Interview with Ron Millar

Earlier this week we had the opportunity to sit together with Ron Millar, Lead Designer on Black&White 2. Below is the transcript of the interview. It's a long interview and we're aware not everyone feels like reading on the web, but it's worth it if you're into Black&White 2...

LHtimes: Tell us a bit about yourself, how did you start in the industry and what have you done?

Ron Millar: I started as an artist and animator in the games industry in 1989 working at California based Virgin Games on some of the major handheld and console systems at the time. I honed my skills and joined Blizzard in 1991. At that time they were five guys in a tiny office and had only been open for six weeks.

During my time at Blizzard I worked in many different roles and found that I really enjoyed the role of a designer. This was something that was not really an official position at that time and was just developing. As time went on I dropped all my art responsibilities to focus primarily on design and became the Senior Designer at Blizzard. It was a really great and amazing time and we worked on a whole host of titles for the major console developers as well as some PC games the most famous of which were Warcraft, Warcraft II, StarCraft and Diablo.

Eventually I left to form my own company which ran for a couple of years. Unfortunately that didn't quite work out and I roamed the industry for a little while, working on various other projects such as Metal Arms and Goblin Commander which was the last game I did before I came to Lionhead Studios. Working in the games industry is tough and risky at times but it can also be amazing and rewarding. It's been a great ride so far and I'm really looking forward to what the future holds.

LHtimes: Which brings us to our next question: how did you end up at Lionhead Studios?

Ron Millar: I send an email to you Sam I think, which went something like "Hey are you guys looking for any designers?" This of course was sort of a long shot and then no reply, no reply, no reply, no reply and no reply and I was almost going to go to another large company in Canada or China. I really wanted to travel and do something different; I've always liked Lionhead Studios and Black&White was the first game ever which I pre-ordered in my life. Then suddenly Mark Webley sends me a reply - I'd almost given up - which went something like "We're totally interested can we set up a meeting with you in a month from now?" and I was like "Look if you're really interested we need to do this next week." So we had an interview over the phone that went pretty well, I came over to England and that went great and its all history from there I guess!

Obviously I was a little bit frightened by the idea of working with Peter Molyneux; he was one of my old legendary heroes for a very long time and I knew it was going to be interesting as we're both experienced designers. I've done a bunch of stuff and he's done a bunch of stuff and he's an industry legend, so I was concerned because I wasn't sure if he'd like me or if our styles would be too different. It turned out we got along great and I am very happy to be working on Black and White 2 now!

   

LHtimes: You knew Lionhead Studios and Black and White before you started working at Lionhead Studios, so what did you think of the first game?

Ron Millar: I thought Black and White was really interesting! It promised a lot and I know there was a lot of stuff hidden under the hood, it was running underneath but it wasn't very visual to the player. To be honest; I only played up to land three because both my creature got taken away and my pc crashed so I had to start from the tutorial again. I played around so much in the first lands; testing everything out, fooling around with my creature and stuff and I didn't get to advance very quickly.

It just seemed like overall it was fantastic and I remember sitting down when I first got it, opening it and got blown away by how much love and attention went into the detail of this game. All the really interesting game mechanics and the incredible creature and villagers made it pretty fantastic!

LHtimes: Did you eventually get a change to get back to it, after you started working at Lionhead Studios?

Ron Millar: Hahaha, no! Ever since I started working at Lionhead Studios I have been in crunch mode; I've been working late every day and I just started working weekends as well now.

LHtimes: Well taking it to Black and White 2 then; was it difficult to start on the project do you think?

Ron Millar: It was indeed very difficult to start on a project like Black and White 2 because it wasn't my project to begin with and there was so much to learn and there was two years of history of programming and design! I had to go back and learn first because you can't come in somewhere and start making decisions which are going to affect the whole team; you need full understanding of the project and the team; what has and hasn't been done and what's currently being thought about.

It was literally a month of getting to know Peter Molyneux and Lionhead Studios and how things are done around here. I also wanted to get a good understanding of Peter's vision and finally last December we had everything fully organized. We even knocked down some walls in our office to get more people in! Now everything is in full swing. Everything is being pulled together, all the technology and features, and shaped into an incredible game.

LHtimes: Is Peter Molyneux closely involved with the project?

Ron Millar: Peter and I have spent an incredible amount of time talking through every aspect of the game. I think working with another designer, was a first for both of us. Peter had a really ambitious vision of where B&W should go, and I had my own really ambitious vision, what happens when these two come together? Well right from the first time we met, this totally unique merging of both our ideas started to happen and the result is the combination of a God game, RTS and simulation set in a world that changes around the player, in other words a totally unique experience.

As Peter and I designed this we could literally see aspects of the game come together before us. Peter and I talk and play the game most days, we do play multiplayer as often as we can but sadly Peter has always won in our matches (I suspect he has some cheating)

LHtimes: Could you elaborate on your vision for the game then?

