Developing VR Shooter - 80 Level Podcast

80 Level talked with Masaru Ohnogi and Dax Berg, Co-founder and VP at Thirdverse studio. We dive into the development of their latest VR shooter game X8 and talk about engines, mechanics, interactivity, and design. Masaru and Dax also share their insights on the future of the VR game market and what developers should focus on to make a game successful.

Get early access to X8
Steam: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1763510/X8/
Meta App Lab: https://www.oculus.com/experiences/quest/4518172508241377/

Learn more about Thirdverse: https://www.thirdverse.io/en/ 

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Transcript

0:00

foreign

0:10

can you do like a little intro a little

0:13

bit about yourself a little bit about

0:15

the company yes um I'm nogi co-founder

0:18

of thought about I'm also the CBO of the

0:20

company

0:25

those thousand Birds is a BL gaming

0:28

developer publisher and then cover 2

0:30

studio in one meeting Japan in Tokyo and

0:33

one in the US but U.S is all remote we

0:35

don't have any offices

0:37

and we currently have a two games right

0:41

then one is a solo fighting game called

0:44

assorted Gargantua and then one day it's

0:47

called archive breaker which we just

0:49

launched on the PlayStation PR2 platform

0:52

and then now our USA studio is making

0:55

the hero based shooter called X8 that's

0:58

what we're expecting on soon then we

1:01

actually uh planning the quote beta 2

1:04

next week from the March 27th couple of

1:07

words about yourself what do you do sure

1:09

yeah my name is daxberg I am the VP of

1:13

us Studios for third verse

1:21

um are we have two Studios one in uh

1:25

Tokyo which is an in-house studio and

1:27

then the US Studios is really kind of a

1:30

global Studio we're all remote

1:33

um on our team we have up to 13

1:35

different countries actually that we're

1:37

working with so we're very uh very

1:39

remote but we're working our main title

1:41

right now is a game called X8 tell us a

1:44

little bit more about it X8 what is it

1:46

what kind of game is it sure uh X8 is a

1:48

VR heroic shooter uh five versus five

1:51

multiplayer so the idea for those

1:55

familiar not familiar with heroic

1:56

Shooters would be kind of like take the

1:58

hero styles of a fighting game but put

2:01

those in those heroic Styles put those

2:04

into uh you know a shooter a first

2:08

person shooter OverWatch is a good

2:09

analogy OverWatch is a good analogy the

2:11

balance is a good analogy

2:13

um those style of games so so X8

2:16

um kind of the quick narrative behind X8

2:18

is it's a uh it's an old game engine

2:21

that has a lot of first-person shooter

2:22

hits

2:24

um and as the time goes on no one is

2:26

making games out of this game engine

2:28

anymore it becomes kind of self-aware

2:30

and it it um kind of eats a part of

2:33

itself and then pulls all of these

2:35

heroes from all these games back into

2:37

its engine and they have to fight

2:39

amongst each other to get their games

2:42

booted back online

2:43

so tell us a little bit about

2:46

what's going on in the VR Market

2:49

currently because

2:50

even last year when I was here at GDC a

2:53

lot of people were saying that

2:55

VR is kind of like

2:58

sort of like a new mobile meaning that

3:01

there is not really that many games but

3:04

there is already sort of some kind of

3:06

demand and a lot of people are kind of

3:08

moving into this space they feel like

3:11

it's an interesting opportunity yes tell

3:13

us a bit more sure so so when we first

3:16

launched the sort of garden control

3:18

that's a

3:20

2019 and that was actually the quest one

3:24

launch date and

3:27

um we also saw the request to launch

3:31

um then we saw how hype the software

3:34

sales so device launching devices always

3:37

expand the market so I think this year

3:40

is another big year for the BR because

3:43

there are two big devices coming up one

3:45

is a Precision BL2 which is just launch

3:47

it and then Chris we definitely they're

3:50

coming this coming Q4 that's why uh

3:52

we're expecting another hype of the

3:55

market close yeah that's why we are

3:58

focusing on product launch this year

4:00

and um as you may know Quest 2 is

4:03

already the sold 20 million units that

4:08

is actually 20 percent of the Bitcoin

4:10

console gaming like uh Nintendo switch

4:13

something and um it's already uh the

4:17

chat caught up is Xbox devices and that

4:21

is actually the beer of the decent

4:23

Market already so it's actually monitor

4:26

uh you know was to do the business

4:28

that's why I think people are starting

4:30

jumping the market again

