ICON 2009 Keynote:

Creating a Different Experience by examples of Blade and Soul

Jae Hyun Bae, a producer at NCsoft, gave a keynote speech at International Contents Creator’s Conference(ICON) 2009, an adjunct event to G-Star 2009. The topic of the speech was a new approach of Blade and Soul.   

■ Technology should not be the center

 “What is the next generation game?”

 Jae Hyun started the speech with a question. He wanted to define the overused words, next generation game, from a developer’s point of view. 

“Most current PCs support high resolution textures, polygons, and Shader Model 3.0. Thanks to the technology, now movie-like high quality CGs made possible to games. But flash technology doesn’t necessarily make a game the next generation,” said Jae Hyun.

No matter how funny quests are written, not many users read them through. They just skip them and rush to play games. You need to appeal to them in other way. 

He wanted to let audience know technology certainly helped to materialize things that grow on users over time but technology doesn’t play a central role in Blade and Soul. 

■ Technology should be used to make games more realistic and humane

Blade and Soul is a martial arts game. Players get to become a master or superhero in the game. We need new technology to make things more realistic.

A real life master does not just walk or kick. He makes exaggerated moves. He doesn’t wear heavy armor but a robe that accentuates his moves. To express this kind of details, animators don’t create animations but real-time simulations by using physical engine.

NPCs shouldn’t feel like an inhumane robot. You feel more compassion for something you spend more time with. You feel worse when your pet dies than tons of people die during a battle.

In Blade and Soul, he focused on delivering that message. For example, make a human-like NPCs rather than just quest vending machine.

■ New Approach to UI

A new interface or tool can change games. Introducing iPhone with touch screen or mouse led to the successful FPS games.

However limited interfaces don’t necessarily mean limited entertainment. Simple joystick and few buttons didn’t keep people from playing arcade games or console FPS games.

For example, no mouse necessary to play Halo. You can play Halo with a gamepad and you can still enjoy the game. With combination of limited (weapon) options, the game brings you different game experience.

In Blade and Soul, there will be more than 40 skills for each class. He won’t put any limit on number of skills. But by limiting skill slots, players will enjoy a variety of ways to combine skills. That’s a new user interface that differentiates Blade and Soul from other MMORPGs.

“We don’t want to just follow predecessors like others. Players can benefit from cookie-cutter games because they don’t have to learn to play in the beginning but won’t tell the difference among games. That would be same UI and same game to them.” Jae Hyun explained.