Topel. Fred Topel.
As an operative for SCI FI Wire, I took part in a spy escapade in Los Angeles last week, sponsored by the nefarious international criminal organization known as Activision (well, maybe they're not so criminal), who were promoting Quantum of Solace, a new video game themed to the upcoming 22nd James Bond movie.
The experience left me both shaken and stirred.
It all began when a hired driver pulled up in a limousine. A comely redhead named Nikki--slinky black gown, high heels--held the door as I and a fellow journalist took our seats in the back.
Two traffic lights into the drive, our driver spotted an enemy tailing us. He took evasive action into an alley. Nikki rushed us out the back. The driver sped off, providing a decoy for our tail.
We met our contact in the alley. He handed us personalized briefcases with weapons (a plastic gun), cover (a T-shirt with a tuxedo pattern on it) and, most important, press kits for the game. We wouldn't want that to fall into enemy hands.
Having lost the tail, our driver returned. He took us to the Viceroy Hotel, a luxe hostelry in Santa Monica, Calif. Nikki and her equally comely companions greeted us--we apparently were not the only two press people on this mission. To maintain our cover, we all posed for photos in front of an Aston Martin. Waiters passed around vodka martinis. (Shaken? Stirred? Do I look like I give a damn?)
Nikki and her companions notwithstanding, the room full of gaming journalists somehow manged to pay more attention to screens displaying the game's multiplayer action and single-player tactical missions. Nikki and her beautiful friends nevertheless remained. Their mission: to pretend as if they thought the video game was cool.
Quantum of Solace is Activision's first James Bond title. It follows the story of both the upcoming movie and its predecessor film, Casino Royale, both of which star Daniel Craig as 007.
The player controls Bond in a first-person-shooter mode, but can also play from a third-person perspective, watching Craig's likeness in tactical modes. Co-design director Jeremy Luyties explained the gameplay.
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"It's important as a Bond game that we wanted to be able to get back to the action, it being a first-person shooter, but we also wanted the player to be able to see Bond," Luyties said in an interview. "What better situation than to be able to have you go in third person and see Bond shoot?"
By pressing a button on the controller, the player can make Bond take cover. The camera pulls back from first person to show 007 backed up against a wall or ducked behind a box. The transition is smooth, with no disorientation when the perspective shifts.
"There are many different games that have a lot of different cover systems," Luyties said. "We looked at the ones that tried to come up with the easiest way to get into it. So, as you can see when you play, you just hit a button, you're in. You pull out, you see a couple modifiers, you hit the button, and you're moving around. It's very simple. We thought it was really more for the player to both see Bond and play him as a first person. Also, too, when you get cover into a game, it makes it a little bit more tactical, which is something that Bond is."
Skilled players may use those tactics as a strategy in multiplayer modes as well. Quantum offers traditional multiplayer modes, such as Death Match, Golden Gun (one-shot kills) and Territory Control (fighting to occupy sections of the game map).
A new mode, Bond Versus, pits one player against a team of up to 20 other players. "It's very intimidating when you finally get to be Bond, and next thing you know, there's tons of guys looking for you," Luyties said.
To make the game a challenge for the players teaming up against Bond, their characters will be fragile and slow so they have to use strategy to defeat the powerful Bond. "If you come around the corner, he'll mow through five or six of you, and you've got to make sure that you work together to take him out," Luyties said.
Quantum of Solace hits stores Nov. 4. (This demo and interview applies to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 versions, designed by Treyarch. Other development companies designed Quantum games for the Wii, PC, PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable and Nintendo DS.)
As for me? Nikki and I will always have Santa Monica.
-Fred Topel, with Patrick Lee