4:32

so you work as a publisher and probably

4:36

a question that a lot of Publishers get

4:38

it what do consumers want what do they

4:41

like what do they want in terms of VR

4:44

experiences what are the tastes like

4:46

because I feel like there's a lot of the

4:48

books who don't really know they don't

4:50

really know the answer to this question

4:52

so our team member has kind of a variety

4:56

of experience from from the non-br

4:59

device for example I'm talking more like

5:02

a PC Mobile gaming developer publisher

5:05

and then our studio head Dax is more

5:07

like console gaming experience but I'll

5:09

be our actually quite unique because

5:15

not have then one is

5:18

yes of course of course you know uh you

5:22

are in uh the in the game because I

5:25

always say the no bigger game

5:28

experiences you only can have through

5:31

the 2D monitor but uh in the BR you're

5:34

in the game actually that's a big

5:36

difference first and then other big

5:39

things is we always say that

5:41

it's our interaction got a non-br gaming

5:45

you just use

5:47

controller Mustang keyboard on top of

5:49

three on the new just uh the control

5:53

game character 3D monitor it's more like

5:57

a southern person view but uh in a beer

5:59

experiences you are going to be a game

6:02

character itself but then you you touch

6:04

object then you kill enemies mini stop

6:07

the two that's totally different

6:09

experience then uh we we know there's

6:13

already many BL gamers in the market and

6:17

then what they uh most expect is more

6:20

like a new experience you know flying

6:23

you know climbing but it's already

6:24

exists but uh they are certain people

6:26

one of the new experiences that's we are

6:28

trying to generate

6:31

so kind of like I guess a noob question

6:33

I'm one of those people who gets

6:35

destroyed in any competitive on live uh

6:38

right and then I think about trying to

6:41

do this in VR and I feel like my chances

6:43

are even smaller so how do you make this

6:46

work in VR that it's not disorienting

6:48

and then you understand where you're

6:50

going because like we mentioned there's

6:52

like 360 degree and you cannot be

6:54

attacked from all over yeah lots and

6:56

lots of options

6:58

um yeah I had a big meeting several

6:59

years ago with Jason Rubin

7:01

um from from meta and he said to me the

7:05

more options you can give a player the

7:07

better they'll be comfortable with so

7:09

for example movement Styles

7:11

um smooth turn is one way some people

7:13

have to play with smooth turn As you

7:15

move and look you kind of turn the way

7:16

you want to go I can't play that way at

7:18

all I need snap turn snap turning with

7:21

the flick you can decide how many

7:22

degrees of rotation you want to have and

7:25

you can set that anywhere from 15 to

7:27

1090 degrees on Snap so there that's

7:30

just one style movement the style of

7:32

locomotion Comfort settings we have a

7:35

massive amount of options in our game to

7:36

custom fit the player so that they feel

7:39

the most comfortable in the game as far

7:41

as the game itself it is a competitive

7:43

game so there is a learning curve

7:46

um but we do have a very extensive

7:48

tutorial and a practice mode to allow

7:50

people to feel very comfortable learning

7:53

all of the abilities and the things that

7:55

you do within the game before you jump

7:57

in

7:58

uh do you guys feel comfortable

8:00

launching the multiplayer title do you

8:02

feel like there's enough players on the

8:04

market right now that are craving

8:06

multiplayer experiences and you're not

8:07

going to end up with like a Lobby that's

8:09

half empty uh we we do uh you know with

8:13

like it's over 20 million

8:15

um devices for Quest plus we're

8:17

cross-platform so the idea of psvr2

8:22

um Quest as well as pcvr on Steam

8:25

um all of those players will be able to

8:26

enter the same Lobby and play together

8:28

do you use any particular like is there

8:32

any particular technological aspect to

8:34

like the networking and making sure that

8:37

it all connects or do you use some yeah

8:40

I mean we use a system called playfab

8:42

for our networking but there's a lot of

8:44

a lot of technical things to be able to

8:46

hook that up and make it run smoothly so

8:49

let's talk a little bit about from the

8:51

developers 10 point

8:52

when I think about

8:55

video games done for VR I think that

8:58

they are shorter in terms of session

9:01

they also have a little bit of a

9:04

different visual Style

9:05

and how those these particular elements

9:09

influence the cost of production and the

9:12

