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What engine are you using for the game?

It's built from the engine we used for Oblivion, obviously we've added a lot of technology to it, enabling us to, for example, get twice as much detail on the screen than before, load times going down and frame rates going up. We're also able to do more things with AI and gun combat, how they move around and take cover in the world. All of those things are things we've built on, added, tweaked or modified so that the engine is custom built for the game.


So how destructible is the world? Can you shoot through stuff and see buildings collapse?

Any things like vehicles, or vehicles that have engines in them, and if they take damage in combat they'll explode and damage anyone else around them. We use Havoc physics, so all the different items in the world will blow around an explosion. We don't do destructible buildings or anything like that, but if you see an enemy through a half blown out window, then you can shoot through that. There is damage detailing on things like concrete and asphalt, but there is no destructible terrain per say. We're already putting so much up on the screen that trying to destroy it would be overly c*bersome.


Let's talk a little bit about the combat system. There's a whole new combat system in place isn't there?

The combat is a mix, we have the real time combat, which works like any first person shooter or third person shooter, because you can play the game in any of those modes; and there's also this pause mode called VATS which is really an homage or throwback to the original Fallout that, during combat, you can press a button an pause time. You can select different body parts on different enemies, you can target several different enemies at once and you cue up attacks using action points that your character has. Once you cue up those attacks you use a button and we use a special camera system that plays back all of your actions that shows you what your character did during combat so that you move between this real time and pause mode. After you use VATS and all your action points, you're able to go back to normal combat and regenerate your action points so that you can use VATS again. It's designed so that the player can use either version as much or as little as they want. They can play the game entirely in real time, entirely in VATS, it's up to them or a combination of the two.


You mention VATS and action points, and the fact that you can pause the game. We only could use VATS for a limited number of moves. Is there any way that you can enhance, upgrade or increase your action points during the game? This goes for health too.

Well, different weapons use different amounts of action points based on what type of weapon it is, so a pistol would use fewer per shot, whereas a bigger gun or a sniper rifle would use more action points. During the game you level up and you are able to increase the number of hit points you have and you can spend the time to increase the number of action points if you so choose. That's a whole other aspect of the character system, the player deciding what they're going to spend their points on. Do you want more action points, do you want more strength to carry more in your inventory, do you want other special abilities or do you want to focus on skills?


Finally, and this is the last question, I promise...what's your favourite thing about the whole game?

Honestly, for me, it's the freedom to go do whatever you want. I love coming to events like this where you've got seven or eight monitors set up like this and you look around the room and everyone has started off at the same point, but then they're off in completely different directions doing completely different things. That is one of the things that people have really come to like about our games, is the aspect of really having the choice to go and play wherever you want and however you want. You can focus on quests, you can focus on free-form exploring or just going out and shooting stuff for fun, using different weapons or making your own weapons. All that stuff adds to the experience of getting to explore what kind of a person you want to be in the game. So go and have fun however you want!


Thanks very much for your time and we'll look forward to the release of the game.

Thanks very much.