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See the original image at arstechnica.com

Game Developers Are Too Human: Interview with Dennis Dyack

arstechnica.com — Silicon Knights' Dennis Dyack is no stranger to controversy, having spoken out against the haters who've trashed his long-awaited title, Too Human. We sit down with Dennis to get a feel for the man behind the flamewars.

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  • skewl, on 07/22/2008, -6/+10At first I wasn't impressed with this game, but it actually looks really good.
    • LLamaStar, on 07/23/2008, -5/+4Link please? I dont think we were watching the same videos.
    • rpgmaker, on 07/23/2008, -0/+1Now that there's an article of the game on Ars it sure looks nice....
  • LimeParrot, on 07/22/2008, -12/+2Dugg for "Game Developers Are Too Human"
  • santasing, on 07/22/2008, -1/+8Not convinced by this game yet, will rent it though. I am mostly turned off by the camera issues and the fact that it is basically a dungeon crawler. Give us bigger and more varied environments.
    • kingmanic, on 07/23/2008, -0/+3It's a dungeon crawler noted for bland generic environments and long corridors of blandness in it's previews.
  • detroit123, on 07/22/2008, -4/+8the demo is horrible. the only game to use the right stick well was jet li rise to honor
    • Asianwaste, on 07/23/2008, -1/+2MGS 2's sword
      • isewise, on 07/23/2008, -0/+3Yea but MGS2's sword parts where only a small part of a much bigger game, Too Human's gameplay is almost entirely based on this right stick only play.
      • ZenMojo, on 07/23/2008, -0/+2@isewise

        Which is why Too Human should have at least gotten THAT right. Crap, Kojima literally has better gameplay in a 10-minute segment than Dyack has in an entire game.
  • petebot, on 07/22/2008, -4/+17Looking forward to this--hack n slash games are few and far between these days...
    • str1fe, on 07/23/2008, -0/+8"Good hack n slash games are few and far between these days"

      ^ fixed. ***** ones are all over the place.
  • goldfenix, on 07/22/2008, -2/+10Fan of all their previous games, Eternal Darkness in particular, but a 9 year development cycle concerns me. Particularly worrisome is that the end product, by his words, is (likely) less than 15 hours in length. That means that for each hour of gameplay then spent roughly 9 months on it. I can't imagine that would have happened to anything unless there were some SERIOUS issues.

    I mean, sure, it's likely that the game will be good, but I can't imagine any case in which it's 9 years good. That is, unless they actually finished it nine years ago and have had it sitting in an oak barrel ever since.
    • negativefx, on 07/23/2008, -2/+3half life 2? didnt it take around 7 years or something? that game was about 15 hrs long if memory serves me.

      maybe spending nine months per hour of gameplay makes each hour worthwhile. your logic is flawed.
    • glacius99, on 07/23/2008, -0/+1I love how everyone keeps throwing around this mystical 9 or 10 years figure.. You know they haven't been actively working on just that game for such a long time, it's just that the game Too Human was conceptually shown that long ago.. They also developed Eternal Darkness and MGS: Twin Snakes during that timeframe..

      I'm not saying the game is great.. In fact I have yet to play the demo since my XBL account went sour (read: silver) on me.. I do have high hopes for the game since I really enjoyed Eternal Darkness as well as like a good hack and slash..
  • netgeek06, on 07/22/2008, -4/+4Silicon Knights' Dennis Dyack is no stranger to controversy.
  • Wizer04, on 07/23/2008, -2/+8The controls just don't work and are really annoying, if they change the controls around then it would be alot better.
    • ThetaDot, on 07/23/2008, -2/+3I thought so too at first but after 20 minutes of playing I had the hang of it. *shrug*
  • Rustiga, on 07/23/2008, -4/+3Don't be so quick to judge the timeframe it's taking this game to come out, TF2 took plenty long and went through many different cycles to be where it's at today, it's better then the opposite, a game released too early for its own good, (perfect dark zero, anyone?)
  • SubjectiveC, on 07/23/2008, -6/+6Eternal Darkness was the least deserving of the extreme hype it received from last generation. It won't surprise me if this bores me to tears as well.
    • Asianwaste, on 07/23/2008, -1/+4The only problem with an insanity system is that if you are expecting it, the illusions in the games don't really work well, do that? In other words, if you are able to quantify just how sane you are, then you're probably not that crazy. They should've taken out the insanity meter and left it all to visual cues.
    • CerMakAlot, on 07/23/2008, -3/+3No. Eternal Darkness was ***** awesome. I haven't tried Too Human yet, but regardless of that I will always have fond memories of Eternal Darkness.
  • knodi, on 07/23/2008, -5/+3Dennis Dyack is a good person his problem is that he has common sense.
  • leafybean, on 07/23/2008, -5/+6Too bad the demo killed any anticipation I had for the game. Seems the developers are more comfortable spending their time responding to trolls on forums such as NeoGAF, and making "deep" comments on Ign podcasts.

