Just Push Start had the privilege of interviewing Dave Rutter – Producer of FIFA 11 – about the latest FIFA game’s features and what improvements have been made for FIFA 11. So lets ‘kick off’ this interview.
Oliver East | Just Push Start | Asks: What improvements have been made since FIFA 10 and FIFA World Cup 2010?
Dave Rutter | Producer FIFA 11 | Answers:Loads. Pretty much every area of gameplay has been refined, and we’ve addressed a lot of fan feedback – especially with out new passing system – Pro Passing. We’ve also added a stack of innovations – Personality +, a system that adds unique player look and characteristics across the pitch, 360 Fight for Possession that allows true freedom of interaction between players – on and off the ball. We’ve also added a completely new game mode Career Mode – that lets you embark on a 15 season career as a player, player manager or manager. In addition we’ve announce most recently that we have full 11 v 11 online team play and be a goalkeeper for the first time.
JPS: And is there anything that you perfected from previous titles? (pro passing etc.)
Dave Rutter: I think we’ve improved significantly on AI controlled goalkeepers this year.
JPS: Fifa World Cup 2010 was a much more colourful Fifa title has this influenced FIFA 11’s development at all?
Dave Rutter: Not significantly. They’re 2 very different games – one based on a spectacular, one off event, the other rooted in the culture of week in week out football. But our pitches are better because of the world cup game.
JPS: Is releasing a yearly title starting to be a strain having to come up with improvements each year?
Dave Rutter: It is a nice kind of strain. I think if you have a long time to think about what you might do you waste a lot of time not doing it. We’re lucky that we’re all so familiar with football and footy games that we can launch ourselves into pragmatic improvements even before we’ve figured out what our next ‘WOW’ moment might be. We have quite a few of those still up our sleeves…
JPS: Have you considered releasing just major DLC to bring up-to-date teams instead of a full retail game?
Dave Rutter: Not really. We offer such a massive amount of content that it would probably break all records of DLC size – and value.
JPS: They’re lots of talks about trophies for games these days, have many of the development team platinumed FIFA 10?
Dave Rutter: Ha – I don’t know if we have since launch. We have to before we send the game off to Sony for certification – but I’m pretty sure we’re playing the game for fun more than trophies. That said Jon Lutz – our CFO – is obsessed with them…
JPS: Have you been thinking of adding the new feature to play as a goalkeeper for a while but couldn’t fit it in old titles or was it something thought up especially for FIFA 11?
Dave Rutter: Yep – it’s well documented. We’ve been working on it for a while and this is the first time we thought we got it right and were happy enough to release it.
JPS: FIFA 10 had some long loading screens at times, have you managed to shorten them or change how the game loads matches?
Dave Rutter: Some of them yes – but not all of them. We keep the pre match arenas in memory all the time to stop you waiting around for matches – but there’s a lot going on with data.
JPS: What is Personality Plus? And how does it affect games?
Dave Rutter: Its more a ‘character’ of the game. This year we’ve totally overhauled the players – encompassing the way they look, animate and behave. We’ve trebled the amount of base player geometries we can use, added more star heads than ever before, added brilliant facial animations and are now using even more attributes and traits to drive the gameplay. Hence the +
JPS: For those still undecided, convince them why FIFA 11 is a great purchase.
Dave Rutter: A massively comprehensive package of gameplay, offline and online modes, significantly improving on the highest rated sports game made. With knobs on.
JPS: Many thanks.
Check back soon for Just Push Start’s review of FIFA 11!
