The Homeworld franchise of real-time strategy games is finally getting a threequel with Homeworld 3 thanks to Blackbird Interactive, the studio responsible for Homeworld's land-based prequel Deserts of Kharak from 2016 and, more recently, the critically acclaimed sci-fi job simulator Hardspace: Shipbreaker. Over 20 years since the last space-based entry in the series, Homeworld still enjoys a well-deserved cult following of dedicated fans and a passionate modding community.
Recently, Game ZXC had the opportunity to play two missions from an early build of Homeworld 3, followed by a conversation about Homeworld 3's development, design choices, and influences with Blackbird Interactive's Chief Creative Officer Rory McGuire and Associate Game Director Kathryn "Kat" Neale. The interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Q: Can you share a little bit about what it feels like to be working on Homeworld 3 so long since Homeworld 2 was released?
McGuire: It's a bit of a dream. Not quite a dream come true, but a dream brought to life. It's something we've been thinking about or discussing in some capacity for over 20 years. Many of us worked on Homeworld 2, and many of us were also working on Homeworld 1. When we ship, it'll have been 20 years since the last major entry, at least in the space side of the franchise. As soon as we shipped Deserts of Kharak, we started talking with our partners at Gearbox, and there were lots of different potential ways we could have gone. And I feel like the way that we went creatively with the cover and some of the things that we're doing with the story was actually one of the things we wanted to do back in the Homeworld 2 era 20 years ago. So many of those things that we wanted to do couldn't be done back then, and now we're able to do them. So some of the things that you saw in the playthrough like being able to interact with cover and terrain and fly through areas, Homeworld 2 and 1 don't have any of that stuff. It's a bit of a technical marvel, and we're really proud of what we're putting together.
Q: For our readers, and for people who are unfamiliar, could you describe the basic plot, gameplay, and any major changes Homeworld 3 has made compared to previous entries?
McGuire:Homeworld 3 is really a continuation of the story of Homeworld 2. Karan S'jet has gone out and has been unlocking these gates that were unlocked at the end of Homeworld 2. But she has since disappeared, like she's gone on a journey out unlocking these gates, and no one has heard from her for 100 years. And the general direction from where she disappeared, a threat has begun to emerge, an anomaly that's creeping into the existing space. And our hero, Imogen S'jet is dispatched with a fleet to essentially combat this threat. And it's consuming the gates and consuming systems. In terms of systems, Homeworld really is best-in-class 3D fleet combat and naval combat.
It was that back in 1999, what we wanted to do was bring it into 2023. Previously in Homeworld, it was like playing in a pool where you could go up and down and go side to side, but there was nothing in the pool. And the way Homeworld 3 plays, as I'm sure you've seen, it's more like a coral reef. There are things that are in the space, there are things that you need to be aware of, and there are spaces that you can go through and go around. There's new terrain and cover the players can use. And the game systems recognize that it's not just the visuals, things like a missile that is tracking in on you. If you duck behind cover the missile will hit that cover. So players that are just playing the game will just enjoy it. But the actual ballistic simulation of the game, which incidentally is the same simulation that was used on Homeworld Remastered and is actually inspired by Homeworld 1 and Homeworld 2 as well, essentially recognizing that there's actually really rich gameplay there too.
Q: Homeworld tended to have a reputation for being fairly relentless as far as difficulty, which really suited the Hiigaran underdog story of the last vestiges of their race trying to get through this hostile galaxy. Is that something you guys are leaning into again for Homeworld 3?
Neale: To Rory's point, he's sort of detailed the story a little bit, but I'm gonna jump in it from the gameplay side. Homeworld has always been about an immersive strategic experience, and really bringing that to the player and making them feel as though they're really lost in the expanse of space. We have been really focused on how to make terrain augment the classic Homeworld experience. And with that point, when we first started talking about the terrain and terrain gameplay, we started digging into the idea that the space between terrain was really the dangerous spot, right? And the same way in a coral reef, you can sort of hide in among the bits and pieces. If you go out into the depths of space, you're going to be much more vulnerable to attack. So what we've been focused on is really making sure that the strategic experience and the way that players make decisions throughout the campaign experience is super important and feels just the same as a previous Homeworld game where you make a strong decision, and it really carries through for you and really feels good or very bad, depending on how good you are.
Q: The Homeworld games have always had a remarkable modding community. Will Homeworld 3 be supporting user-created content? Have you guys ever taken any inspiration from things that the fans have put together?
