Summary
It’s been more than 20 years since the last mainline entry in the genre-defining space RTS series, and the wait forHomeworld 3is finally at an end. Although the game is expectedly full of refinements to its controls, massively upgraded visuals, and a freshened-up roster of ships, it’s clear that Blackbird Interactive sought to deliver an authentic sequel that doesn’t stray too far from the experience fans fell in love with many years ago.
Game Rant sat down withHomeworld 3Game Director Lance Mueller and Lead Producer Iain Myers-Smith ahead of its release to discuss BBI’s approach to various aspects of the game. They went into detail about the core design pillars ofHomeworldgames, changes they made based on player feedback from the recent public War Games demo, modding capabilities, and even their thoughts on the game’s simulated ballistics system.This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
What Was Important To Get Homeworld 3 Right
Q: What do you feel was important to “get right” withHomeworld 3’s gameplay? Are there certain elements that were especially important for the game’s identity?
Mueller:Homeworldhas some major pillars that the franchise has always been about. The first of which is grand scale and a sense of awe. If you playedHomeworld 1like I did when I was 13 years old, you’ll remember that amazing experience ofgoing through these massive environmentsand not really knowing where you’re gonna go next, but finding out on this amazing journey as you go. We knew we had to make sure thatHomeworld 3adhered to that first pillar.
A second pillar for us was cinematic combat and cinematic elements. I don’t know about you, but I always loved zooming in and watching the ships do their thing. They’re the pilots and they’re doing cool stuff. I’m gonna give them tactical orders and strategy orders, but I’m gonna enjoy watching them do their thing. So that was super important for us as well.
Q: Speaking of playing the previousHomeworldtitles, were there any pain points or things you identified that you wanted to change forHomeworld 3?
Mueller:I don’t know about you, but when I playedHomeworld 1,when I was done, I had a degree in physics. I learned how to use three-dimensional software, I learned how to navigate three-dimensional space, and that can be a little challenging for a 14-year-old and a lot of people. One of the big things we wanted to do withHomeworld 3was bring the control scheme to a modern audience, to a modern level, and have it be a little bit more intuitive for people who maybe haven’t playedHomeworldsince it came out.
We wanted to make it something that anybody can pick up and understand more intuitively with all the differentmodern expectations for an RTSor video games in general.
Q: The genre has steadily evolved in the decades sinceHomeworlddebuted. Was there anything from more recent RTS games that inspired you as you worked onHomeworld 3?
Mueller: There’s a ton of really great RTS coming out and we’re super excited to see all of them and super proud to join a bunch of RTS games coming out in the 2020s. Everybody’s trying to find different avenues to help push the RTS genre in exciting and innovative ways.
It was interesting for us to figure out how to bring something new toHomeworldand RTS that some people aren’t doing in RTS. So for us, that’sthe War Games mode, a cooperative roguelike RTS. I don’t even know who else is doing that right now, but it is really an awesome challenge. We were looking at the mode and what we wanted to do with it, and we thought, “This fits so well into the franchise ofHomeworld. I go persistently from one mission to the next with my fleet, that fleet is powered up, and not only do I get to do that myself but now I get to do that with my friends,” which is just next level. It came down to “How can we push a new game mode or the RTS genre in a really cool way?”
Q: Players recently got their hands onHomeworld 3with the War Games demo. What was the team’s reaction to fans' response to the demo, and was there any feedback that helped guide the studio’s direction moving forward?
Myers-Smith: It was fantastic seeing it out in the world with a wide audience. We’ve done user research, group testing, and internal tests, but getting that wide audience was excellent. It validated a bunch of assumptions we had made.
I think the most interesting bit of feedback was that we were straddling the line between the modern controls and the legacy controls, and the legacy controls weren’t fully back in the legacy realm far enough. It was interesting to see the feedback from the old-school players who were all fans that really resonated with the legacy control schemes fromHomeworld Remasteredand the original games, and really wanted that control scheme available to them.
