Red Storm Rising
The game company formed by Tom Clancy is finally spreading its wings. The
noted author spent the morning telling E3News all about it.
By Helen A. Lee
This exclusive news story
was part of Gamespot's
special E3 News coverage
on June 20, 1997.
Red Storm has been keeping a pretty low profile until recently, but it's only
because the fledgling company hasn't had any major news to report. Lately, however,
this has been changing: CEO Doug Littlejohns promises that from now on, Red Storm
will certainly be rising.
The gaming company formed by author Tom Clancy doesn't have a booth at E3--it's
camped outside the Hilton instead, a US$5 cab ride from the major action. Still
it is promoting its two premier titles, Planet Texas and Tom Clancy's Politika,
both of which follow the company policy of stressing story over technology.
With Clancy's credentials--author of novels like Hunt for Red October and Cardinal
of the Kremling--Red Storm is poised to create incredibly rich game worlds. Four
games are currently under development at the company's North Carolina offices
(not far from Interactive Magic and Southpeak Interactive), but two--due in the
summer and fall of next year--haven't been officially announced. Two of the four
carry the Clancy name, though all of them were his ideas. Eventually, Red Storm
hopes to develop eight games a year. Games will be designed as multiplayer titles
from the ground up. What you won't see from Red Storm are mindless games, excessive
blood and gore, or what Littlejohns calls "me-too" titles.
Clancy, who comes into the office once a month to actively assist with development
as well a provide vast informational resources in the form of his Rolodex, told
E3 News that he went into the gaming business to help create a new and interactive
way of storytelling. "It's a new world to conquer. even old farts like me
get to have fun sometime," he said.
Red Storm isn't ignoring the bells and whistles, and in fact just signed an agreement
with IBM to develop technology for online gaming applications.But the real innovation
will come from its games, which the company hesitates to pigeonhole in any particular
category.
"We don't want to be in an existing, well-defined genre. We want to bridge
our own genres," said Frank Boosman, Red Storm's vice president of product
marketing. Littlejohns added, "We want to be the cutting-edge of technology,
but not the bleeding edge."
E3 News was able to get first look at the two new Red Storm games currently in
alpha and pre-alpha stages.
The first is Tom Clancy's Politika, and it's due out this fall. The title is part
of a category called "conversational gaming." In it, up to eight players
(with probably support for more later on) vie to control Russia after the death
of President Yeltsin. Different factions include the KGB, the Mafia and the Church,
with players indulging in espionage and political attacks to win people over.
Virtual dice control gamers' fates, and a chat window allows conversatiional play
and strategy. Money is extremely important here, since everything in Russia is
for sale.There is a single-player mode, and Red Storm is working on the AI for
that this summer. At the time we saw it, the animation and sound hadn't yet been
added. When Politika is released later this year, Tom Clancy's novel of the same
name will arrive in bookstores.
Tom Clancy's Planet Texas takes place in a world created by comic book artists, where a nuclear war has turned Texas into the US' last stronghold. The setting is Waxahachie, TX, a town built arround a superconductor supercollider. An industry has formed around track racing, and mutants--each with bounties on his head--compete on 3-D tracks that allow deathmatching and climbing around on walls. There are even killer clowns, and the sketches we saw of the various characters (including one based on a mechaninc in Chapel Hill, NC) were excellent.
Clancy is optimistic about the future of computer gaming and seems as committed to it as he is to writing. "It's a new art form, and my name's going to be on it."