Podcast Q&A summary
Q1: Does one have to play WFC in order to understand the FoC story?
A1: Nope. But doing so may give you an extra level of enjoyment.
Q2: Which TFs did not make it into the game, and where would they want the series to head next?
A2: Arcee. Being a female character, her animation skeleton would have required twice as much animation, which was too much for their system. Also, no Primus (as Cybertron's robot mode) or Unicron. As for where the series would go, there's a big gap of time between the TFs leaving Cybertron and arriving on Earth, so there's that to explore. And it'd be awesome to flesh out the era of the Thirteen, either
Knights of the Old Republic-style or RPG style. Then again, Hasbro is very precious with that timeperiod.
Q3: Will there be any FoC toys?
A3: Hasbro has been quiet about that, so it's not yet known.
Q4: Were there parts of the FoC game written to connect to the Prime cartoon?
A4: No. There are a couple of things that they did to connect with Prime, but not necessarily in the story. They create the story, and then work with Hasbro to make sure it doesn't violate what goes on in the Prime series. But they did grab some things from Prime in the visual development of certain things like Cliffjumper's head, Optimus's gun, some ship designs, some melee weapons, etc. etc.
As an aside, they reiterated that the show and the two games are seen as part of the same overall continuity.Q5: Any thoughts about single-player DLC for this game?
A5: There have been talks. They're still going through the finances of that that and haven't committed to anything yet. But they are interested and are trying to see where they're going with this.
Q6: With Teletraan I being in this game, will gamers be able to access it and learn some history info of the TFs in this continuity? Will there be any attempts in this game to decompress the narrative and add some text files (like in
Arkham Asylum and
Mass Effect) to expand out the lore for those who are interested.
A6: Short answer, "Yes." WFC had an okay story that didn't need to expand on the things that most non-TF fans wouldn't care about. But, there is still that hunger for that next layer down of backstory, audio logs, text logs, concept art, that was not satisfied with WFC. So, they're looking at a number of ways to give this extra info in this game should it be wanted. Don't know if it'll be done through Teletraan, but they're looking at several options.
Q7: Is Megatron fought by the player as an Autobot?
A7: A straight answer for this wasn't permitted to be given. Instead, it was described how Megatron plays an important role in the game as a character who's to be seen from many perspectives, as are a lot of the charactrs in the game. The first game was an Autobot story and a Decepticon story, while this game is a Cybertron story. It's about Cybertron itself and many play key roles of importance in its story.
Q8: More Starscream?
A8: There is definitely more Starscream in this one.
Q9: With the Insecticons showing up, will they all be mindless swarming bots or will some individual Insecticon characters (a la Bombshell/Shrapnel/Kickback) be featured?
A9: The Insecticons are in the game, but as far as for any
named Insecticons, that's classified. Wait and see.
Q10: Wheeljack's presence: confirm or deny?
A10: Again, can't say yes or no.
Q11: Do all the characters that have been shown up to this point cover the basis of all the playable characters in the game?
A11: Absolutely not. There are more characters than what have been talked about. There will be more playable characters released as they go through.
As an aside, Matt Tieger asked how many Transformers there are. They figured since there's so many, at least several thousands, that they can't possibly please everyone by putting everyone's favorites in the game since there's just too many to pick from.Q12: In WFC, one often ran out of ammo too quickly. How will this be improved in FoC?
A12: Several ways to fix this. In the first game, there wasn't enough ammo, and it wasn't easy to find. This time, however, the equipment sizes are significantly larger so you can carry more ammo with you. The ammo design has been changed and have been put in more easy-to-find places. And, the AI enemies will now drop ammo when you kill them. But they did not add a self-fulfilling ammo overheat system for the guns. Plus, there is also now the Teletraan Store placed all throughout the game's world where you can buy and upgrade weapons, and one upgrade you can buy will automatically refill all your ammo every time you go into the store.
Q13: Will there be a cover system in this game?
A13: No.
Q14: What new and interesting things are being done with boss fights and boss characters in this game? Will there be boss fights in FoC?
A14: There are some that are different from what would be called a traditional boss, but different in a good way. The experiences in this game may surprise people. They're what one might call "Transformer-y".
Q15: Difficult question. Will FoC have the same campaign length as WFC, or longer?
A15: Depends on the person. Some felt WFC's campaign was too short, while others felt it was too long. It might be about the same as WFC, but can't say for sure.
Q16: This game looks a lot more colorful than the first. What drove this design decision?
A16: They wanted to go places where they haven't been before and really push what the visuals of Cybertron could be. They really put a lot more effort into the looks of all kinds of metals that have opened up the color palette a little bit. And when making a game like this, it really needs that kind of color variety.
Q17: Will the game come to PC?
A17: Sadly, no PC version. They focused on delivering the highest quality experience as possible, which is in the console department. They wanted to support the PC community, but they weren't able to do so like they wanted to. They wish it were possible and are bummed about this, but at the same time it was a hard decision and they feel it was the right call.
Q18: What is High Moon doing to increase online mutliplayer longevity for FoC to make gamers play it longer than WFC?
A18: Beg them to play it longer.
But seriously, they're trying to address the issues people had with the online multiplayer of WFC and figure pout how to make the community even greater than before.
Q19: Will one be able to customize weapons in multiplayer? Will the customizations of single player be able to carry over into multiplayer? Will Dinobots be playable in multiplayer?
A19: Can't answer about the customization of weapons because nothing is certain of it yet. for Dinobots, their skeletons are completely different form the other TFs. Their scale is huge compared to the others. Putting them with the others would detract from the gameplay experience. If they were scaled down to be better match with the others, then they would look silly (Grimlock would be a tiny T-Rex). And Grimlock cannot transform willingly, so it wouldn't work well in multiplayer. So, it's better that they aren't in multiplayer. It's not that it's a bad idea, but that it just can't be done.
Q20: What sort of customizations will there be for multiplayer?
A20: Four different classes: cars, trucks, tanks, planes. Each consists of six parts: head, chest, upper arm, lower arm, legs, (he couldn't remember the last part). You pick whichever parts you want. They'll all unlock as you play through the game and level up. The customization system is very complex. People spent hours making their own TFs out of these parts and colors. Severely better than the not-so-thorough WFC version.
Q21:Any possibility of AI bots in multiplayer?
A21: Said too much already about multiplayer, so this was not answered. But, they will make announcements later near the end of the year giving more info on the game.
I don't mind the complex face of the game version though.
Also very happy with what we saw for cutscenes, and level/character transitions. Very, very, exciting to me, and helps justify the lack of SP co-op. B: ALSO, VERY happy to hear more gameplay types integrated in more. I'm one of those people who prefer combining gameplay types versus sticking to one for sake of simplicity, and/or learning curve. Now let's wait and see if/how it affects MP. Likely not, but excited if it does.
