The life of a studio famed for big, difficult decisions began with a no-brainer. When John Romero approached Warren Spector with a blank cheque to make his dream game, Spector’s team was unemployed—showing up to the defunct Looking Glass Austin office to pitch ideas unpaid. In their sketches and documents was a concept for a spy game called Shooter, in which an agent could hack devices and control nanotechnology. The year was 1997, and the air was thick with Hollywood actors in mirrored sunglasses tapping away at chunky keyboards.
Suddenly, with Romero’s backing, anything Spector and his studio could imagine was fair game. The fundamentals were clear for a team that had coalesced around Thief: The Dark Project—a first-person world in which objects behaved as expected when subjected to gravity and the elements, and NPCs reacted with a nuance that enabled players to manipulate them.
Yet it wouldn’t be true to say that Deus Ex was born from a unified creative vision. In fact, Spector encouraged discord by creating two design teams, each with a separate idea of what the game should be. One, headed up by future Arkane boss Harvey Smith, was determined to ground the adventure in a fashion that emphasized the ‘near-’ of near-future; the other had inherited the Ultima RPG sensibilities of Spector’s alma mater, Origin Systems.
SOCIALIST SKILLS
This story is from the December 2021 edition of PC Gamer US Edition.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the December 2021 edition of PC Gamer US Edition.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
TERMINATOR: RESISTANCE
Revisiting Teyon’s game after Robocop: Rogue City.
RICH'N BEEFY
LIKE A DRAGON: INFINITE WEALTH is a dizzyingly huge all-you-can-eat Yakuza buffet
ROUND 8 FIGHT!
TEKKEN 8 is a blend of nostalgia for fans and a pair of welcoming arms for newbies
HOLY HELL
THE INQUISITOR is a grim yet strangely gripping dark fantasy adventure
SHOT DEAD
There are flashes of greatness in SUICIDE SQUAD: KILL THE JUSTICE LEAGUE
THE BEST NON-TRADITIONAL WAR GAMES
Is it possible for wargamers to give peace a chance?
WHEELIE GOOD
Freewheeling with Northern Irish indie studio Billy Goat Entertainment and its next project, PARCEL CORPS
PALWORLD
Shockingly, animal cruelty doesn't make for a fulfilling experience
DIVINE FREQUENCY
This horror-RPG-FPS built in the Doom engine is terrifying
AVOWED
Obsidian's next RPG goes all in on first-person action