McGuire: We haven't actually announced UGC, we'll revisit user-generated content. We fully acknowledge, though, that our fans love it, and they love interacting with it. And to the second part of your question, whether or not we've been inspired by fans? Absolutely. There was actually a version of the Homeworld 3 story that we were discussing for a bit (but the story is different now) that I love, that actually I saw on a Reddit post and I was like, "this idea is f****** great!" And I pitched that to a couple of folks. The story is different now, but we would have given credit to that user if we did go down that path. But there are actual things that show up in the game, too. There was a fan-created -- It's kind of become the authority and I'll give a shout-out to NorseHound who is now actually involved in the games industry -- that has essentially become the canon of the Homeworld universe and it's this fan-created map. So yeah, absolutely. We watch those subreddits, the Facebook group is actually quite active, and Twitter, and look at what fans are creating and what they're pitching.
Neale: I'll add on to that, as well. The player base in the community is pretty incredible. And we draw a lot of inspiration from them, and from their energy and their excitement over the day. We were trying to make the Homeworld game that everyone's been waiting for, right? And we have an incredible pedigree on our game team, veterans of the Homeworld franchise that are helping drive that effort. But to that point, we also want to make sure that we're listening to the player base and understanding what they're looking for as well.
McGuire: One last thing too is we've also brought in a lot of those fans and myself included. I was a Homeworld super fan before I went to Blackbird and a lot of our concept artists, a lot of our vehicle artists, they're all inspired by that original generation, and now they're there. They're the new veterans.
Q: Deserts of Kharak brought Homeworld-style gameplay to a completely new environment. Did anything from that experience help inform decisions about what you'd like to do with Homeworld 3?
Neale: The short answer is yes. Again, when we started talking about this, a lot of what came up was that previous Homeworld games had always wanted to have terrain, always wanted to be able to fly through these incredibly sized monolithic structures and interact with them, and fly through and around them. The terrain was something that was incredibly important to the gameplay experience in DoK and had answered a lot of questions in a lot of different ways. So we definitely drew inspiration from how we worked on that. We also have a lot of DoK devs on our team as well to help inform those decisions.
Q: What was one of the most challenging things to perfect during Homeworld 3's development? Was there something that was particularly difficult to get down?
Neale: There were a few things, I would say. We were very ambitious with this idea of having these huge structures and the absolute scale of that and making sure that we still hit the visual fidelity that we wanted out of the whole experience. So we really put a lot of cycles into that and made sure that it felt really immersive and sell that scale from a visual sense. And also making sure that the units' reactions to their commands and how they interacted with the terrain gameplay was really important to selling that experience. So we spend a lot of cycles on these.
Q: The new roguelike mode that you guys kind of teased a little bit sounds perfect for Homeworld's gameplay style. What sorts of roguelike elements can we expect in this mode? Is there going to be any kind of permanent progression or unlocks that aren't available in campaign and skirmish?
McGuire: We are definitely thinking of it as a separate mode. And don't think we're diving too deep into the details of it right now. But I will say our inspiration is very much so grounded in Risk of Rain 2. We absolutely love that game. And we expect to have some degree of connection to that. But we're not diving too deep into the details, but that's one of our principal inspirations. That's also I think published by Gearbox unless I'm mistaken. And it's an important reference for us because we want it to play -- like I love roguelikes, I literally play like every roguelike that comes out -- but it's important that we don't reference, like, Slay the Spire, necessarily. We want that feel, that co-op feel, the multiplayer feel that we're aspiring to be more session-based, et cetera. Yeah, we love that game.
Q: Are there any new additions to the ship roster that you guys are particularly excited about? How do they influence the battlefield?
Neale: There's a lot of exciting stuff that we've dug into. The Homeworld roster is rich with some incredible new roles and different ways in which that forms your strategy and the bigger moments reflect that new ship roster that we have for Homeworld 3. With that said, I think one of the ones that I can talk about that I'm really excited about is the missile frigate that you see in mission three. It's so amazing to see those ballistics really show up and be showcased in the terrain gameplay, being able to move around behind cover in order to avoid that ship, or being able to go in through tunnels and ambush around behind in order to get the advantage. That's the kind of gameplay that we're really excited about. And having that reflected in the different ship roles is super important to us.
Q: What aspect of Homeworld 3 are you most excited for players to experience?
McGuire: For me, it's what we're doing with the gameplay. When you imagine 3D combat and you imagine naval combat or combat in space, it is kind of that idyllic vision of what might be taken and realized in 3D. But then also surprising, like there are moments where you will be in a dogfight, and you rotate your camera up to look down the face of a structure, and then maneuver your ships down the terrain and then rotate your camera around and then maneuver it again, it's at once both chaotic and ordered and just beautiful. And it's space combat in a way that others haven't gotten to experience, and it will surprise them with how cool it is.