time of production is it as expensive to

9:14

build a VR title as you're building like

9:17

a game for computers or is it cheaper or

9:21

maybe it's faster like what are the

9:23

advantages if you're trying want to try

9:25

to do a VR thing

9:27

that's good to ask to dark small but uh

9:31

of course if it's maybe there are no

9:33

advantages that's also an answer but if

9:36

you try to make a high degree definition

9:37

content of course costs gonna be really

9:40

higher gotta you know every single beer

9:43

is a 3D you know and the 63 a 360

9:45

environment so you have to you know

9:47

touch generate everything that's why or

9:50

lower simple visual should be uh uh more

9:55

reasonable to develop that that uh data

9:58

sense of the development in appears so

10:00

far

10:01

how do you think

10:03

games like

10:05

Alex are made like what do you feel like

10:07

it costs to do a game like that you know

10:10

half right box yeah that's crazy you'd

10:13

remember the course it should be 100 or

10:16

200 million something

10:17

that we you can not do right now it's

10:20

not affordable to do you're talking

10:22

about cross-platform

10:24

um what kind of Technology do you use in

10:27

terms of rendering like do you use Unity

10:28

or unreal we use unreal unreal tell us a

10:32

little bit about how unreal Fields

10:34

itself in the VR

10:36

um the platform it adapts pretty well

10:39

we're not on unreal five we're still in

10:42

4.262 I believe

10:44

um we do have a VR version of unreal so

10:47

there's a small kind of plug-in

10:49

specifically for VR and then on top of

10:51

that we we add our own little bits of

10:53

flavor uh to to help with the game but

10:57

uh but I'm real it's done done well for

10:59

us we really we really feel like that's

11:01

where uh you know the game engines are

11:04

moving and a lot of our our story is

11:06

based on a game engine so it's kind of

11:08

funny we we use a lot of unreal you know

11:11

Meta Meta Meta exactly exactly so

11:16

in terms of like customers and when

11:19

you're going to Market how do you how do

11:21

you suggest approaching you know

11:23

Community Building how do you approach

11:25

kind of ramping up the Market to make

11:29

sure that the sales are started like day

11:31

one and so on what are the tools that

11:33

you could use to make sure that your

11:35

game especially a VR game is successful

11:37

down the line like do you work more with

11:40

platform do you work more with the

11:42

community do you need to have a large

11:44

marketing budget maybe a lower marketing

11:46

budget so

11:49

um we already launched two titles and um

11:53

we learned a lot and then current our

11:56

concept of the game development is more

11:58

like Community Driven but uh of course

12:01

we work with the platforms such as you

12:03

know mirror also Steam and the Sie for

12:07

the Precision be after but uh of course

12:10

we need their support but we are making

12:13

contents which we are selling to the

12:15

consumers so

12:16

current our approach is uh trying to

12:19

talk with interact with more communities

12:22

and then try to get more feedback and

12:24

then try to implement our game I think

12:26

that's the key and then that they have a

12:29

direct answer as well they want to do

12:31

when they want right that's why

12:34

um we use social media also Discord and

12:39

then and um

12:41

then uh the ability to community over

12:43

there then interact with them what do

12:46

you think about Platforms in general

12:48

like what is the platform to go to if

12:50

you want to be successful in VR is it uh

12:53

kind of meta stuff or is it a

12:54

PlayStation or do you need to because

12:57

you can't cover all of them like at

12:59

immediately right so you need to

13:01

prioritize so where do you think the

13:03

focus should be so the idea ideally if

13:07

you can you know launch the old

13:09

platforms semester 3 then we can reach

13:12

out all users that's why that's an ideal

13:15

case but uh uh as far as we know the the

13:18

steering majority of share the metacrist

13:21

has

13:22

probably a 60 to 80 70 that's why

13:28

um I think there if you target Quest 2

13:31

primarily it's uh

13:34

I think you get more chance right now

13:36

yeah and then they can expand the other

13:39

platforms do you get a lot of support

13:41

from you know meta and the platform

13:44

holders themselves are they

13:46

you know are they featuring you more do

13:49

they provide you some extra support and

13:51

other like technical questions or

13:52

something like that yeah our advantages

13:54

are so I leave the I live in their

13:58

boarding game which is a mirror Excel

