Crytek says main character Marius is “not some brute that hacks his way through combat,” discusses game’s evolution from being Kinect-exclusive to third-person cinematic action game.

Combat in upcoming Xbox One game Ryse: Son of Rome was “built to feel good,” developer Crytek said in a new post on the Xbox Wire.

“Marius is not some brute that hacks his way through combat,” Crytek said. “He is a virtuoso with his sword and shield, moving from enemy to enemy with precise and calculated blows.”

Crytek added that executing adept timing for moves will be “crucial” to staying alive, with perfect timing being rewarded will quick kills.

“There are no prescribed combos since all of your moves are available to you at any time, giving you maximum creativity in how you want to dispatch your enemies,” the developer said. “You’ll find different combinations of inputs will kill some enemies quickly while the same input on other enemies could get you killed.”

Crytek previously described the combat in Ryse: Son of Rome as being on a spectrum ranging from “mashing to mastery.”

Also in the blog post, Crytek discussed the game’s evolution over time, from its announcement in 2010 as Kinect-exclusive Codename: Kingdoms for Xbox 360 to the controller-enabled third-person version for Xbox One revealed during E3 in June.

Crytek said three prototypes of Ryse were created: one played exclusively with Kinect, a second that combined Kinect and a controller, and a third, final version that was played with a controller and was set in a third-person perspective.

“Every version had its fans within the company, but over time we saw people were increasingly leaning towards the third, controller-based, prototype that showed Marius on screen,” Crytek said. “This also tied in neatly with the fact we were now imagining Ryse as a much more cinematic, character-led experience. Our earlier vision of a more on-rails offering just didn’t seem compatible with the ideas for the game we were now committed to.”

“And so, with all that in mind, we presented this reinterpretation of the game to Microsoft,” the developer added. “They shared our excitement and agreed that a shift to third-person perspective and more controller-led gameplay was the right path for Ryse.”

Ryse: Son of Rome will be released as an Xbox One launch title in November. The game will feature microtransactions for its multiplayer mode. For more, check out GameSpot’s previous coverage of Ryse: Son of Rome.

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