FeatureThe big Cliff Bleszinski interview
'I've had a very polarising personality in the 25 years I've been doing this.'
There's probably never a good time to talk to an exceptionally busy CEO, but I guarantee it's most certainly not this; just days after the launch of the game you've been gearing up to for three years, and the first fruits of your box-fresh studio.
What is the biggest shooter in the world these days? Call Of Duty has held that mantle for years, based on sales figures, cultural cache and column inches. But as its popularity wanes, does Destiny now have a shout for the top spot? How about Overwatch, surely the most talked about FPS in the past 12 months?
FeatureCliff Bleszinski's return to video games
“Some of us are starting to recognise that games have been about white dudes for so long...”
Cliff Bleszinski said goodbye to Gears of War four years ago, but I'm not sure he's left it behind. We're sitting in a curtained-off area of the showfloor below the offices of Bosskey Productions - the studio Bleszinski founded in 2014 with former Guerilla Games development director and Jazz Jackrabbit coder Arjan Brussee. On the other side of the cloth, a community manager thunders exhortations as journalists get to grips with a pre-alpha build of LawBreakers, Bosskey's hectic, highly involved arena shooter. Within, I ask for Bleszinski's thoughts on Gears of War 4's recent story teaser, a beat-by-beat reprise of the legendary "Mad World" trailer that first marked Gears out as more than the usual triple-A mess of gore and gristle, and Bleszinski himself as one of the industry's brighter stars.
FeatureLawBreakers is Unreal Tournament for the Titanfall generation
Hands-on impressions of Cliff Bleszinski and Bosskey's gravity-bashing arena shooter.
If Bosskey's daring, uneven debut has taught me anything, it's that every blast cloud has its silver lining. We're a few minutes into a round of Capture The Flag variant Overcharge on the Grandview map - a mixture of Black Ops 3's Combine and Shanghai from Deus Ex: Human Revolution, furnished with jade statues of rampaging samurai, a golden temple bell on a central rock spur and sprays of cherry blossom that make surprisingly effective aerial cover.
