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Quantic Dreams' David Cage

On the development of Heavy Rain, Move integration and the difficulty of the triple-A market

GamesIndustry.biz Do you ever regret sticking with one platform? Because you’ve said that you wanted Heavy Rain to reach wider audiences and prove that games can stand head and shoulders with other forms of entertainment - siding with one format seems to go against that.
David Cage

No, honestly, no. I’m absolutely happy with the agreement with Sony, it was the perfect move. It was the right platform for what we wanted to achieve, it was the platform with the Blu-ray disc, promoting movies, promoting a more sophisticated entertainment experience.

GamesIndustry.biz So it helped that Sony’s platform is seen as more of a home entertainment box rather than just a games machine?
David Cage

Yes, certainly. The question is more for us now, with Heavy Rain it was right, but after Heavy Rain the question can be asked whether we should stick to one platform or open out to different platforms. Now that we’re established why are we limiting ourselves to one share of the market when we can reach more. There are pros and cons and it’s not an easy decision.

GamesIndustry.biz Are you looking to go multiform at with your next project?
David Cage

We’re not looking at anything, we have people asking, and we’re seeing different options. We’re really thankful of Sony’s support and the relationship we have because there are very few publishers that would have supported Heavy Rain the way they supported us.

GamesIndustry.biz You said in your session at GDC Europe that there were no tools for the kind of game you created with Heavy Rain, apart from Word.
David Cage

I didn’t have any tools to write it, but we had tools for every other aspect of the project. We’re a very tools-centric company. But in terms of writing we don’t have any software to write this specific type of game. It’s difficult to have a tool that can simplify the writing because there are no mechanics. Each game is different depending on what story you want to tell and how you want to play it. Having a tool that was dedicated to writing would be extremely useful.

GamesIndustry.biz The next step for Heavy Rain is to introduce Move support. Was that a significant extra cost to add that to the game and at what point in the development process was that incorporated?
David Cage

It came up at the end of the project and Sony saw the success of the game. We came up with the idea fairly early on to have motion control in the game. So we thought it was the perfect fit, it makes sense from a gameplay point of view. We dedicated all of the Heavy Rain team to this extension, so it’s not really something we did cheap. We did it right, we’ve added a lot of content, there is about 45 minutes of extra video content that’s really interesting. The team has done a really great job of this version, it’s something we really, really worked on.

GamesIndustry.biz Do you see it helping sales of the game to pick up again?
David Cage

I think we’re going to get some sales of the game by releasing this version, which is of course why Sony asked us to do it. Is it going to sell zillions of copies? I don’t know, I think people who were already interested in the game have already bought it. I’m also glad that those people have access to a free patch for the new version of Heavy Rain. For some the (DualShock) controller was maybe a barrier, and hopefully they’ll pick up the game with Move.

GamesIndustry.biz Do you think Move can extend the lifecycle of the PlayStation 3 significantly?
David Cage

It’s difficult to answer that question and I think Sony has better insight into that. I’m curious to see how Move will do. It really depends on the software because the hardware works really well. It’s all about the software. If it’s only about casual entertainment and casual games I don’t think it’s going to play a big role in the life of the console. If it can get more support from triple-A titles then that will be interesting.

David Cage is founder and president of Quantic Dream. Interview by Matt Martin.

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Matt Martin

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Matt Martin joined GamesIndustry in 2006 and was made editor of the site in 2008. With over ten years experience in journalism, he has written for multiple trade, consumer, contract and business-to-business publications in the games, retail and technology sectors.
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