What you need to know
- Machine Games is building Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, an upcoming action-adventure based on the popular Lucas Film franchise.
- Set in 1937, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle once again follows Indiana on a journey to prevent the Nazi regime from acquiring supernatural powers.
- In an exclusive interview with Windows Central, Creative Director Axel Torvenius spoke about the game's performance targets on Xbox, as well as how the project came about.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle could be Xbox's answer to PlayStation's Spider-man, giving gamers within the Xbox Game Pass ecosystem an iconic hero they can call their own. In my Indiana Jones preview, I noted how Machine Games expertly weaves players' expectations of the classic franchise with modern gameplay design sensibilities, landing on something that feels uniquely Indiana while still offering the fun and interactivity you'd expect from the medium.
In an interview with Creative Director Axel Torvenius, we learned a little bit more about what players can expect from Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, as well as the performance targets the studio hopes to hit on Xbox Series X|S consoles.
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How Indiana Jones and the Great Circle materialized
"It all started with Todd Howard, our long-time friend. He's a huge Indiana Jones fan, he had an idea for an Indiana Jones game a while ago around this Great Circle myth. He had the opportunity to pitch the game to LucasFilm Games, and they were immediately positive. Then, Todd Howard reached out to us, he thought we'd be the ideal partner for this."
The Great Circle is this idea that various major real-world monuments, such as the Great Pyramid in Giza, can be lined up to form a perfect circle circumnavigating the entire planet. It's a fairly obscure theory and is, of course, most likely the result of cascading coincidences, but it makes for an interesting setting for Indiana's latest adventure. Much like the Fallout TV show and Starfield, Todd Howard has served to help produce Indiana Jones and the Great Circle alongside Machine Games, as they strive to maintain Indiana's iconic character in the most authentic way possible.
"We were very excited to be given the opportunity to work on it, so taking that from the get-go, Todd has been on board as the executive producer on the project. We took concepts of the Great Circle myth and expanded into a fully-fledged script, while exploring what world locations should expand into the game.
We were in contact with LucasFilm Games very early on in the project and then continuously, they have granted us access to all of their franchise archives, all old photographs from the sets, concept art, and even concepts that never made it into the early movies. It has been an interesting relationship and a good one.
With respect to the existing IP, we never set out with the goal to reinvent Indiana Jones, nothing like 'let's make him hip and cool for the kids.' None of that we were ever interested in. We love the Indiana Jones that we remember from Raiders of the Lost Ark, we want to get as close as possible to that."
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle's core pillars, and technical targets on Xbox Series X|S
I asked Axel Torvenius how the studio explored nailing that Indiana Jones feel while also managing some of the expectations revolving around Machine Games, given that the studio is known for the high-octane violence-o-rama that is Wolfenstein: The New Order and its sequel. Axel noted that ultimately, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle follows the studio's core pillars, Machine Games' "trinity," of strong narrative, interesting gameplay, and great art.
"It's always about those three things. You have to have a fantastically cool story, a strong narrative that runs right the way through the game. We need good gameplay and pacing, a roller coaster, with exciting new mechanics that unlock as you progress. Interesting interactions with enemies. Whether it's shooting nazis as B.J. with sci-fi shotguns, or pulling a Nazi in and beating him in the face with a banjo as Indiana Jones. It should still feel rewarding and interesting. The third part is the art, amazing art. The visuals, but also the animation, the audio, the lighting, and so on. Binding those three is the technical engineers and programmers. We've heard from testers that 'Oh yeah, it still feels like a Machine Games game.' That represents the core fundamentals of Machine Games."
I also wanted to get a sense of how the game performs on Xbox Series X|S, particularly the Xbox Series S, owing to the controversy of how games often perform (or underperform) on that system, as the case may be. Thankfully, for Series S owners out there, it seems Machine Games has your back.
"It might be that we will release even more details in terms of specifics, technical details, as we get closer to launch, once we see all the telemetry on performance. But what I can tell you is that the ambition is that the game runs at 60 FPS on Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S, and that, you know, it shouldn't be compromised in the visuals or the experience of the product. It should feel cohesive, running smoothly at 60 on both."
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Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is shaping up incredibly well and could join STALKER 2, Flight Simulator 2024, and Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 to wrap up the year quite nicely for Xbox.
Microsoft has courted controversy with many of its core fans in recent months for inconsistent messaging about its overarching strategy. But with a strong games line up heading straight into Xbox Game Pass over the past year, it's hard to deny that gamers in the Xbox Series X|S ecosystem have been eating pretty good lately.
Indiana Jones and the Great Circle launches on December 9, 2024, straight into Xbox Game Pass for Xbox Series X|S and Windows PC. It's also heading to PlayStation 5 sometime in 2025.
