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We think animals are fun.
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Contrary to what you may think, "Squirrel" and "APE" aren't members of a perverted zoo. APE (Anachronox Programming Environment) is the aforementioned language used in Anachronox. Users can create their own planets and make really fun games in quick time, ensuring Anachronox will be chalk full of areas to explore and things to do, but also making sure there's room for later user addons to keep the game alive. According to Hall, "Squirrel" did a great job making the language so that it is simplistic in use but powerful also. That tends to be one of the tougher things to do. Often times if a developer releases the tools they use for their game to the public, only the very hardcore fans try and make sense of the tools to make their own additions to the game. On the other hand, the really "user friendly" applications let you do about as much as picking what color you want the floor of a single room to be and what kind of enemy you'd like to roam around. It remains to be seen whether or not APE can prove to be easy to use and still be powerful, but I have faith that it will.
At the very end of our interview, ION Storm's Tom Hall said, "Pardon me while I smell the roses." Despite all of the ridicule ION Storm receives, Hall is confident in his own ability and the ability of the talent he works with that they can pull off this ambitious feat and make Anachronox rock. The gaming community is watching with eager eyes to see whether or not the game will ever even come out (look at Daikatana…), and if it does come out, everyone wants to see if the game will further invoke ridicule on ION Storm's behalf. With all of this going against ION Storm you might think they'd have less faith in their own work, but it simply isn't the case. They're confident they can make Anachronox the game they want, and I believe it.
In short, Anachronox is going to be worth checking out for lots of reasons, which is a statement that at first sounds overtly obvious. Nonetheless, it's true. A lot of games are anxiously awaited because of the "killer graphics" or "novel like story," but Anachronox is already receiving a strong amount of attention from the press and fan sites because it has so much that it will offer. I'm not sure if, by the time it comes out, the graphics will be "killer," but they're impressive nonetheless. The story is top notch, and the mix of gameplay types with the focus on innovative combat make Anachronox one game to look for soon.
You can check out the full interview text between myself and Tom Hall here on 3D News.
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