Gamescom 2024 was hectic, but one of the best parts was taking the time to sit down for an hour-long discussion with Saber Interactive’s CCO, and Doom legend Tim Willits.
Surprisingly honest, and very chipper about all things gaming, he was overly honest and in his own words, said so much that “I’m going to be in so much trouble when this drops”.
[Some answers have been edited for brevity and clarity.]
Space Marine 2, Warhammer 40K Lore, and Helldivers 2
First of all, thanks for taking the time to speak to us, Tim. Space Marine 2 is no small game, and a big part of it seems to be the Swarm technology at play, would you mind explaining that first of all?
It’s powered by our Saber technology. It’s proprietary technology. It has, of course, the graphic layer and the gameplay layer, but it has the Swarm Engine, and then it has the AI Director. And both of those systems were in World War Z, but it was like Version 1.0. And then as the team worked on World War Z, they improved the AI director and the Swarm technology, and then the new evolution came, so you can call it Swarm 2.0, or the new version.
So in World War Z, when the zombies came, a big swarm would come and then they would hit a wall or barriers and they came in. Some would break apart but in Space Marine 2 now you know each of those Tyranids; once they break from the group they’re like on you.
Now, the AI Director knows your state, it knows your buddy’s state, it knows what’s coming, it knows you, it knows how you’re playing and it will adjust to you. It works well whether you’re playing by yourself and even when you have two other humans it works really well because in World War Z you know when you have four humans you can kind of game the system a little bit but, in Space Marine 2, that’s not possible.
The Warhammer 40K lore is dense and seemingly unending, how did you navigate it to decide what to include?
Dude, nobody knows the entire universe. Like, there’s too much. You know, one of the writers was like, oh, they’re going to include this. I was like, I don’t know. And then another one was like, oh, and they include this. I was like, I don’t know. There’s just too much!
That said, our game director, uh, Dimitri Igorenko and Oliver Hollis-Leick, they know their stuff. Ollie is kind of like, he has everything in this universe in his head and he’s got a British accent. So just like, ‘Ooh, you sound smart’.
So Saber signed this game even before I got to Saber because I came in 2019. My understanding is the guys went up to Game’s Workshop and they actually were impressed. The guys came in, they had a passion for it. They knew the universe. They knew what they wanted to make. And cause it’s been a while since the other game.
The team has worked so hard to get it right. And Games Workshop, I mean, they’re awesome, but those guys, nothing gets past them. For
instance, the ankle armor was the wrong size and they’re like ‘You’ve got to fix that’. They’re perfectionists!
How did the surprising success of Helldivers 2 impact the game considering the similar themes and gameplay?
One of the things that I have tried hard in my career to avoid, and game developers fall into this trap all the time is they have a vision and then, oh, that game came out. Let’s add that! So I feel proud in my career that I’ve stuck to, you know, the design.
You know, lots of teams. They, um, they, uh, they’ll work for months on, on something, and then have this crazy idea. Let’s change it. And it’s like, dude, you’ve burned millions of dollars.
What Helldivers 2 did is it just kind of proved some of the theories that we already had, which are pretty common. Yeah. People love playing with their players and, you know, they love over-the-top battles.
You recently tweeted that Space Marine 2 is the ‘action game of 2024’. Can you tell me exactly why you think that?
There’s just so much, you know, with what you get in the package. You have the campaign, you have the friends, you know, and the feel. It’s hard to do gunplay that actually works. And then melee, because melee is so hard. It’s the hardest thing in a video game. To do melee that works. And then, um, to live that fantasy, to really immerse yourself.
One thing that I want players to understand, is that the Warhammer 40K Universe has been around for what, 45 years? So it’s still legit. And that game has influenced our video game industry for decades. Like, go all the way back, to Doom in 93. The Space Marine. What did he kind of look like? You know what I’m saying? Yeah. You know, uh, the Lancer. The Lancer was definitely not invented in Gears of War.
And then we looked at the original Space Marine. And with that ‘push forward’ combat that Space Marine had, it was like, ‘this is cool!’. You know? Obviously, we took that further. Then the glory kills in Doom, the Space Marine 2 team was like, “That’s fucking awesome. Let’s do more of that shit!”.
Are we going to be waiting 13 years for Space Marine 3?
We will not be waiting 13 years for it. If I have anything to do with it, we won’t be waiting 13 years for Space Marine 3.
So there will be a Space Marine 3?
I hope so. I hope so. If everyone buys Space Marine 2, we will have this baby.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but Doom: The Dark Ages, would be the first game in the franchise since the 90s you weren’t involved with?
Yes. So, uh, Doom Eternal. So I left at the end of 19 and, uh, and then Doom Eternal came out in like May 2020.
What part of The Dark Ages are you excited about considering you get to experience it like us, from the consumer side?
Yeah. This is the first game in years where I know nothing, like you and me know exactly the same. I have no insider information.
They didn’t come to you for pointers?
No, they just want to strike out their own. That’s fine. You know what? I always got irritated when ex-ID Software people would talk about games that we were making. I’m like, “Shut the fuck up!”, so I’m definitely not going to say anything cause I was on the other side of that.
It’s amazing to look at what all the games can do, you know, and how you can look at that and be like, oh, I know where they got that idea. And that’s what, that’s what, that’s, what’s awesome about our job, you know?
Talking of what games can do, the swarm technology in Space Marine 2 is incredible. You’ve already talked about it a little, but would you ever allow another developer to use it?
Yes. We will license the swarm technology out to anyone who wants it, but licensing technology is difficult. It actually is, you know, what Epic has done with Unreal, it’s amazing because we have, we tried at ID to license technology and it’s hard because you need a team of programmers to help. You need tools to be better. Our tools were always a little clunky.