Neale: I'll sort of echo that point, you know, I'm a little biased because of my position. With that said, I'm actually really excited about not just the terrain gameplay, but really the incredible fidelity with which the units are able to react to player commands when getting close to that terrain. It's one of the best things that you can do is really just fly in close to some structures and fly down into these trenches. And moving along really does feel like the experience that you always wanted to happen in space with these fighters. It's just an incredible feeling to be able to move through and actually be able to interact directly with the terrain and have that experience.
McGuire: I will say, too, like we only showed the two missions, but what we showed is very early and the team has done amazing things with those systems. You can just imagine some of the things that they've done. They've taken it to really amazing heights.
Q: It seems like you put a lot of effort into streamlining the UI and the experience, have there been any major changes you'd like to talk about in terms of making the game more accessible?
Neale: Accessibility was definitely a factor. And again, everything comes back to the terrain gameplay, right? Really, when you take a look at previous games, that was one of the most difficult things was sort of the verticality, being able to move vertically throughout the level. And that was something that we're going to focus on and dig deeper into how can we really get the player to be able to move through the environment in a sort of truly 3D way without the UI getting in the way of that experience. So having terrain that you can actually click on and get in deep really streamlines that process.
McGuire: There have also been 20 years of not only RTS but also just maneuvering in 3D, 3D suite packages, Maya, et cetera, that we wanted to integrate back into Homeworld. I mean, it's literally been 20 years since that control schema was developed. So yeah, we have looked at the modern aesthetic and modern expectations of how the interaction might go, the level of information that a player gets, or lack of information the player might get, and not overwhelm them with too much info which Homeworld occasionally did. So I think for our UX team and designers it's actually been very exciting because they get to go back to this beloved franchise and imagine how the player interacts with it in a way that's still true to our fans.
Q: Is there anything else you'd like our say to our readers about Homeworld 3?
McGuire: To us, this game will be worth the wait. For us, it's been a long wait. It's been a long wait for us to even begin development on it. And then now it's been in development for many years. But I actually had a moment the other day where the director asked me to review a mechanic. And so I grabbed the latest, and I started playing, and I actually ended up playing for an hour. Like, hey, come eat dinner, it's getting cold. And so I wouldn't eat dinner. I came back, and I played for three more hours. I didn't have to, like I was done reviewing mechanics like 20 minutes in, and when a game does that it's pretty special. And we're not launching in the next few months, we still have time to continue to improve that and continue to iterate on it until our launch in the first half of 2023. So yeah, I think it is going to be worth the wait. And I hope if you were a fan, whether it was 20 years ago, or 10 years ago, come back and wishlist the game, support us on Steam and follow the launch of the game. We think you'll love it.
Q: Lastly, Blackbird Interactive made headlines for moving to a four-day workweek. Has that had a positive impact on your health and the development process?
McGuire: It's been amazing. It's been really amazing. We're actually going to issue a follow-up to it. You know, we announced it back in February. And now we have the whole studio on it, including the Homeworld 3 team. We're closely monitoring all of our stats in terms of productivity and things like that. And it's actually quite, it's like, numbers-wise, it's almost identical to where we were with the five-day work week, except everyone is more refreshed. Everyone makes smarter decisions. Everyone's happier. And it's just been incredible for us. So we're actually going to try and share this with other developers and share some great insights. We've been writing a white paper that we could share with people. But yeah, it's been really incredible for us. Thank you for asking.
And it's interesting because it's actually given people fuel to go further and do better, which we didn't really account for. It was really more about quality of life and resting folks and not burning people out. But it actually had the opposite effect where productivity is comparable to what it was before. People make smarter decisions when they're rested. So it's something we didn't really account for. What are you feeling about it, Kat?
Neale: This is an industry that is known for crunch. And it's also a very creative industry. And when it's something super creative, that you want to really draw the passion out from people, it's super important that you give them the time away from them to really percolate these ideas and get excited coming back into the office. And I really think that that's what we've been able to draw out of the team with this change. It's really reinforcing their excitement for getting back into work and jumping into this stuff. You know, we've worked on spaceships, we talked about the most exciting things all the time, but it is hard work. And so it's really important to us that we remain excited. And I think that BBI has done an incredible job in maintaining the pulse of the teams and setting up this sustainable workweek. It gets us to where we want to be.
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Homeworld 3 is currently in development and will be available on PC in the first half of 2023.