Wallace and Gromit's first VR adventure, "Wallace and the Great Heist," pays homage to "The Excursion." Set to be released on Quest this year, the developers of Wallace & Gromit sat down with us to find out more. Read on for our full interview.
Developed by Aardman, No Ghost and Atlas V, Wallace & Gromit relaunched in June this year following last year's announcement. The story follows Wallace as he misunderstands the date of their upcoming vacation, and the famous duo use their iconic orange rocket to get there in time. Predictably, the rocket goes off course and you're quickly stranded on Mars.
We got a hands-on experience with Theft at its premiere at the Panorama in Venice, Italy. We'll be publishing our impressions soon, but in the weeks leading up to that, we've also been communicating with the development team via email interviews to learn more.
先从《重大失窃》的开发历史开始，Aardman的导演和编剧芬巴·霍金斯告诉我，这个想法来源于与No Ghost的会议。他解释说，工作室希望为Atlas V开发“高水平”的概念，Meta希望委托一个已经建立的IP。约瑟夫·贝尔，Aardman的制片人，表示：“在《马德里黑夜》的成功之后，《大事件》很希望找到知名角色，创造一个更大的体验，作为他们的下一个项目。”在确定了火星的想法之后，霍金斯与另一位Aardman导演布拉姆·特瓦姆以及梅林·克拉辛汉姆共同工作，系列创作者尼克·帕克帮助扩展了这个概念。
When asked about the Martian setting, Bell said "Theft" paid homage to "The Excursion" and compared it to old-school adventures. "With VR, we're transporting the audience to a new virtual space," said Hawkins. "By taking our duo to a less familiar place — just like when we met them in the first film — That’s a good starting point.”
Twame said he and Hawkins were keen to achieve "complete B-movie quality" with a Jules Verne-esque atmosphere. "You can imagine that Wallace had just watched Forbidden Planet and was inspired to build his rocket," Twam told me, while Hawkins explained further.
We also get an early glimpse of how exciting these different scenes will be in a VR environment - from iconic restaurants and rockets to unknown and terrifying places. As B-movie aficionados, Bram and I were very keen to bring the style and love of 50s/60s sci-fi movies to this production, which we felt would fit perfectly with the old-school look of Wallace & Gromit, as well as with Other movies are also closely connected.
I asked if The Big Deal, the AR project that Twam and Hawkins worked on, influenced the development of Theft. Twam calls it a great way to "world-build" and have them consider the audience's role as active participants.
Bell told me that Belle, the AI robot in the AR game, has also returned. "She was an early decision because she was so useful in Big Events... We created Belle to help the user experience," Hawkins said during the face-to-face meeting. "We came up with the idea that one character didn't speak and the other character was kind of goofy and we needed some help."
But was it difficult to adapt the series for VR? uncertain. Bell calls VR an "asset" for finding opportunities for humor that complement the script. He suggested: "Wallace and the Underworld exists in a world that's real and tactile. Even on a regular screen, you want to take it all in... Expand it and make it a world you can step into and explore." World, it’s perfect.”
Hawkins explained that both studios found that interacting with scenes and elements in a VR environment gave them a degree of freedom. Twam said the established world of Wallace and Gromit provided a lot of inspiration for them. "There are some rules to humor that are great for conveying, and as long as you follow them, everything will work," he responded, referring to the duo's character dynamic.
Gameplay Switch multiple characters between chapters. "You're going to be doing a variety of things that the characters do in the movie," explains No Ghost's game director Lawrence Bennett. "Repair, launch, tune and eat cookies, and of course there will be some mechanical gameplay, focusing on skill, timing and puzzle solving." Although my demo used a controller, I later learned that The Great Heist Will support hand tracking control.
Bennett identified narrative as the main focus, but said gameplay must support the narrative, explaining to me why The Heist doesn't support free movement. "Exploring the environment is something we always wanted to do, but it was important that the characters stayed authentic. When they were in the scene, walking over and waving would be a big problem," he advises. Hawkins agreed, saying both teams approached the issue from a filming and setting perspective.
I also asked if we should expect a shorter experience like Madrid Under Night, or something more. In an emailed Q&A, Atlas V co-creator Antoine Carolle, executive producer of "Theft," said it would take "2 to 2.5 hours" and be divided into twelve chapters. As for other platforms, Stolen is not leaving the Quest platform, but Carole said that the possibility of launching on other platforms has not been completely closed.
Our partnership with Meta is more than just a financial one, they resonate with the vision of Wallace and the Undercover Detective, which makes it even more meaningful... Although I can't go into detail right now, but for sure, We are always thinking about how to bring our work to a wider audience. The idea of releasing on other platforms such as PSVR 2 is definitely on our radar.
Focusing on Quest, I asked about potential performance improvements on Quest Pro or Quest 3. Kairoll explained that their focus is on ensuring the best possible experience on Quest 2, and while they didn't mention any Pro improvements, playing on Quest 3 will get "improved resolution, better Refined texture quality and smoother overall performance with higher frame rates and faster load times."
Wallace and Gromit's Big Heist is coming exclusively this yearMeta Questplatform. We'll bring you our detailed impressions of the Venice Panorama later this week.
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