Peter Tamte Talks Six Days In Fallujah And Breach

17 May 2010 at 15:28:21 by

Tamer Asfahani gets a rare opportunity to catch up with Atmoic Games big cheese, Peter Tamte, to discuss the controversy around Six Days in Fallujah and the studio's latest project, online FPS Breach.

Talk to me about Six Days In Fallujah. Is that going to happen now; is that definite?

Oh yeah. We've got to wrap up some deals with some publishers on that, but as far as Atomic is concerned it's one of our highest priorities to release that game.

Obviously I want to focus on Six Days, as that's a game that I think is particularly important. Especially with games being release now like Medal of Honor, that take the whole idea of telling the story of the people who were on the ground during that battle. I presume you're still sticking with that survival horror genre.

I don't know if I'd describe it as a survival horror game as much as I'd say there are aspects of the survival horror genre that inform the interior combat in the game. I would say there're things like the pacing, for example, and the use of surprises, et cetera. The idea for that actually came from the Marines themselves. We had a number of Marines, when they got back from Fallujah, who told us that they felt that going through these darkened buildings inside Fallujah reminded them of playing a survival horror game, and so we kind of worked off of that and expanded on that to say there are aspects of the survival horror game experience that applied to it. But we don't want to call it a survival horror game because there are many aspects of the survival horror genre that are just not applicable, whether that be the supernatural, the over-the-top blood and gore... That's really not what Six Days in Fallujah is all about.

It's interesting you said the Marines had said to you that coming into some of these buildings reminded them of videogames. That must have been really bizarre to hear, for somebody to be comparing very tight battles within tight streets to a videogame.

Yeah. These guys play videogames, right? It's their medium of choice. [Laughs] They spend more time playing videogames than they do watching films. A lot of these guys, they play videogames when they're in the field, when they're deployed and they're waiting for things – they've got Xboxes and PlayStations and they play games. So yeah, I think it's very natural for them to compare their experiences in real life with their experiences playing videogames.

Marines are, on the whole, young men. Presumably videogames are a huge part of their culture, which I suppose would be half the reason why they would've wanted you guys, or a developer, to create a game about their experiences. Surely their stories are valid too?

Many of the Marines that we've worked with are in their early 20s, or so. There are some that also go into their 30s and 40s, who've been helpful in the creation of Six Days in Fallujah, too, but certainly a lot of them are in their 20s and this is a generation where nearly everybody in that generation - and in our generation, I should say! [Laughs] They play videogames. This is natural. I certainly would agree with the direction you're asking there, which is that sometimes people from other generations don't understand that.

I don't get why, if the Marines are willing to talk to you about it, a publisher would drop the title. I undestand and I know that there's still a lot of controversy around the subject matter because it is quite a fresh story, but Peter, just make it clear. You're not trying in any way to glorify war, or to create it as a cash cow. What was the reason behind it, how did you get involved with the Marines, and where did the idea come from?

The idea for Six Days in Fallujah started with Marines who came back from Fallujah. We had been building training systems with the Marine Corps for a number of years before that, and that work brought us very close to many of Marines, especially in the 3rd Battalion 1st Marine division. Those Marines, the 3/1, ended up being one of the battalions at the heart of some of the most challenging parts of the Fallujah operation. We'd grown to be great friends with a lot of these guys through the creation of the training systems before that, and after they got back from Fallujah – I mean, immediately after they got back from Fallujah – I got phone calls from a couple of those guys, and they explained to me the experiences of Fallujah and what they had gone through. I'm fairly well informed about military matters, but a number of the things they were telling me were things I had not heard, read, and just didn't know about. Right away, they asked us. They said "We've worked with you before. We trust you to do the right thing here. Is this something that you'd be interested in creating a videogame about?" And I said "Based on what you've just explained to me on what happened in Fallujah, absolutely we would be."

And so it kinda went from there. One of the questions I asked, too, was "I know you guys, because we've worked together for a number of years. I know you're interested in this, but how do you think the other Marines would feel?" And they said "I think they'd be very supportive, but let's go ask them." I went out to Camp Pendleton shortly after that and spent time with a number of Marines. There was overwhelming support for it. These were Marines who'd just got back from Fallujah – overwhelming support for the game. So that's how it came about.

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