That surprised us. We thought modernization of the control scheme was something that they would love to give a try, and some people did. A lot of people really loved the modern control schemes, but some of those hardcore legacyHomeworldfans really just wanted that legacy experience.
So we took that to heart.We made a bunch of changesto bring the legacy controls more in line with what had been and also gave players a lot more options and flexibility in defining their own control scheme. I, for one, really resonate with the modern control scheme. However, there are some customization options from the legacy control scheme that I think mixing and matching makes the perfect approach for me, specifically.
But in general, there was just a bunch of really, really good feedback from the demo. Seeing what was missing from people’s experiences and the things that they called out and helped us prioritize the fixes that we already had in progress, and made sure we hit on some of those major feedback items so the launch could really cater to the experiences the players wanted.
Q: We might’ve touched on this a bit, but was there anything that surprised you about the War Games demo?
Myers-Smith: For me, the most surprising thing was how tied to the legacy controls some players were. I think, based on my own personal biases, and my own love of the modern controls, I made assumptions even as an old-schoolHomeworldplayer having played throughHomeworld 1andHomeworld 2back when I was a kid. Having that legacy and having playedHomeworld Remastered–I don’t know how many times I’ve played through those campaigns–I quicklyadapted to the modern controlsand had biases that everyone would be in that same boat. So that was probably one of the things that was more surprising to me.
But also, just how quickly people picked up and resonated with the War Games mode as well. It was really awesome to see how quickly people started talking about strategies and campaigns and artifact combinations and even exploits–though I guess you can’t really call them exploits if they’re design interactions. But finding the best builds and talking about the best builds and sharing their runs and stories and the emergent narrative that came out of those experiences was really cool to see.
Q: As you worked on War Games, did anything wind up affecting how you approached certain elements of the campaign?
Mueller:The campaign was the highest priority for us. We needed to make sure that this was amazing for the fans. Everyone’s been waiting for the campaign for so long, so we actually focused on building a campaign that was really, really great, and then utilizing War Games and skirmish to help understand a little bit about the balance of the units. There would be a little cross-pollination between the campaign and War Games, but we ended up using the artifacts to push units in certain directions and to push those types of metas.
Myers-Smith:One thing that also speaks to the previous questions about things that surprised us and things that sort of carried through from War Games to the campaign in particular was time-to-kill. In the demo, TTK was very, very short, and that was one of the bits of feedback that came out of that. People wanted more time to make tactical decisions and to make their actions count and to be able to turn the tide of individual battles.
So we made changes to address that in both War Games and that also carried through and had a positive impact on some of our campaign missions where they were taken to the next strategic level where individual combat actions and your chosen tactics really impacted the gameplay experience.
Homeworld 3’s Ship Roster and New Faction
Q: We can’t talk aboutHomeworldwithout talking about spaceships. How did you approachHomeworld 3’s ship roster compared to pastHomeworldgames? For example, I noticed the change to resource controllers being a single unit now.
Mueller:Homeworld 1had a really great roster. It had a bunch of great units, but there were a lot of things that were a little bit of busywork here and there. You brought up the resource controllers and having to micromanage each of those resource collectors. For us, with the modern version of the resource controller which is now just our resourcer in general, we really wanted to attempt to reduce a bit of that micromanaging and tediousness of having to do every single controller or collector. So we decided to put it all into one unit. It does all the resourcing but each of those collectors is actually still targetable.
The enemy can choose to engage your resource controller to destroy your capability ofgetting resources back to your mothership, or they can take out the collectors themselves to postpone their capability to get resources. I’m expecting it to show up more in skirmish matches with players versus players, and we’ll see which approach ends up being a higher meta.
But with the overall roster in general, we really wanted to focus on things that people are familiar with, but add new twists and give them a little bit of something so it’s not just the same game you’re playing fromHomeworld 1andHomeworld 2. A lot of the different units have different roles. We wanted to focus on one faction being very fighter-heavy with a corvette attachment, and the other faction being very corvette-heavy and then having a very good large assortment of frigates that you may bring into battle.
