016
06
While Journey To
The Savage Planet
is the first game to
blast off from
Typhoon Studios, a
lot of the staff
behind the game have a history of
successful missions. Between them,
co-founders Alex Hutchinsonand
Reid Schneider
(creative director
and executive
producer
respectively) have
worked on
Batman, Far Cry,
and Assassin’s
Creed. Savage
Planet might seem
quite different from those globally-
known franchises, but Hutchinson
explains it’s not really.
“Exploration is core to all [those
titles], and it’s still one of the thingsthat fascinates me most about
games,” he says. “With Savage
Planet to take it out of the real world
and into a more fantastical sci-fi
style interpretation was exciting: not
being bound by reality gives us the
opportunity to try all kinds of weird
and wonderful design ideas for
creaturesortools or challenges
that we couldn’t
do in a more
realistic game.”
Schneider adds,
“It’s really
refreshing to work
on something that
is bright and
colourful; for
most of the team
(myself included) this is the
exception rather than the rule.”
Exploring this strange world,
which you’re unceremoniously
dumped onto by your employer,provides plenty of bizarre
experiences. The world is alien, after
all. Your role is more to uncover the
mysteries of this planet than shoot it
up. “At first we didn’t even want a
gun!” explains Hutchinson. “We set
ourselves an early goal of having
other tools that were more
interesting or more useful than the
gun.” Eventually, the gun did make its
way into the game, but only
alongside other gadgets. “We only
have one gun in the whole game and
it’s a strange solar-powered device
that can be overclocked (if you
upgrade it), kind of like a super-
soaker, to gain extra functionality.”INSPECTOR GADGET
Those other tools will get plenty of
use as you chart this zany corner of
the galaxy. “I’m a fan of the grapple
seed,” says Hutchinson. “You can
throw it onto weird purple fungusWE HAVE A
POINT TO MAKE,
BUT WE WANT TO
LAUGH ALONG
THE WAY.Now we’re talking
terraforming
We discuss Journey To The Savage Planet with Typhoon Studios
There are lots of
interesting environments
and bizarre creatures to
uncover on AR-Y 26.dev talk
“[Golden Age sci-fi]
serials had a sense
of optimism that I find
really attractive at
the moment. People in
search of adventure,
or discovery, and this
feeling of hope and a
belief in our ability to
overcome adversity.
I wanted the game
to have an uplifting
feeling so winding the
clock back [...] felt like
a good starting point.”
Alex Hutchinson
Creative director,
Typhoon Studios