will it take to play all through?
Alexander Jorias: That again depends on the way you play the game. Try to get all the bonus targets and you're in for a very long game experience. If you're more into straight gaming it'll take you about 20 hours.


GGMania: Did you further improve your Krass-engine for AquaNox2: Revelation?

Alexander Jorias: Yes, of course. Besides some very cool environmental effects Krass now is able to render ships of more than 30,000 polygons. We also improved the plant rendering systems by a factor of 30. Everything became slicker and faster.


GGMania: Will a lot of the look and feeling be brought from AquaNox to AquaNox2: Revelation?

Alexander Jorias: Our own feelings and public reactions supported the idea to become darker, moodier and improve the feeling of being thousands of meters under the sea. So the look and feel stepped into this direction. We also felt that the habitats, the places where the people of Aqua actually live needed a better representation in the game. So we created that pre-rendered animated background showing the habitats through the part, where the player leads the dialogs and experiences most of the story.
So honestly I have to say: there are huge differences in the look and feel of AquaNox and AquaNox2: Revelation


GGMania: What are some of the special effects you're proud of having in the game so far?

Alexander Jorias: Just take a look at the guns: the beautiful environmental mapping there. We have a huge number of new and very impressive explosions, the weapons effects got smaller without losing impressiveness.


GGMania: What type of music will be played during the missions?

Alexander Jorias: It's a wide selection between orchestral stuff and NuMetal. Whatever we thought would fit a certain situation during missions went into the soundtrack.


GGMania: I noticed that some fans (mostly Americans) criticized non-professional voice-acting in the original game. Did you hire some new actors for AquaNox2: Revelation?

Alexander Jorias: All of the actors are new. We learned a lot of this. First of all: we ourself lead the recordings. The recordings for AquaNox have been led by someone from Fishtank, which back then was our publisher. All of the speakers are experience professionals and the director is the actor who played the role of Emerald "Deadeye" Flint in the first Aqua-game ever: Archimedian Dynasty" back in 1996. AD got praises for its voice acting back then.


GGMania: Will the game have a multiplayer mode?

Alexander Jorias: No. Nowadays it's nearly impossible to create a game with an exceptional single-player mode PLUS a triple A multiplayer mode in a reasonable amount of time and money. Creating a multiplayer game which lasts in the community means no less effort anymore than creating a full scale single player game. AquaNox2: Revelation concentrates fully on singleplayer. Which doesn't mean the multiplayer in Aqua is dead.


GGMania: How are you planning on captivating the playing audience yet again?

Alexander Jorias: I already mentioned it above. Well, of course first of all we improved the game's quality by literally all means and we do everything to spread the news. Then the world of Aqua is one of those fictional worlds which are fully alive, a vivid background making each visitor wanting to come back. We love this world and we're sure there a lot of people out there want to know what's going on down there.


GGMania: What are the minimum and recommended hardware and software specifications?

Alexander Jorias: As a minimum you need a 750 Mhz processor with 128 megs RAM (256 on Win2k or WinXP systems), full DX8.1 support in any hardware periphery, a mouse and a keyboard. But we recommend a gigahertz processor and 256 Megs of RAM.




GGMania: Currently what is the status of the current progress of the game and when can we expect to see it in stores?

Alexander Jorias: We're in time for a mid-october goldmaster, so expect the game in the first half of November.


GGMania: Thank you very much for taking the time to do this interview. Is there anything else you'll like to tell our readers about?

Alexander Jorias: Thanks for asking. It's been a pleasure. Stay tuned for AquaNox2: Revelation. It's worth it. And if you're reluctant: play the demo. It'll be out soon.