14:00

headquarters there that's why I interact

14:03

with them very often and our Japan team

14:06

the majority of people from the Sie

14:09

that's why we talk with sap partner

14:11

that's why we we have a more like

14:14

Information Program

14:15

now that's our advantage

14:17

I was in uh epic headquarters like I

14:22

think it was like five years ago or six

14:23

years ago and

14:25

they were really heavy on showing their

14:28

VR stuff and they were using

14:30

uh VR basically in engine so you can

14:33

build you know spaces using AR goggles

14:36

and stuff like that I'm not sure this is

14:38

it was more like a gimmick it would have

14:40

kind of like showcasing the technology

14:41

but do you feel like

14:44

technology companies are really

14:46

embracing more VR right now like do you

14:49

feel like companies like Adobe you know

14:52

like

14:53

uh I think it I think it Ebbs and flows

14:56

I think sometimes there's a push and

14:58

then it goes and VR is is is trending up

15:01

but it's done this the whole way right

15:03

so it's just finding that time and space

15:06

for when there's enough adapt you know

15:09

early adopters that then fully Push It

15:12

Forward right I look at the same kind of

15:14

analogy of like you know

15:18

beta or VHS you know it's eventually

15:20

like one of those hits and then that

15:23

adaption moves and then you've you've

15:26

got everybody eventually will launch

15:27

into it so I see the VR space as

15:30

eventually how the mobile market was

15:33

circuit kind of 2005 2006 uh where it's

15:38

it's inevitable that will will will

15:40

really launch it's just exactly when you

15:43

mentioned while working on X8 you have

15:47

um kind of distributed team

15:49

what are you looking in when you're

15:52

trying to hire a developer like are you

15:54

just looking at their heart skills do

15:57

you want to people from particular

15:59

region because it's better for your

16:02

um you know yeah for for time zone for

16:05

for us on our team we

16:07

what works best for us is anything

16:10

that's not kind of in the Japan

16:12

Australia kind of Realm because we have

16:14

kind of a core set of hours usually from

16:17

about 7 30 in the morning Pacific time

16:20

uh all the way to to noon or one and

16:24

those are times across the globe where

16:25

most of the people are going to be

16:26

active and on and then the rest of that

16:28

time they fill in to kind of finish

16:30

their full day so we have some people

16:32

starting earlier in the day and and

16:34

they're ending their their you know

16:35

their day or their evening uh um in in

16:39

all the way in Eastern Europe all the

16:40

way to you know uh the Pacific coast is

16:44

there enough uh people right now who

16:46

know unreal and are also comfortable

16:48

with VR or do you feel like there is

16:51

like a need for more whatever it is it

16:53

is sometimes difficult it was very

16:55

difficult hiring the right kind of

16:57

networking because you're looking for

16:58

someone who has VR experience you're

17:00

looking for someone who's unreal

17:01

experience you're looking for someone

17:02

that has play Fab experience you know

17:03

there's that that that gets a lot

17:06

smaller as you kind of go through but

17:08

um you know we have a lot of really good

17:10

uh developers who have who have the ones

17:13

that didn't have a lot of VR experience

17:16

um have really learned the game and the

17:20

Dynamics and the and and and the design

17:22

part of it and and the reason for a lot

17:25

of the tactile experiences

17:27

um and then you know others um have have

17:30

been in it you know as long as I have

17:31

and and have been really fascinated

17:34

since all the way back to the the dk1

17:36

launch

17:38

okay so kind of like last question for

17:40

you is when when you're browsing through

17:43

pitches when you're browsing through

17:45

projects what are you looking for like

17:47

how do I sign a contract with you what

17:50

do you need from a developer

17:52

uh oh so sorry what if you're looking

17:55

for a new project what are you looking

17:58

for does it has to be a team with a

18:01

proven record does it have to be an

18:03

interest in IP does it have to be a

18:05

particular style or maybe a technical

18:07

quality that you're how do you know that

18:09

it's you want to work with this company

18:12

and make a game

18:13

cutting a company called The Vision is

18:17

try to create a metaboss it could be if

18:21

we can describe a little bit more detail

18:22

uh it should be kind of

18:26

RPG type of game so many people know

18:30

access at the same time but uh that was

