TerraTech is making its way to PS4 in a couple of weeks, so I got in touch with Payload Studios to talk about the game’s development. Come check it out!
PS4Blog: Morning! Welcome to PS4Blog.net. Could you please introduce yourself to our readers and tell them a bit about your work?
My name is Rob Kinder, and I’m the Publishing Director at Payload Studios. Essentially, I run the company’s marketing, PR, community and event activity, although, like the rest of our relatively small team, we all get involved in many areas of game development. We, along with the support of our community, help shape and build TerraTech.
PS4B: TerraTech is releasing on PlayStation 4 in a few days. How would you describe the game to someone who’s never heard about it?
In broader terms, TerraTech is an open-world, sandbox adventure game, where you design and build your own creations through a mix of crafting, combat, and discovery.
If I was to compare it to something more relatable, I would say that TerraTech is like a mash-up of Lego Technic and Robot Wars. It’s a creative builder where instead of reshaping your landscape (ala Minecraft), you create and reshape yourself.
PS4B: How long did it take to bring the game from its initial concept to the version we’ll soon play on Sony’s console? Where there any particular hurdles or challenges you had to overcome?
We first launched TerraTech in Steam Early Access back in early 2015, so it’s been around three and a half years between our initial launch and the console release. However, we started the console port during the second half of 2017. The team has grown since launch from a handful of people to over 20 in that time, so development picked up to a significant pace over the last year.
There are always going to be hurdles to overcome when bringing a game to new formats, so there were a few interesting challenges along the way. The most obvious perhaps was that, as a team, this is our first console release. Launching on console is a very different experience than PC, so we had to learn the nuances of those processes very quickly.
Both Sony and Microsoft were excellent in helping us get where we needed to be, so we were in good hands.
PS4B: What is the release plan for DLC to be made available for the game post-launch?
At launch, PlayStation Plus members can download a free, PlayStation-exclusive DLC skin pack called the Venture Cobalt pack. This alternative skin is for use within multiplayer and will be available from launch, for a limited time (one month).
We do have plans for more follow up content, but we will have more to announce a little closer to launch. What I would say, is that like we have on PC, we will continue to update TerraTech with new features and content without the requirement for paid downloads.
PS4B: Thank you for taking the time to do this interview. Would you like to add anything else before we go?
We would love our relationship with our new PlayStation audience to be as integral to TerraTech’s development as our existing community is. We rely on players to help tell us what we do right, where we go wrong, and what they’d like to see going forward. This is how we’ve worked since we launched back in 2015, and it’s how we work now.
