OneMetal.com INTERVIEW:
Nihilistic Software and Zombie Apocalypse

We recently reviewed Nihilistic Software’s latest XBLA release, Zombie Apocalypse, where you and up to three friends deal out hot leaded justice to the undead horde.

We also got the opportunity to pose to questions to Mark Cooke from Nihilistic Software about the game and gaming in general…

OneMetal:Zombie Apocalypse, we loved it and it seems to have been well liked across the board. How well do you feel about how the game has been received?

Mark Cooke:We’ve been pleased to hear positive fan reactions, especially stories about four friends playing together trying to survive the zombie hordes.

OneMetal:What are you most proud of with Zombie Apocalypse?

Mark Cooke:By far my favorite part of the game is the combination of cooperation and competition you feel when playing multiplayer. Multiplayer is cooperative and your team’s score is shared, so you all want to work together to do well, but you also want to grab the best weapon powerups and rescue uninfected survivors to earn more points than your buddies.

OneMetal:What was the greatest challenge you faced when creating Zombie Apocalypse?

Mark Cooke:The biggest game design challenge was balancing the game such that it worked well for one player playing by themselves and up to four players player cooperatively. I think that overall we succeeded but I personally prefer to play the game with friends.

OneMetal:Obviously there have been a few noted similarities with other titles ‘Left 4 Dead’ and ‘Smash TV’ among the more to comment. How do you feel about those references, and where would you say your inspirations come from?

Mark Cooke:There were two main sources of inspiration for Zombie Apocalypse. Thematically, it was influenced by classic zombie horror films of the late 70s and early 80s. The gameplay was inspired directly from both Robotron and Smash TV, two classic arcade shooters. The development of Zombie Apocalypse began before any information on Left 4 Dead was publically released so the similarities are down to being inspired by the same thematic material.

OneMetal:Did you find it hard striking a balance between gameplay and wanting to add more and more cool things such as environmental hazards? Where there any left out in the final build?

Mark Cooke:We tried to integrate the environmental hazards tightly into the gameplay as one of the unique features of the title. While the environmental hazards are cool they didn’t quite work exactly as we had hoped and some were more successful than others. The gas pump and the woodchipper work pretty well and setup some mass zombie carnage, for example.

Unleaded or diesel, your gonna burn anyway.

There was one major environment cut from the game before release. We started to build a slaughterhouse environment with meat hooks zombies could get attached to but we ended up running out of time and had to cut it.

OneMetal:If you had another 6 weeks of development time, what do you think would have changed / added?

Mark Cooke:If we had another six weeks we would have spent it primarily on tuning the length and difficulty of the campaign missions. While we are happy overall with how the game turned out the design team now feels that the ramp up in difficulty is a bit too slow. It’s great for easing new players into the game but experienced players have let us know they want the game to get more challenging more quickly.

OneMetal:We had a great time playing Zombie Apocalypse, especially in multiplayer. Were you tempted to change the single player to create a different experience?

Mark Cooke:From day one we were focused on making Zombie Apocalypse a fun multiplayer game and I think it shows when you play the game. At one time we discussed having a different mission structure for when one or two players were in a game versus three or four but in the end felt that we would make better use of our time making one main set of levels.

OneMetal:Why don’t we see more Co-Operative play in games on XBLA or incorporated more expansively into full-title games?

Mark Cooke:Cooperative play is quite difficult to implement and pace in the typical story based game which is why it isn’t often seen. It requires a considerable amount of extra planning and implementation time, and thus cost, to develop smoothly. Arcade style games fare a lot better as they are usually composed of much more contained environments.

OneMetal:We noticed that the suicide zombie bore more than a passing resemblance to Adolf Hitler; hasn’t the guy suffered enough?

Mark Cooke:No!

OneMetal:What are the core principles that make a good game? And is it very different when approaching an ‘Arcade’ title?

Mark Cooke:It differs between what type of genre of game you are creating but for an arcade game I believe the basis of a good game is in how smoothly the player can control their character. Once the base player controls feel solid, it’s all about building interesting choices for the player to make and have those choices come at a frequent enough pace to keep the game interesting.

Great player controls are very important for an action style “arcade” game but interesting choices are important for any type of game.

OneMetal:What do you feel is the best pitch for an arcade title? Multiplayer, Casual or Niche?

Mark Cooke:The quality bar for downloadable games is quickly rising and as digital distribution becomes more prevalent you’ll be seeing all genres represented. I don’t think there is a specific best type of game.

OneMetal:Is there a different approach to developing ‘Arcade’ titles or is it simply a matter of scale?

Mark Cooke:These days it is more about the genre of game and budget that adjust your approach. As a revival of some classic arcade games, Zombie Apocalypse was definitely created in a different way than we would create a large story based game. There is more of a focus on replayability in an arcade title than there is in a story driven game.

OneMetal:Other than Zombie Apocalypse (of course), what are you guys playing / looking forward to playing at the moment?

Mark Cooke:A lot of people around the office are enjoying Uncharted 2 and Demon’s Souls. Two very different games but both are really fun.

OneMetal:What do you think will be the next best thing in gaming?

Mark Cooke:Hands down, the way digital distribution changes the gaming landscape. I believe the industry will be fully digitally distributed in the next 10-15 years. This allows games of all kinds of different game sizes and budgets to exist, allows gamers to more easily connect with one another since everyone is online, and allows game companies to more closely track how users are enjoying their games which will lead to better games in the future.

OneMetal:What is next from Nihilistic Software?

Mark Cooke:All of our current work is unannounced, I can’t reveal anything yet. Stay tuned!

OneMetal:Phew! And that’s it. I hope you’ve enjoyed it and thanks for the chance to glimpse into a game development studio!

Mark Cooke:No problem

Zombie Apocalypse is available on Xbox Live Arcade for 800 points and coming soon to the Playstation Network.