ABOVE: I’m not a
farmer so I’ll just
assume this is a really
lively corn crop.“SAM HAS TO DEAL
WITH THE FULL-
FLEDGED INVASION
OF THE EARTH”but from talking with the studio and
experiencing snippets of the dialogue,
as voiced by the pair in placeholder
audio, the tone is very much Serious
Sam and not philosophical android
consciousness puzzler.
In terms of the game structure,
despite some huge levels, Croteam is
keen to point out that Planet Badass
will not be an
open world game.
The team likens it
to Uncharted 4,
with large maps
you can explore
for sidemissions
or Easter eggs but
ultimately there’s
a linear mission
path to follow, and the vast
128kmx128km level spaces will be
interspersed with smaller maps.
“In other words, we’re just using
this tech to take Sam’s new adventure
on a brutally bigger scale and tell the
story, instead of building the game
around the tech,” explains Ladavac.
“This time Sam has to deal with
the full-fledged invasion of the Earth
by Mental’s armies and armies aren’t
comprised of five, ten or even ahundred simultaneous enemies in a
single scene. We wanted to have
thousands [of ] enemies, no, hundreds
of thousands [of ] enemies in epic
battles that aren’t just cutscenes and
you can be a part of battle – in an FPS
game! Think Lord of the Rings, with
you playing as Sam in the thick of it,
wielding a minigun. And no beards.”
I’m assuming
the Sam in this
instance refers to
Sam Stone and
not Samwise
Gamgee; the
latter is clean-
shaven but lacks a
minigun.
Supporting
this cinematic scope is a slight
change in the music direction for the
franchise. The games’ soundscapes
have traditionally focused on
instruments and rhythms closely
linked with the location. Serious
Sam 4 will still have that element,
however Damjan Mravunac – he of
the E3 guitar ballad and eternal
sound studio construction fame- explains that the whole thing will
sound more cinematic.
Rather than Sam blasting his way
through these worlds as a lone
badass, this time he is one badass
amongst many.
Talking to Ladavac, Croteam had
started to make that change from
lone badass in Serious Sam 3, but
lacked the resources to put many
characters into the game. This time
around you’re joining the remaining
chunk of humanity in trying to resist
series antagonist, Mental’s invasion of
Earth, so it’s a prequel. “We’re all for
prequels of prequels,” says Ladavac.
“When you put that together with
time travel it’s very interesting
because the third one is actually
before the first one but it’s actually
after the second one because he went
back in time. It gets complicated!”
This conversation is starting to
feel like Mulholland Drive. Rather
than trying to draw a timeline out of
all this, you just need to know that
Earth is now a planet populated by
remaining badasses. “It’s pretty
badass,” concludes Ladavac.
Curiously, the story is being
handled by Jonas and Verena
Kyratzes. Jonas previously worked
with Croteam on The Talos Principle,