We consider frigates to be your bread and butter inHomeworld 3, especially with terrain and how they interact with terrain. It just makes it easier for you to engage around those terrain pieces and then bring in your “hero” units. All of the destroyers sand carriers and battle cruisers: you’re gonna have less of them, so it’s going to be easier to use them like hero units in battle.
Q: That terrain system really shakes upHomeworld’s trademark 3D strategy. Did you face any unexpected challenges trying to implement that system?
Mueller: It really does. And honestly, a lot of RTS games have terrain in them by default, and so for us to bring it intoHomeworld, there’s a balance there where we have to make sure that we’re stillHomeworld, and there’s still a lot of open space to engage and move around, but there are pockets of terrain and pieces ofterrain that give strategic advantages.
My favorite is in War Games, pulling over the AI that are attacking you and getting them to come over a ridgeline, and then you start hosing them. There are a lot of different areas where you can do that, especially with tunnels, because your units are now going to be invisible on enemy sensors. You can come up and ambush the enemy in War Games and campaign and skirmish. It was definitely a challenge to figure out how to add terrain without making it overbearing, while also adding a couple of features that make it worth getting into but not overwhelming you as a player.
Q:Homeworld 3is also introducing a brand-new race, the Incarnate. What was your approach to their capabilities and combat style?
Mueller:They are very focused on fewer numbers, higher damage, and a little higher cost. We’re looking at them like a counter faction to the main faction, where you’re going to have some more numbers.The antagonistic factionwill come at you with very large ships that are imposing, and, as I was saying, the corvette vs fighter relationship starts to come into play here where you’re gonna have to start thinking about, “Okay, I’ve got an interceptor, recon, and bomber squadron. They’ve got a couple of corvettes. How do I get in here and take out this corvette so the fighters can move safely through this space?”
Their main relationship is a little bit more damage and more cost, so if you’re playing skirmish, you’re going to have that asymmetry.
Q: Did you have any internal rules working onHomeworld 3as far as things you definitely did or did not want to do with the game?
Mueller: It was really about making sure that we don’t deviate too far from theHomeworldfranchise pillars in general. We really wanted to make a love letter to the fans, for everybody who’s been with us through all the different games–I think there’s like five or something now– and really verify that we stay within the bounds of what they know while trying to push some new stuff like terrain which will give us a really great foundation to build even more off of.
Q: In general, what do you guys feel makes a good RTS? How do you attempt to embody those qualities in aHomeworldRTS?
Mueller: I’m glad you added theHomeworldpart to that at the end there. There area lot of RTS gamesthat are really amazing, and especially right now there’s such a resurgence and so many cool things are happening. But for us, what really makes a funHomeworldRTS–and we definitely got a lot of feedback during the demo about this–is bringing in your fleet and having them be able to tactically do different scenarios around the terrain and really have those long engagements that are as cinematic as you’ve ever wished.
It really comes back to how I can send my units into here, go here, go there, my tactics are playing out, and now I can zoom in and watch how that battle is unfolding and make the decisions by pulling back out, moving something here, and watching that tactical decision-making play out over time.
Myers-Smith:I think player decision-making is a key foundational element for RTS in general, andHomeworldRTS is making player choices matter. Making meaningful tactical decisions and making your resourcing meaningful. Making sure your fleet selection, unit selection, fleet composition, and even your group compositions are meaningful. That is what adds up to a really solid RTS experience as the result ofHomeworld’s RTS experience.
Lessons Homeworld 3 Learned From The Series
Q:Homeworldfans often discuss the series' campaign scaling, sharing gripes about how scaling works throughoutHomeworldcampaigns or strategies involving lots of marine frigates. What was your approach to the scaling and difficulty curve ofHomeworld 3’s campaign?
