Pearl Abyss interview at Gamescom 2014 (EU and US release ~ in 2016)

[KAMIKADzE]

Content Editor of 2p.com Alex “Apollonius” has had the opportunity to meet with Director of Overseas Business of Pearl Abyss, Brian Oh, and Game Business Team Manager of Daum Communications, Park Yoo Jin, and discuss about the future of Black Desert Online:

Alex “Apollonius”: Hello Brian it’s nice seeing you! A lot has happened since we met last year; congratulations on your recently announced cooperation with Daum Communications, we definitely welcome that decision, seeing how well your relationship with them is progressing in regard to the Korean release of Black Desert Online. It’s also a pleasure to meet you in person, Park Yoo Jin. How are both of you finding things at Gamescom?

Brian Oh: Hi Alex, it’s good to see you too. As you probably know, we’ve been spending the past year working hard on improving and polishing Black Desert Online. We’ve also had a pleasant surprise a few days ago back in Korea, when your colleague Alex “Ike” visited us in our office.

Park Yoo Jin: Hello Alex, it’s nice meeting you, too! We’ve heard a lot of positives about black-desert.com and we want to thank you for your overwhelming support.

Alex “Apollonius”: Let me begin with a question, our community is dying for to know; you’ve mentioned before, that while there’s Factions in Black Desert Online the Player-interaction (PvP) will revolve around Guild-warfare. In regard to this, do you have Plans on further expanding the Player experience in connection to Guilds via Guild-quests? If yes, can you tell us a bit about it?

Brian Oh: Yes we do have Plans for Quests specifically aimed towards Guilds, Black Desert Online is all about Player-Interaction and we feel that content promoting this kind of behavior will be of benefit to both the Community, but also the Game itself.

Alex “Apollonius”: Do the notorious “guild skills” fall under this category?

Brian Oh: Yes, Guild Skills will play an important role around the Guild Systems; they will enable Guilds to advance on essential aspects according to their role (fighting/crafting).

Alex “Apollonius”: Is there any possibility we’ll see an “Alliance System”?

Brian Oh: No, at least not at the beginning. The very notion of Guilds vs. Guilds is intrigue. We feel, that this allow for in-depth player interaction, as they won’t be bound by a system limiting them, so solidarity and betrayal will be sitting next to each other.  Of course, depending on future feedback, we’ll might reevaluate our concept.

Alex “Apollonius”: While being on the PvP aspect of Black Desert Online, we’ve known for long, that there will be Siege Warfare implemented to the Game. Have you made thoughts about friendly fire during such an event?

Brian Oh: Since it’d be very difficult for Players to maintain their focus during a Castle-Siege, we think that friendly fire wouldn’t be a good idea, as such it won’t be present in the game.

Alex “Apollonius”: Siege-Warfare is going to be a central aspect of the Game and so far we know that there will be 3 Castles; do you plan expanding on the aspect of Castles & Siege warfare in general?

Park Yoo Jin:  You’re correct, there’s 3 Castles currently in Black Desert Online, but around the area in which these Castles are being located, Players will be able to fight for various smaller Command Centers, which control a specific area within their range. More to the point, these Command Centers will be able to be built and then later on be taken over by Players. Controlling these Command Centers will be an essential part towards preparing for a Castle Siege.

Alex “Apollonius”: Can you describe to our community the main incentives for fighting over a Castle?

Park Yoo Jin:  The main point to take a Castle is the ability to accumulate tax money, but we’re also thinking including other types of resources.

Alex “Apollonius”: Is there any plans on revising the PK (Player Killing) system for the 3rd Closed Beta?

Park Yoo Jin:  The PK System that was present in the 2nd Closed Beta was more or less working smoothly, so it won’t be that different during the 3rd Closed Beta Test. We’d rather shift our attention toward the balancing of the different Classes.

Alex “Apollonius”: Naval Combat seems to be becoming a trend and there’s just recently been information, that Black Desert Online will feature naval transportation and combat.

Park Yoo Jin:  Yes naval transportation & combat will be present in Black Desert Online. Players will be able to control boats and ships and depending on the kind of naval unit, there will be the possibility to board it with more than one person.

Alex “Apollonius”: There’s been since the very beginning several trailers highlighting Mounted-Combat; what can Players expect from it?

Brian Oh:  In order to for a Player to experience Mounted-Combat, they need to own a horse. There will be some special skills reserved for this kind of combat, but in general, skills take more time to be executed while mounted and not all of them are usable. In that sense, foot combat is the most effective form of fighting.

Alex “Apollonius”: During CBT2 we experimented to see in what regard the weather affects skills, but we only found out, that the order in which the skills are being used affects the animation speed, could you shed more light into this?

Brian Oh:  The weather itself won’t have any effect on the speed of skill animations, but on the damage dealt. For example fighting while it’s raining has as a result the reduction of damage dealt.

Alex “Apollonius”: Our community at black-desert.com includes a somewhat large minority of Roleplayers. They were concerned about the lack of ingame emotes. Can we expect something like that in the future?

