Tim Willits is a name synonymous with some of iD’s most well-known and loved franchises such as Doom and Quake. Game Culture caught up with Tim while he was in Australia earlier this week to discuss his latest involvement with iD’s newest IP, Rage:

GC: In your words Tim, how would you best describe Rage?

Tim: Um well, it’s actually difficult to sum up in a few words because it’s so different and it’s much different to anything we’ve done in the past. At it’s core it’s a first person game, it’s a true iD game where you have your hands on a shotgun, you’re shooting bandits and mutants, but there’s so much more to it that makes it more than just a corridor shooter – we have the driving elements, the vehicle combat, a much richer story, over-the-top characters, an inventory and economy system. I call Rage the complete first person experience. I’d say if you play Rage for an hour I know you’ll love it. That’s kinda how I explain what Rage is.

GC: So there are a lot of different elements to it. In terms of creating a world like that, how difficult was it to merge all those different elements together?

Um it was actually trickier than most people realise. After working through the vehicle mechanics and vehicle physics and racing and combat I have much more respect for the guys that make racing games. It was very tricky but I feel that we were really able to really integrate the gameplay and the mechanics and how it’s integrated into the first person component of the game, it’s very approachable, it’s intuitive so that was probaby one of our biggest challenges. And then the rest of the pieces of Rage because the setting is this post apocalyptic world and it’s not really like a post apocalyptic game where you’re trying to survive – that’s just kind of the setting for the action. But because it’s this kind of patchwork recycled world that has these different aspects to it, we were able to really be creative in some of the settings that we created in Rage like mutant mass tv which is this crazy post-apocalyptic game show where you it’s like a Running Man meets Make A Deal and we have like a whole racing circuit, then we have missions where you’re in this like urban destroyed city where you’re hunting mutants, sp there’s a lot of variety and not only in the places that you go but what you do and the weapons and ammo types that you have in your arsenal

GC: Great, it sounds like a very indepth game

Tim: Yes. When we set out to work on Rage we knew that it had to you know, of course stand tall with Doom, Quake and Wolfenstein but it also had to stand apart from them. So you know when people play it they will feel that it’s an iD software game but they will also say “you know this is really not an iD software game”. And we’re looking to attract maybe gamers that have never played an iD game and of course appeal to the super hardcore fans that have always been with us

GC: Could you tell us about Rage’s multiplayer mode? What could gamers expect there?

Tim: We have two types of multiplayer in Rage, the first revolves around the vehicle racing and combat rally and within the combat rally we have multiple game modes from just straight deathmatch to things like Tri Rally where you earn points for the rally and then you also earn points for blowing up your buddy. And that’s where we have unlocks and vehicle upgrades and power-up unlocks as you progress and then we have a coop mode we call “Legends of the Wasteland,” and those are specific coop missions that you and your buddy can play together and these missions are extensions of the single player campaign.

GC: So what was your favourite part of creating Rage?

Tim: The wing stick is definitely my favourite thing in the game, but really I think the thing that I liked the best was how it all fits together, the sum of its parts. It’s so different and so special to me because its like no other game that we’ve ever done and it’s hard to find a comparison to it. To be able to explore the different game plan aspects and the variety and program things to work well together. We have very robust AI. You can carry all weapons so you don’t have to drop weapons to pick up a weapon in Rage.

GC: Wow, that’s cool

Tim: Yeah, I love it. It drives me nuts when I have to drop a cool weapon to pick up new weapon. In Rage there’s no encumbrance so if you find something cool, pick it up and ya know, kill some mutants with it. That aspect of the game it doesn’t follow the cookie cutter mono-shooter games that are out nowadays. I really think that gamers will prefer the change but in a classic old style iD game

GC: So it’s got the feel of what you guys have been doing for a while now but it’s still original and I think that’s really important

Tim: Exactly!

GC: Even though the game sounds very expansive, are there any plans at all to expand the game further once the game is out?

Tim: Well we have the DLC that we’re working on. We will finalise the DLC plans once the game is actually out so we can find out what people want more of. It actually does lend itself well to off-shoots to expandability. Our iPhone version of the game is centered around mutant mass tv and it’s a rail shooter and it’s differnet but we’ve taken a small section of the big game and we turned it into a cool iphone game. We worked with Dark Horse comics and we created a three part comic book series that tells the story of Rage 10 years before you actually start the game, so we’ve put a lot of effort into creating the rich universe and rich setting that will live on past this game

GC: Just to finish up on a more personal note, once you’ve finished promoting Rage, is there anything exciting on the horizon for you afterwards that you can tell us about?

Tim: The team back at iD is working on the next Doom game. I can’t talk about it but it’s gonna be cool. Hopefully Rage will be successful and the people will actually like it, so far everyone does, and I’m happy about that. And we can start working on when we want to do a Rage 2 but its still up in the air but for me personally, there are a number of different titles, I mean iD software’s growing. We have our iPhone group and we have Quake Live that we still support and we have the Doom team and the Rage guys working on DLC so there are a number of different aspects that I will personally work with as we solidify our future plans.

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