Former designers from the Battlefield series are looking to try something a little different. In Project Wight, players control an intelligent monster whose kind has been driven to near extinction by humanity.
Project Wight is the current focus of The Outsiders, a studio founded by David Goldfarb and Ben Cousins. The duo have worked on various titles in the Battlefield series included the much loved Battlefield: Bad Company 2. The studio released a sneak peek of their game yesterday.
Among the team’s many goals is a desire to look at video games from a different perspective. Goldfarb and Cousins explained outlined their vision in a brief interview with Kotaku.
“I always side with the monster and the underdog,” Goldfarb said. “This is a way to invert the traditional idea of being a hero.”
He cites John Gardner’s Grendel as an inspiration for the change to a non-human perspective. The two also see plenty of opportunities for interesting gameplay that capitalizes on the monster’s ability to do what humans can’t.
“We’re inventing this species of creatures. We can invent what it does,” Cousins explained.
Cousins also mentioned Project Wight’s intention to show different phases of the creature’s life. Players can expect shift in how powerful or vulnerable they are at different stages of development. They hope this allows for gameplay variety.
Project Wight is also a technical passion project. The game is developed using Unity. The duo are eager to show that the engine can deliver an experience on par with AAA productions. The project still has a long way to go but the team is optimistic.
“In a couple of months, we were able to turn a prototype into something competitive,” Cousins noted. Goldfarb was similarly enthusiastic.
“I think the opportunities are greater than the potential challenges,” he added. “What’s compelling to me is that you’ll get to inhabit another space imaginatively.”
Disclosure: Ben Cousins wrote a column for Kotaku in 2012