18:33

we need a more like a server technology

18:35

but uh it's as I said as I said in the

18:37

city 60 environment it's hard to print

18:39

many people that we have to do also

18:43

um no

18:45

more like you know more

18:47

the major physics combat and shooting

18:51

mechanics many things you have to

18:52

implement it that's why we're making

18:54

solo fighting game shooter game also

18:57

um to um

18:59

make a beer market popular I think we

19:02

need existing eyepiece that's why we are

19:04

also talking so that's a main Peter we

19:07

are trying to implement again is VR

19:10

development Big in Japan currently

19:13

is it like a a lot of companies are

19:16

doing it or do you feel like it's still

19:17

like a smaller niche

19:20

uh it's getting bigger but I'm not

19:25

there are another mini uh PR specific

19:29

developers in Japan but it's expanding

19:31

right now but uh ideally the big console

19:35

gaming guys like you know Capcom economy

19:38

Sega if they those guys if they see us

19:40

and jump in the market the data time I

19:42

think is no more biggest expansion I

19:45

think Capcom was doing some work and

19:46

like with the Resident Evil series yeah

19:48

but we are they just provided IP they

19:52

didn't make it oh they didn't do it yeah

19:54

that type of cool project with the

19:55

mirror I feel like when you're looking

19:57

for developers one of the things

19:59

everybody's saying that you need to have

20:01

passion you need to have passion you

20:03

need to be very you know engaged and so

20:06

on

20:07

um do you feel the same way or maybe

20:09

there are some things like passion that

20:11

sometimes it can hurt but people get

20:13

burnt too often or they kind of

20:18

get sold in one idea and then you can

20:21

push them from it like and do something

20:23

else yeah I mean that comes a lot with

20:25

just design there is

20:28

there is a passion to make sure that the

20:30

game is not just a port from you know if

20:34

you were making OverWatch you were

20:36

making valorant or you know oh we're

20:37

just going to Port that into into the VR

20:40

space we really want a lot of

20:42

interactivity so we we call them uh

20:44

gvris Global VR interactives that we

20:47

have to have in the game so we're trying

20:49

to make sure that the things that you do

20:51

you're not just clicking buttons but

20:53

you're interacting or you're you're

20:55

enhancing or you're moving in different

20:57

ways and get given a lot of different

20:59

physicality however we do base the game

21:02

around being very

21:04

uh wait it's not room based so you can

21:06

turn and spin and take a step side and

21:08

leans right but you don't move

21:10

throughout the throughout the room uh

21:13

you'll need to and the reason behind

21:15

that is that our game lasts or anywhere

21:17

from 15 to 20 minutes for a full match

21:19

people play a couple matches in a row

21:21

and I still feel like in some ways

21:23

gamers are inherently lazy where they

21:25

want to be comfortable but still want to

21:27

play a lot of times so we keep that

21:31

a pivot point there and and you're

21:33

stationary but we do have a lot of

21:36

movement from your your Center standing

21:39

so a final question you have a lot of

21:42

this media ideas that there's a game

21:44

engine this kind of became Salient and

21:46

the he starts to stand something though

21:49

where does that come from and do you

21:52

feel like market right currently is

21:54

ready for kind of these kind of story

21:56

pitches so on because it sounds like

21:57

what you're saying is basically it's uh

22:00

it feels to me it's like there's like

22:02

this audience that first of all knows

22:04

what a game engine is and it's large

22:06

enough to you know get you enough

22:09

players I I think post uh epic fortnite

22:14

where unreal became its real own entity

22:18

and has grown very big I think the cat

22:20

like an average video gamer knows what a

22:23

game engine is these days

22:25

um and also the narrative on the game is

22:27

a pretty small part of the actual game

22:29

itself so the game mechanics themselves

22:31

with each hero having their own heroic

22:33

abilities and the casting system that

22:35

you use it's not really adhering to a

22:39

narrative is that narrative is a nice

22:40

way to kind of put it all together and

22:43

and make it fun and make it have some

22:45

sort of background sense thanks for

22:47

enjoying another episode of the 80 level

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LV join our career site at 80.lv RFP

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[Music]