    The graphics were meh, controls *****, and the difficulty was spot on for players suffering from a coma. Ill pass.
  • mdavis, on 07/23/2008, -3/+8Dennis is a arrogant, pompous ass. If Too Human fails it should at least humble him a little.
    • SethEllis, on 07/23/2008, -0/+5If that doesn't humble him I'm sure that the huge fine they'll have to pay Epic for stealing intellectual property will do it.
    • m0deth, on 07/23/2008, -0/+2Perhaps you haven't heard of Derek Smart, and his 15 years of arrogance over nothing but broken, overbloated 'titles'. you cant really even call it different titles, its all the same crap, over and over, with more stuff added, and little to no improvement.

      In afterthought, maybe Dennis should read up on Derek....
      • ZenMojo, on 07/23/2008, -2/+1This year, Dennis Dyack will make you his bitch.*

        *...John Romero, eat your heart out!
  • Spl1nter, on 07/23/2008, -2/+4To anyone who disliked the demo try it again and go with the beserker. (you can find out how on youtube) I wng to as extremely dissapointed with the game but then decided to play through the demo once more and found it much better so much that I have played it twice more and from not buying the game I am not going to get it day one.
    • GlitchEnzo, on 07/23/2008, -1/+2I didn't think you could select the Berserker in the demo. From all of the previews I have seen and read for the game I knew I wanted to play the Berserker, but when I played the demo it would only let me select the Warrior. Maybe I should go back and check it out again.

      Still I had fun with the game. I feel like it will have a really good story. Plus, I LOVE the designs for the robot enemies!
      • isewise, on 07/23/2008, -1/+2You have to do a little hack to play as The Beserker, instead of just mentioning it, Spl1nter should have linked to it:
        http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5UzK_5DySU

      • GlitchEnzo, on 07/23/2008, -1/+2Oh I completely missed the part where Spl1nter said "you can find out how on youtube".

        Thanks for providing the video link isewise. It's hilarious how excited that guy is in the video.
  • goatface, on 07/23/2008, -2/+6I had high hopes for this game, but it pretty much failed at everything i wanted it to be. I gave the demo a fair shake and it never grew on me, the controls, the cameras, animations are all icky.
    I thought dennis was okay, until his remarks on how the lack of 4 person co-op wasn't that big of a deal after he hyped up the whole team interplay for months.
  • Asianwaste, on 07/23/2008, -5/+5If to err is human, than this game's demo was too human.
    Go fig, Silicon Knights can't make games worth *****.
    • SLockhart, on 07/23/2008, -3/+1Wow...um, well you tried, i'll give you that.
  • tikited, on 07/23/2008, -4/+4The game should of been released on ps1 then second one on gamecube then finally xbox 360. Well it took ten years and scraped each version that they did. To bad I don't care about this game, I heard people thought it was repetitive gameplay. Dennis should of have shut his mouth instead of complain on neogaf or other places.
  • zcrazed1, on 07/23/2008, -1/+4Played the demo........ Have to say i was highly unimpressed. The controls are *****, the visuals are sub par and the animation is jerky and unrealistic. It's unfortunate, they could have made a really cool game out of it but i feel it falls very short of what some modern games are doing with the technology.
  • whodat807, on 07/23/2008, -2/+15Dennis Dyack annoys the crap out of me. I was listening to him go on a long, meandering rant on 1-Up Yours a few weeks ago, trying to make the argument that the media coverage of Too Human was not only unfair, but unethical. Which is nonsense anyways, and it was made even more annoying by Dyack's unstoppably pretentious douchbaggery.