Park Yoo Jin:  We are fully aware, that an open sandbox MMORPG such as Black Desert Online will provide players due to its player-focused features and open world a hub to enjoy it in many ways. We’re happy, that the western audience loves our game and we’ll surely go on and include features such as emotes ingame to provide them with a more complete experience and immersion. In addition, you’ll be able to enjoy several of the new cutscenes that we’ve added to the game for the upcoming Closed Beta Test.

Alex “Apollonius”: There was a change between the 1st Closed Beta Test and the 2nd Closed Beta Test concerning the Housing System, what can we expect it to eventually look like?

Brian Oh:  During the 1st Closed Beta Test the housing System was non-instanced, but we felt, that it was accompanied by other factors, which wouldn’t contribute to a positive experience for the majority of Players, as houses would be very limited. Therefore in the 2nd Closed Beta we experimented with instanced housing that requires the players to meet very specific criteria. For the 3rd Closed Beta Test we’ll continue with a hybrid system; this means normal housing will be instanced, while special houses such as Guild Halls will be non-instanced.

Alex “Apollonius”: While playing Black Desert Online during the 2nd Closed Beta, we noticed, that there was no feature allowing for skill points to be reset. Can we expect it to be implemented in the future?

Brian Oh: Resetting skill points has been used in many games for a long period of time, so we don’t see any issue why we shouldn’t include it in the future.

Alex “Apollonius”: Last, let me drop the notorious “L-Bomb” i.e Localization. I’ve featured it recently in one of my articles; players start to panic the very moment they hear this word, because they haven’t had a good experience with it in the past. Park Yoo Jin you’re representing today Daum Communications, what can you tell us about your plans?

Park Yoo Jin:  Thank you Alex for giving me this opportunity to express myself on the subject of Localization. To us, as well as Pearl Abyss, it’s important, that we preserve the core assets of the game, so you can be certain, we won’t change anything that constitutes the very essence of Black Desert Online. In fact and Brian can confirm it (Brian Oh agreed with a nod), Black Desert Online may be more “hardcore” in the future. We’ve accumulated a lot of feedback from our tests so far and it is evident, that the community likes the notion of a more “hardcore” orientation. We’ll keep monitoring the direction the Game goes in line with the feedback we’ll receive, but the western community can be certain, that we won’t water down their game-experience.

Alex “Apollonius”: And when can we expect our beloved game to be available to the north American and European players?

Park Yoo Jin:  We’re currently doing a lot of preparations setting up our western office, even though we’d like to see the Game released by the end of 2015, we feel, that early 2016 is a more realistic estimation.

Alex “Apollonius”:  Is there something else, we can look forward to in the next CBT?

Brian Oh:  We’ll feature in CBT3 the Dye System, where Players will be able to customize their Armour on 3 different levels, we’ll include swimming and limited diving and the biggest addition is going to be the introduction of a pet system, which will allow Players to feature various animals as companions.

Alex “Apollonius”: Thank you both for this very informative conversation, as well as taking your time to share your thoughts and plans with our beloved community; In the name of black-desert.com I wish you all the best for the future and look forward to meeting you again!

Brian Oh: I want to thank you, too Alex. It is also for us something special to witness the joy and excitement our Game brings to others and I have to admit, that we think highly of black-desert.com. You are so far the largest English-speaking Community and the  the passion you show for everything around Black Desert Online is amazing and also manifested by the quite frequent contact we’ve had twice here at Gamescom and also in our office in Korea.

Park Yoo Jin:  Alex please relay my thanks to all of the black-desert.com Community! Once we’ve set up our western office, you can count on further support.

[RocketBarrage]

Haven't got time to read it all yesterday, but here we go today - that is just bad news, really bad 2016? Are they going to release it in EU/US without beta or what? I just can't believe that simple translation can take 1,5 year! It surely can be done faster even by a solo-guy.

[KAMIKADzE]

Haven't got time to read it all yesterday, but here we go today - that is just bad news, really bad 2016? Are they going to release it in EU/US without beta or what? I just can't believe that simple translation can take 1,5 year! It surely can be done faster even by a solo-guy.

I guess that the main problem is that they can't find publisher that will agree on their monthly fee, cause they are definitely great game and have experienced team (in MMORPG-gaming/creation/selling) and so their price (I guess) is quite not small ))
As for the translation, from public info it seems that it is really done by 1-2 guys as for now, but yeah even solo it can be done faster than 1,5 year.
Beta will surely be there (at least OBT) because even if the game will be perfectly made and translated - there are still a possibility of bugs related to servers, connectivity, etc. etc.

[RocketBarrage]

Haven't got time to read it all yesterday, but here we go today - that is just bad news, really bad 2016? Are they going to release it in EU/US without beta or what? I just can't believe that simple translation can take 1,5 year! It surely can be done faster even by a solo-guy.

I guess that the main problem is that they can't find publisher that will agree on their monthly fee, cause they are definitely great game and have experienced team (in MMORPG-gaming/creation/selling) and so their price (I guess) is quite not small ))
As for the translation, from public info it seems that it is really done by 1-2 guys as for now, but yeah even solo it can be done faster than 1,5 year.
Beta will surely be there (at least OBT) because even if the game will be perfectly made and translated - there are still a possibility of bugs related to servers, connectivity, etc. etc.

Well maybe you're right about the money, but even though 2016 is kind of disappointing.