So, uh, like you have to make tools, you have to make tutorials, you have to have support, you gotta like add features. You gotta upgrade. I mean, it’s hard work. You gotta understand how hard it is. So, um, yes, we would be more than welcome, but it’s our crazy tools in our crazy build system. It’s our crazy. You know, whereas Epic makes it look easy.
Do you think that’s because Epic started off with that in mind?
Well, they were like, we’re in a license and we’re going to build an infrastructure, an organization around it. Tim Sweeney’s like, this is what I’m going to do.
I’m oversimplifying it, but it’s much more difficult than that, you know, but, uh, but with the right partner and someone that, that, sure, we’d license. Cause it’s everything, you get the whole technology. It’s not just like, take this and stick it in unreal. It doesn’t work. Um, so it’ll just take a while, you know, but we’re not opposed to it.
The Embracer Group and How Some Big Studios Are in Trouble and They Don’t Know It
Switching gears now, The Embracer Group is big news throughout the gaming industry right now, with the amount of closures and cancelations. Was Saber’s move away because you wanted to be more independent, or was that because you just wanted to get out of Embracer because you saw what was coming?
Well, when it met its end, it was a little bit different. I think it was like, um, yeah, so we like bought ourselves back because it gives us the flexibility to, you know, focus on these big things. And we haven’t killed any games that we’ve announced.
What it does allow, is us to make decisions really quick. You got Matt, you got Andre, you got me and you got Anton. So I can just like text [Matthew] Karcher and be like, “Dude, we need to do this”. He’s like, “Yeah, let’s do it”. And it’s done. We are small and we do work on a lot of things, but we develop games around the world.
And so it doesn’t matter what country you are in the world, if you are talented and you can do art if you are in this country [referencing Germany at the time], you’re no worse off than if you were in California.
You can be more affordable in theory, with smaller games, that are scoped, and that just focus on core gameplay. And we can be successful with a game that costs five million. And, uh, because you don’t need to spend. You know, ‘that game’, we made it for peanuts, and it prints money.
Using our Evil Dead game as an example, that was made in Madrid. To be honest, it’s just cheaper to make a game in Madrid than it is in California. And I’m not picking on California, I’m just using that as an example. And, uh, and, and that game is fucking awesome. It didn’t really have the legs that we wanted, but it was successful, and it was very profitable for us because we didn’t have to spend $200 million making the game.
That’s what these big publishers in North America have lost track of. You know, they have these giant teams. These guys are paying ridiculous amounts of money. And, uh, they’re working on one game.
You got 200 people working on a game and getting, you’re wasting money. Yeah. So, you know, so while these guys are working on stuff, allow these guys [those waiting in the pipeline for their turn] to make some cool shit. People will, and people will amaze you with their creativity if you just give them the opportunity.
And then when everyone, when, when ramps up. You got to pile on. Get everybody. Stop working on that. Pile on. And then it starts to drop. You’re like, hey, I’m going to work on this stuff. And you start working on a game. You know, and a lot of these big, uh, developers. They work on one game. So they got to fund 200-plus people. In concept stage. All the way to bug fixing. In his heart.
It kind of sounds like the collaborative way that Call of Duty has found itself in. With all the studios working on all the things, even though people don’t necessarily know that.
Yes, they do. That formula works. You know, and again, I don’t know how Activision does it. But, but I have heard that as well. That’s some of the guys. Then, when you’re ramping up some of those people, will go and they’ll help.
Like in our studios, especially Sabre Corp. We have a culture, where you work on anything. You know like we have Jurassic Park: Survival guys, that have worked on Space Marine 2, that have worked on Toxic Commando. They can submit an asset and then it’s gotta go in the build, so you got like half a day. You’re like, “I’m gonna work on this Toxic Commando”, or I’m gonna go help, you know, the JP guys with, with some things.
You have to get them into your culture though, because sometimes some teams are like, “No, I’m on this team”. This is, I’m like this guy. This is what I do on this team. And that doesn’t work. You’re just burning money. And, and a lot of people don’t understand. Burning money. You know, lots of teams. They, um, they, uh, they’ll work for months on, on something, and then have this crazy idea. Let’s change it. And it’s like, dude, you’ve burned millions of dollars.
It actually is, you know, what Epic has done with Unreal, it’s amazing because we have, we tried at ID to license technology and it’s hard because you need a team of programmers to help. You need tools to be better. Our tools were always a little clunky.
It’s fine when you have five people working on that. But when you have 200 people in your studio you change your vision. Dude, you, you wasted money. But you got five people. And you’re, and we, we change at Saber. We change stuff all the time. We got 10, 20. It’s manageable. It’s manageable. But when you get 200 people, you can’t fuck up. You know? And video games are all about iteration. You know? So, and, and we make mistakes all the time. We make mistakes all the time. But if you’re small enough where you’re not just piling money into the fire.
You can do that. I mean, look at Evil Dead. You know? I love the game. But you can tell there’s a little bit of jank in that game. You know? And, uh, and you’re like, really? We needed to get the three map pieces. You know? That was not our original idea. You know? It was totally different. We changed that. We changed the gameplay rules so much until we finally figured it out, but it just took iteration. We weren’t burning two million dollars a month. That’s the difference.
You know, the massive studios do that in a day. I have friends who work in these big, big studios. You know? And those studios, they make ridiculous games that are so good. It’s like, oh my God, that’s so good, and then they sell 10 million, but, if it doesn’t sell 10 million, people are losing their jobs.
The leak, how badly did it hurt the studio?
Oh my god, I’m not even sure if this is knowledge, it actually did really well for us. We get some exposure. That said, there are so many crypto scammers in the world if you are stupid enough to try to find that game you’re going to be a Bitcoin miner [for someone else, without knowing].
Our wishlist and pre-orders ticked up though!
