The team behind the upcoming Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy video game revealed they decided to make it a single-player game to emphasize the team dynamics in the story.
"That's what led us actually to making it a single-player game, which, you know, it's not necessarily what you would expect," Patrick Fortier, the game's senior gameplay director, told GamesRadar+. "How do we put that tension in the team and the fact that they're so defined by the fact that they're together, this bunch of misfits, defying the odds."
Jean-Francois Dugas, who served as senior creative director for Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy added that the team spent a lot of time researching other styles of gameplay during the early brainstorm sessions for the game. He recalled, "We were like, 'What is the best way to engage you with the Guardians?', because they're so colorful, they're so many things."
Fortier also discussed that playing as a single character forces players to experience the team more like they would in a real-life situation. He shared, "When you're part of the team, you don't control the team, you suffer the team. Sometimes you influence the team, sometimes two will think alike and sway you in a certain direction… That feels rich for the Guardians of the Galaxy."
The senior gameplay director further explained that the AI characters also compliment the team mentality of the game. "Even in combat, when the AI is driving Drax, it drives it based on his personality," he added. "He is always courageous and takes on too many enemies, and then he gets into trouble and you have to help him out."
"And then Gamora is on the sidelines, sometimes, and when she comes in, she's acrobatic," Fortier revealed. "And so it was always about thinking about them in that way so that they would create that bond between the players. It's like, yeah, you know, it's single-player, but it's kind of like solo team play. You feel like even though you're only controlling one character, you feel like they're present in every aspect of the game."
The official description for Marvel's Guardian's of the Galaxy reads,
Fire up Star-Lord’s jet boots for a wild ride across the cosmos in this third-person action-adventure game, a fresh take on Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy. With the unpredictable Guardians at your side, blast your way from one explosive situation to another, with original and iconic Marvel characters caught in a struggle for the fate of the universe. You got this. Probably.
Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy launches on Oct. 26 on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One and PC.
Source: GamesRadar+