Mueller:We learned a lot fromDeserts of Kharak. In that game, I was one of the main core designers and combat designers, and we learned a lot about how we want to deal with difficulty. We heard a lot of the feedback fromHomeworld 1. “If you do this mission with no units, and then build them, you get to win that mission” or whatever. Knowing the tricks that were done in the previous games, we didn’t want to have to recreate that problem. We really wanted to have people be able to enjoy the experience and the vibes and story of aHomeworldgame, sowe decided to do a difficulty system. We have story, easy, medium, and hard. We actually also have custom difficulties, so you may go in and turn on a bunch of things like make your mothership invulnerable, instant build, and all these things for people who want to just play the experience how they want to.
That’s a huge thing forHomeworld 3in general: we want people to be able to play how they want to play. We’re trying to give them as many options as they can to be able to do that. But going back to the difficulty, medium difficulty is going to be best for players who playedHomeworld Remasteredwhen it came out or if they last played whenHomeworld 2came out. Hard difficulty is definitely going to be for the people who have been playingHomeworldevery day since 1999 or 2000. It’ll be a good challenge for everybody and there are some fun surprises in there, but we really wanted to make sure that everybody could play throughHomeworld 3’s campaign.
Q: Were there any features or systems you tried out inHomeworld 3but were like “No, don’t do that. Nevermind.”
Mueller:We did think about a fully 3D fog of war system, which you can imagine we’d have to have dynamic sphere shapes around terrain and figure out how a poke through a piece of terrain would require you to draw a procedural mesh on that. It was a really cool idea, but it’s just so beyond most people’s comprehension of physical space and also the rendering requirements on that would be pretty crazy.
Q: InHomeworld 1, we had a physical ballistic simulation, whereas inHomeworld 2there was a switch to dice rolls. Can you talk about your approach toHomeworld 3’s ballistics system? Did you weigh the pros and cons of both approaches?
Mueller:What it came down to is, if you playedHomeworld 3, you’ll notice that it has a lot ofHomeworld 1in it. There were a lot of people who were very vocal in the community, who were very into the idea thatHomeworld 1’s true ballistics are a very important part of the game. From the very beginning, we all agreed that that was super important toHomeworld 3as well. We had a portion of ballistics inDeserts of Kharakthat were simulated and another large portion of them were dice rolls.
Whereas withHomeworld 3, with the addition of terrain, simulated ballistics and terrain go hand-in-hand. They need each other to help each other be even better. I love it when I see incoming missiles and I dive one of my frigates downbehind a piece of terrainand that terrain actually blocks that incoming fire. It’s awesome. It just validates both systems and makes them top-tier for me.
Q: All of us here have been playingHomeworldfor many years, so we’ve all probably modded it on occasion. What kinds of mods do you anticipate people will be able to make forHomeworld 3?
Myers-Smith:From a high level we are supporting mods at launch. We have a mod editor that we are going to be distributing via Epic. At launch, we are supporting the creation of skirmish maps via our modding tool, but we fully expect people to go beyond skirmish maps once they dig into the system. We’re sort of supporting skirmish maps from an official standpoint, and then people will go beyond that.
Q: Any last thoughts you’d like to share before we head out?
Myers-Smith:We’re just super excited about the game launch. 20 years has been a really long time for folks to wait for a sequel to this amazing franchise, and we’re super honored to work on it. For a lot of us on the team, it’s a childhood dream. We grew up playingHomeworld, and here we are building the next step inHomeworld’s future and that’s really amazing and really awesome.
For me, the biggest takeaway forHomeworld 3is how it really builds on the previousHomeworldexperiences and maintains that trueHomeworldscience fiction experience, while also bringing the game into the modern era bymodernizing the controlsand making 3D movement and unit control in 3D space much more intuitive, fun and interesting, and it allows you to focus on the gameplay rather than trying to figure out where in 3D space your movement is based on a 2D plane. That was always my biggest challenge inHomeworldgames.
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