When news broke that Halo 2/3 multiplayer boss of all creation Max Hoberman had started his own studio, we swung into action quick smart. His new outfit, Certain Affinity is now open for biz in Austin, Texas (a place that's been home to so many hot developers, as well as John Romero's infamous Ion Storm). His team includes some of the most influential names behind such games as Asheron's Call and Freelancer, not to mention the legendary Martin Galway, who was a renowned musical genius on the Commodore 64.

Max has been kind enough to answer some questions for us - and as luck would have it, we're the first official interview. Hurrah. And yes, we know Bungie.net did a little sumthin' sumthin', but they don't count, as they're mates. So ner. Forgive any typos - it is Saturday night.

Certain Affinity

BigPond GameArena: As someone who helmed Halo 2 (and Halo 3’s) multiplayer direction you’ve essentially brought online play to a whole new audience. What are your key priorities now when creating a multiplayer experience?

Max Hoberman: Well, fun of course! That only gets you so far though, so you have to figure out what "fun" means. In the case of Halo 2 we felt that the most fun experiences from Halo 1 were LAN parties, playing with a group of friends on the couch in your living room, yelling at each other, playing team games without communication barriers, not having to worry about griefers, playing with people of comparable skill level, etc. That was our guiding light on Halo 2 multiplayer development. You can only get so close to the live experience over the Internet, but I think that features like skill based matchmaking, voice communication, and parties got us closer than almost anyone else. The crazy success of Halo 2 online is a testament to this. That's not all there is to it, of course, as no amount of social niceties will make up for boring, repetitive or unbalanced gameplay, but it's a great starting point for online direction.


GA: How have these priorities changed from back when you worked on Halo 2? How much of a tightrope do you walk between assumed knowledge of gamers and bringing new concepts to them (i.e the balance between innovating and ensuring you don’t lose people along the way)?

MH: Trying to balance innovation and familiarity is a huge challenge, and to some degree an impossible problem. There will always be people that want to relive the old, familiar experience in new ways, and there will always be people that want something entirely new. This is a fact of life not just on a sequel, but whenever you're dealing with innovations of any sort. I consider my job as a designer to be finding the happy medium between the two, and so your tightrope analogy is quite accurate--it's easy to misstep and fall on your face. Fortunately Halo 2 walked this line fairly well, and I believe Halo 3 will do the same. Striking the proper balance has certainly always been top priority.


GA: Your team includes some legendary names from games development – and even at this stage seems *potentially* geared towards MMO/persistent gaming with key figures from Freelancer and Asheron’s Call on board. Without giving the, er, ‘game’ away, is it fair to suggest that your longer term orientation may be towards massively multiplayer?

MH: You obviously don't know me that well :-)(Oh SNAP - kreese)


GA: Further - your team has experience across PC and consoles – have you built CA with a view to working on both platforms? What’s your view on the viability of cross platform integration with games – an area that’s just beginning to get explored. If we accept it’s inevitable (or if you do not) – what are the challenges it faces?

MH: I've built CA with a view towards making amazing games, regardless of the platform, so I guess we'll have to wait and see what transpires. I'm a huge fan of the Xbox 360 and Xbox Live though, and we're obviously developing maps for Bungie on the Xbox 360 , so it's a logical conclusion that we'll end up making games for it . As for cross-platform integration, I'd love to see the features and services available on Xbox Live made available on the PC. From a developer's standpoint, the more integrated the systems, regardless of platform, the easier the job--and the fewer technical hurdles we face the more we can focus on designing for fun gameplay and telling enthralling stories.


GA: There’s E3 still, but not as we know it. Will CA be coming to Santa Monica in 2007 for what essentially will be E3 lite – and would you like to have had at least one big-scale, E3 style event to ‘hello world’ CA with?

MH: Honestly, no. E3 is inevitably a drain on the team, pulling us to do things we wouldn't otherwise do and distracing us from our real focus. We had huge success showing off solely real work with Halo 2 multiplayer and our Zanzibar playable level, and I'll try to follow the same philosophy in the future. That is to say, if something like this fits into our schedule and isn't a major distraction we'll consider it, otherwise we'll focus on making the best damn game possible. Of course I can't promise our future partners will feel the same way, so that might be wishful thinking!


GA: What is it about Austin that attracts high profile developers? Is it something in the water there? Is there certain elements (beyond proximity to a University campus) that make certain places better than others for creating a kick-ass gaming environment>

MH: That's an interesting question, and honestly I don't know if I'm qualified to answer it. I came back here because it's home, and I was amazed to find so much going on in the games business. I knew it was a hotbed, of course, but I didn't realize the scale. Austin is an awesome place to work and live though, so I can only assume it's related. Personally I'm having a great time being back, and I now appreciate Austin a lot more than I did when I left to join Bungie. The city has grown up quite a bit, and the game business is huge here.


GA: Halo 2 did a lot for multiplayer gaming back when it was released - what games out right now do you think are leading the way for online gaming (console or PC)?

MH: I've been pretty heads down for a while starting up Certain Affinity, but I haven't heard of anything yet that I think competes with Halo 2's online model, certainly not on the console. There's amazing gameplay out there, of course, but nothing that's quite as advanced socially outside of massively multiplayer games. Oh wait, I know ... Halo 3 is leading the way. You don't know what you're in for!


GA: Where is multiplayer heading, big picture?

MH: I would hope that more games are headed in the direction that we've tried to blaze with Halo 2. I've seen the start of a trend in this direction, and I've seen some huge leaps in online cooperative play, and I hope that this all is a sign of things to come. I think that Halo 3 will set the next standard, but I don't think the Bungie guys want me talking about everything they have up their sleeve just yet.

I hope I don't sound too conceited about all this Halo online business! I'm biased, I admit, but I also think the game's online success is a testament to all of this. The success was no accident, we based our strategy on a ton of solid experience running an online service.


GA: What are your gaming influences – excluding titles you’ve worked on of course – what games originally inspired you to work in the industry, and what games continue to motivate you onwards and upwards?

MH: I'm a huge multiplayer fan, I admit it. I grew up playing Bungie games -Minotaur, Marathon, and Myth, and I think that each was amazingly innovative for its time. Myth: The Fallen Lords in particular is probably my favorite game of all time. Incidentally this game was also the first to use Bungie's online social service, Bungie.net. The experience working on and managing Bungie.net gave us invaluable experience that we later applied to Halo's online model.

Right now I'm most inspired by games with solid fundamental mechanics. I've been playing Ninja Gaiden and other titles with innovative combat and movement models, including one of my all-time favorites, Bushido Blade. Sadly this whole starting a business thing has taken up way too much time, and I haven't gotten to play games in ages. I have a stack that I'm going to get through though, including titles like Oblivion, Final Fantasy XII, and Metal Gear Solid II.


GA: Finally, a quick word association quiz – what’s the first thing you think of when you read the following:

a. World of Warcraft
MH: Amazing distraction for my team back at Bungie :-)

b. Master Chief
MH: Badass.

c. Dallas Mavericks
MH: Um... (For non-NBA fans, the Mavs choked their way into losing an 'unlosable' NBA finals last year - kreese)

d. “otherworldly ruins and ancient artifacts”
MH: Yum...

e. Ion Storm
MH: Is this a trick question?


Thanks so much to Martin Galway and Max Hoberman for taking the time to do this at very short notice. Keep checking out the Certain Affinity site as time goes on to keep track of what this ensemble lineup will be up to.