Vampyr Developer Interview

Polygon has a new editorial-style interview with Dontnod Entertainment’s developers working on Vampyr, a third-person Action-RPG. The article describes the premise of the game that involves an early 20th century army physician-turned vampire struggling with his affliction and the moral choices players will have to make. Here’s an excerpt:

“One interesting question we want the player to ask themselves is, ‘Who am I going to kill and who am I going to spare?’” said Moreau. “We have created a wide variety of citizen archetypes, very different archetypes, so you can really decide to play the game like Dexter, as he would do in the TV show. Or you can decide to do it the other way, be like Jack the Ripper and take lives and just feed and be in full possession of your supernatural skills.

“You can navigate between these two extreme paths. There is no good or bad decision. We don’t want to influence you on your moral choices. It’s really up to you how you want to experience the game.”

Where other vampire games might weaken players if they don’t feed, Szucs and Moreau talked more in terms of how Reid’s choice to kill citizens would grant him evolutionary powers. One conflict they hope to play with is Reid’s own need for self preservation. In Vampyr, a powerful group of vampire hunters are hot on the doctor’s trail, and only by increasing his own combat abilities can he stay alive long enough to cure himself.

Throughout the interview, the team stressed that Reid had a rational, scientific mind. We asked if someone like that, given his experiences during the war and his horrible affliction, might consider allowing the vampire hunters to simply kill him, or even go so far as to take their own life.

“That’s a very interesting question,” said Szucs wryly. “Jonathan has a lot of trouble accepting the situation at first and it will definitely approach it in a rational way, so he will conduct experiences and he will come to some conclusions. But then it is going to be up to the player, really. There are a lot of ways you can deal with the situation.”