Lionheart Designer Diary #1
Producer Ion Hardie gives a behind-the-scenes account of this upcoming RPG's development.
Entry #1 - 08/12/02
By Ion Hardie,
Reflexive Entertainment
Lionheart will be an off-beat role-playing game that will combine real-time combat, traditional high fantasy, and an alternate version of European history. The game is currently in development at Reflexive Entertainment, though it's being produced with feedback from veteran role-playing developer Black Isle Studios. In fact, Lionheart will actually feature the SPECIAL character creation system that originally appeared in Black Isle's classic 1997 game Fallout. We join Reflexive Entertainment producer Ion Hardie for a behind-the-scenes look at the development of Lionheart, including Ion's role in the project and how this unusual game got its start.
Why does this madman write? Press! That's what these designer diaries are all about. Getting the word out. Going into the backyards of your local Southern California game development houses and seeing what people do in the wee hours of the morning.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. My name is Ion Hardie, and I am the coproducer and lead designer for Reflexive Entertainment's latest game, Lionheart. Lionheart will be a new historically based RPG that will be published by Black Isle. And yes, I played Dungeons & Dragons as a kid. Then I grew up and translated the "time wasting" of playing RPGs and video games into marketable skills. The money I sank into my Colecovision really paid off. However, 10-plus-hour days are what allow it all to happen, so any kids reading this--don't be fooled. Some work is required. But it's not all bad. I don't have to worry about getting burned by the sun during the day, and I don't have to speak to any telemarketers at all. Ever.
For those of you who don't know who Reflexive Entertainment is, we are a game development studio set up in Lake Forest, California. We've been in business for about five years and have made Star Trek: Away Team, Zax: The Alien Hunter, Swarm, and Ricochet Xtreme. Reflexive started out as four people working in the downstairs of a condo I shared with our then almost meaninglessly titled CEO, Lars Brubaker. The other guys lived close by, and we worked all the time. Our first big contract was with Hasbro Interactive, and I can still hardly believe that they agreed to a million-dollar contract while sitting at our kitchen table. Maybe it was the big bowl of leftover Halloween chocolate bars that got their interest. Anyway, it was the break we needed, and we moved out of that condo and into larger and then a year later even larger offices. We also convinced Activision, JoWood, and then Black Isle to sign us up, and along the way we were able to hire some real talent and grow our staff. I sometimes wonder how the pieces all came together like they did.
Our current project, Lionheart, is our most ambitious project to date. We have six artists, three designers, and four programmers working on it on our end, and at least three other people from Black Isle assisting in its development. I currently am scurrying around, making sure things are getting done, making monsters work and attack correctly, and working on a bunch of other minutiae, like writing this designer diary. Other designers are testing the dialogue in the game, making sure the quest log works correctly, and so on. I feel like we have been running as fast as we can for months, getting scripting commands, level maps, story elements, enemy models, and all the other thousands of pieces together for these last few months of final construction and testing.
Lionheart: Legacy of the Crusader Quick Links
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- Interplay
- Reflexive Ent.
- Computer Role-Playing
- Release: Aug 13, 2003 »
- ESRB: Teen
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