Ron Millar: I would really like to emphasize the whole black and whiteness of it all - the good and evil - in every aspect: visually, the audio, the advisors, the missions etc... I want everything I do to really affect my game; so for example I am playing the game and I throw a person across the landscape; the game tells me that's an evil thing to do by seeing tool tips come up that tell me that it's evil, and the advisors comment on it, my hand and the whole world gets a little darker, the audio changes to reflect this and villagers will react and are horrified by my evil deed. That's exactly the feeling that I want, this super reactive world in which everything I do in it will make people react to it.

The God Game aspect, the creature, the wars and the city building, is all great and cool but there needs to be a focus, what's the motivation and what's the fun about it? Well I think one of the coolest things of Black and White 2 is the world and whatever you do changes you and it changes your environment and that, similar to Fable, is a very original idea compared to other games out there.

LHtimes: Do you think Black and White 2, compared to the first installment of the game, is much more about the world and the environment changing depending on how you play the game?

Ron Millar: I don't think the world and environment are the way to say it; everything changes depending on my style, even the game mechanics! So for example if I am an evil player my people will start to request barracks and walls and more people to feed this war machine. They will start not to care about the beautification of their city or having gardens around their homes. But then when I am a good God I have to take care of my people, not build the different buildings too close to each other which will make people happier and they will respond to that. It's really about the relationship between you as a god and your people and your creature. Remember that your tribe is what makes you exist in the world so you have to have a connection with them.

LLHtimes: What do you think is the most important for gamers to understand about this game? What's vital for them to know?

Ron Millar: Well... that's a good question. That you are a God. That you can do anything as a God. You can change the time of day. You can rip trees out of the ground, you can be good or evil, mean to your people or you can look after them. You can send them to war or you can defend them. You can grow them or shrink them, as far as the population goes. I think that's the most important aspect yes; the feeling that "I am God" and that "I can do anything I want in this world". Now you might have to work for your power to expand - essentially that's the beginning of the game; you have been sleeping for a very long time and so when you wake up you are not quite as powerful as you once were and you have to kind of gain your strength back, but this time you're even stronger then you ever were before and you're able to do some amazing things like epic miracles. But I can't say anything more about those...

LHtimes: What do you think is the best feature of black and white 2?

Ron Millar: There's a top five of things in Black and White 2 that are amazing in my opinion!

First of all visually it just blows your mind! It looks gorgeous! I play the game every Saturday morning or during the day and sometimes I just sit and stop and just think to myself "fuck this just looks soooo good!"

The second thing is the villager simulation which has advanced a lot compared to the original Black and White, no they're not necessarily getting married and things like that, which is one of the things that came up on our forums, but the thing is they do have lives, people will, if you place a building down next to a farm or field, go and work on those fields. People will get up in the morning, they'll go to work then they get off work and they'll go and do spare time stuff, they go to church if they're good or they go to the pub if they're bad. They also go to sleep at night and of course they breed and then there are a couple of secrets and surprises in there which I won't give away! In their spare time they'll also go shopping: they'll buy things and bring them back and put them up around their house. I can tell you it's an intimate experience to build up your city and really feel you've done something! Especially if you make a little slum and you make a very rich area and you can really tell the difference.

The third feature that's important is the creature. The technology behind it is just incredible with the hair, growing and the alignment changes and his ability to use armies or help out the towns. I believe the pet feeling is really important with this creature; you throw a stick across the land and he goes and fetches it to bring it back to you, that kind of thing.

On number four are the spells which have an unbelievable depth to it now thanks to the special technology and mechanics that we thought of and that, together with the unmentionable epic miracles that are just visual treats, will give players lots of different strategies to experiment with.

Finally and maybe this should be my number one, is the morphing gameplay. The game now actually really changes depending on how you play the game! Isn't that cool? So if for example you are a warlike player the game will be more like that: the world will be full of armies and wars and actually you can win the land by kicking people's ass, by using force. If you're good on the other hand it's a whole other method of gameplay, one I never realized before and that is that people will get impressed, put their swords down and will come to your city and be part of it all. Being able to pacify people by giving them food or healing them if they're sick is just really cool and it makes a complete different game.

LHtimes: Any last words or some advice for the Black and White 2 community?

Ron Millar: Last words, ok these are going to be carefully chosen I think. Last words are that this game is mesmerizing to play and I find myself playing it for longer than I should because I'm having such a good time. You just get so involved in shaping the future of your tribe and your creature and fiddling about with everything in the land. That's very rare for me after having worked on a project so intensely for so long and it's a really good sign that people are going to enjoy it. Every now and then, late at night, someone in the office yells out something like "man, this is really cool. This game is really fun!" and that warms my heart. The whole team is excited and we're working very hard to finish it up for you all. The Black & White 2 team are truly an incredible and hard working bunch and I'm honored to be leading the design of such a cool and very refreshing game.

LHtimes: Thank you for this interview Ron Millar!

Ron Millar: You're welcome guys; hey Sam do you happen to have any of that Belgian chocolate left? <laughs>