Quantic Dream has revealed that development of PlayStation 3 psychological thriller Heavy Rain is progressing at a steady pace, insisting the hotly anticipated title is ‘on time, on budget.’
Speaking to GI.biz at the recent GameHorizon event, co-CEO Guillaume de Fondaumi attributed the success of the game’s production to careful planning and outsourcing: "We understood we’d have to double the structure in our studio, that we’d have to rely on external resources to produce our next game,” he said.
"And for almost a year and a half we not only worked on technology in setting certain standards, and the quality bar on the development, but also on the organisation.”
"You don’t work the same way when you outsource – especially when you outsource 500 man-months of production – then if you have everybody working in the same room on a project. So it took quite some time, but it’s been quite successful, and we’re very happy with how we organised internally to be able to work with faraway outsourcing companies, the way the outsourced work was delivered, and the way that the whole thing integrated into the final game.”
"But from what I can tell, looking especially at the games I’ve seen at E3, a number of developers are doing this successfully. I think we’ve reached another stage in the industry where developers can be much more mature."
De Fondaumi also highlighted the company’s strong relationship with Sony Computer Entertainment, as well as extolling the efforts of the Liverpool team, describing the studio as ‘dynamic.’
“This is also very important – when you don’t have to worry about whether the publisher is going to pay you, whether they’re going to accept this and this, whether they’re going to ask you to do the same thing two, three or four times, and so on," he explained.
"Unfortunately we’ve all experienced that in the past, and you’re using up a lot of time and resources – but thankfully we’ve had a great relationship with SCE and I think, from what I hear from other developers, not only are developers becoming more mature, but also publishers."
Heavy Rain is due out exclusively on PS3 in 2010.