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We caught up with Maciej Mietkiewicz to learn more about the voxel RPG and sandbox survival title that takes players into the skies to craft, loot, and battle monsters.
"Hello everyone and welcome back to Gamereactor.
As you can probably infer by this lovely bit of artwork we have behind us, I'm currently outside of the Skyverse area at Gamescom."
"Now I'm here with Maciej to talk a little bit about it, because you are heavily involved with the game, aren't you?
I am indeed, and I will be happy to tell you more about the project right now.
So where did the inspiration come from for Skyverse?
Inspiration came from dreams about making great games at the start, and it was emerging from totally different ideas, I have to say."
"When I heard how the prior version of the game looked like, it had almost nothing to do with what we have here in the end, so the process was very long and it was forged during the long conversations.
I have to admit that."
"I joined the studio after the idea was ready, and they already started to craft the basics of the game, so I didn't see the project being born, yet I see it in the very young childhood, so I'm in the process."
"Tell me about the idea of it then.
What do players need to do when they get into Skyverse?
What's the challenge of the game?
The challenge of the game, basically at first, is to look around, choose the direction where we want to go, and go there."
"The exploration is a big part of Skyverse, as we have those floating islands.
Every island might have something for you that's not anywhere else, but exploration, fighting through the dungeons, and most importantly, finding what this world is all about, why the floating islands are all around, what are those shards, why we have skeletons and other weird things trying to fight us, and not let us know their secrets."
"So there won't be any prize, like magical armor sets of all their gods.
No, it will be just knowing the history of the world, and how it happened that it looks like this.
Tell me a little bit about the art direction, and why you went with this voxel sort of design."
"Nostalgia of many players who were raised on Minecraft, let's say it out loud, that many players like this style.
It's just feeling good to play with it.
Again, this art style can never grow old, and as we want to create a big world with generation, content, and all of that stuff, it gives us more opportunity for optimization."
"So basically it's a win-win situation.
And tell me, I'm going to say the crafting mechanics here, but it's more, I guess in a way, base construction, right?
The way that you develop your flying ship so you can reach new areas."
"Tell us about how that works.
At this point, I will just make a quick explanation that it might change in the process, because we are in the very early pre-alpha stage of development."
"So right now, we want the player to go around the world, find recipes, find objects, craft some very basic ones, and then when you get to know more, when you get more recipes, you can choose, because you won't be forced to probably, but you can choose to build whatever you want."
"The machinery, the crafting system, because let's say machinery is on the ship, are there to help you if you want to spend some time setting them up, but they won't be forced upon you."
"Not everyone is an engineer, and not everyone wants to be one, so it's fully optional.
And everything we put in the game is more than, if you want to do it, it will help you, but it's up to you."
"And Skyverse is coming to early access next year, I believe, but when that time does come around and players start flocking to the game, what's something you're really excited for them to experience for themselves?
That the game works for everyone?
You know, we will be prepared for that, because we set up the demo in February on the Steam Next Fest, most probably it's like 99% actually."
"And the early access has a very important task for us, it's like the feedback from the players.
If our vision of the game is similar to the vision of the community that will grow, because I believe it will grow there, and if their ideas are the same that we have, it will allow us to actually carve the solid, proper game that we will like, the players will like, and we will continue to go into that one direction."
"Because right now, you know, at this stage we just test it, test that, check if it might be nice, but in the end we want to have solid vision and go in that direction."
"Since we will also port the game, we need to get as much information as we can, so before the porting starts, we have everything in the very base PC version."
"Well, there you have it.
Skyverse is going to be coming to early access next year.
There will be a demo in February, so if you're interested in checking out more about the game, you know where to find it."
"Otherwise, Magic, this has been a wonderful interview, and if you want to hear more interviews from Game Director, make sure to stay tuned and keep an eye on your local region.
Take care, everyone."