    Dyack needs to stop running his mouth and shut up about his deep, ponderous thoughts on the ethics of internet messageboards and devote his energy on making a game that doesn't suck.
    • Vhaeos, on 07/23/2008, -1/+7Seriously, his game may be good.. but he himself is so incredibly annoying. To say that NeoGAF is destroying society just because the moderators allow users on a gaming forum to critique game footage is stupid. Plus for him to say that he could probably shut down a NeoGAF because the USERS said bad things about your game is not only stupid, but childish. (not to mention wrong.) People have opinions Dennis, you can't get around that.
    • leafybean, on 07/23/2008, -1/+4The problem is that not only does he annoy the crap out of people, but his game backs nothing up. It is a terrible looking game so far and doesn't warrant any praise.
    • isewise, on 07/23/2008, -1/+5If you listened to the latest 1up Yours E3 wrap up podcast, you can hear Garnett own him pretty bad about the suckiness of the levels.
  • nihilistic, on 07/23/2008, -4/+3Too few game companies can claim a blemishless game record (i.e. Blizzard) and Silicon Knights are one of those companies. Anybody who would badmouth this game based on word of mouth has likely never picked up a single title of theirs ever.
  • BedPost, on 07/23/2008, -2/+5If you've played the demo, you already know this, but for those that haven't: Too Human is awful. It's just awful. I can't believe how, after 9 years, they decide to release a game this shoddy - the controls are clunky, the graphics are very mediocre (the art isn't terrible), the voice acting (and the animations in cutscenes) are all very poor, and the game just isn't fun. It's a bummer, but it's true.
  • LordoftheLoo, on 07/23/2008, -0/+3After playing the demo as the Champion class I was thoroughly disappointed, but after glitching the demo and playing as the other classes (I find berserker to be the best) its only kind of disappointing now.
  • Ubergoober3, on 07/23/2008, -1/+3The gameplay is pretty good, but it is severely marred by the camera.
  • johnnyzero, on 07/23/2008, -0/+5I hadn't followed the pre-release drama of the game, but deleted the demo after playing it for a very short time, there was nothing compellingly impressive about it at all.
  • dominuece, on 07/23/2008, -0/+3I know that I sound ridiculous right now, mainly because I'm in a "meditative" state, but the title of the article was totally stolen from my NeoGAF post. Sorry, geek out.
  • Volath, on 07/23/2008, -1/+0After I started getting used to the controls and put the camera on the 'back' setting I thought it was pretty good. I'll be sure to rent it though before I make a decision to buy it.
  • protonone, on 07/23/2008, -2/+1Keep in mind that it is a demo, and that the control scheme could be changed and tweeked before the final release in response to what the public says. I thought the controls were a little off, but if I got to play with it more and really learned more about the game then my opinion would probably change.
  • Nextrix, on 07/23/2008, -0/+3The demo was kind of *****. There were bugs where the damage done to the mini-bosses at long range would not take effect until you go close to them and they indicated there basic attacking rush animation. The camera movement was only useful when introducing certain story elements and was a total turnoff when it changes in the middle of combat! The UI needs a lot of work! It was hard to read a lot of the text in the skills and equipment screens. I feel either this game will be another stupid rush to market, that or they really sucked at making this game. Only worth a rent if you really want to try it out. If you buy this at launch you have either not played the demo, or you are an impulsive buyer.
  • godzillaWax, on 07/23/2008, -0/+2Puff piece on an unrestrained ego.
    I really wouldn't mind the value he places on his own opinion if it actually measured up to anything worth listening to.

    Everything that's gone against Silicon Knights has been someone else's fault, and Dyack has always been right out in front of the line to tell everyone why. Or to tell us about how tough he was in college when he wrestled.

    Once upon a time I was interested in their game. Even disregarding the stream of negative hands-on experiences, I'll be avoiding this game with a 10 foot pole simply because of him.
  • seavers, on 07/23/2008, -0/+1Dyack always finds someone to blame. I wonder who's fault it is when TH flops.
  • DavidGX, on 07/23/2008, -0/+2Demo sucked.
  •  

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