Four years ago, the chief designer of Electronic Arts left to co-create his own studio, created with the support of Nexon. On Monday, Patrick Söderlund’s studio showed his first game: The finalea squad-based, free-to-play multiplayer shooter inspired by sci-fi blood sports stories such as squid game and The running manwhere virtually everything on the deck’s cards can be destroyed.
The finaleEmbark Studios creative director Gustav Tilleby said, is “a hero builder, not a hero shooter.” As seen in a debut trailer, players will have access to a variety of weapons and their tactical uses, from a katana and other melee weapons to rocket launchers and even a foam cannon that can reinforce crumbling walls or build a bridge to higher ground.
“We want to build a game that gives players the tools to interact, change and use their world in a meaningful way,” said Tilleby. “So this is a shooter; it is a game where aim and shoot is important. But it is also a game where the players can use the environment and adapt to changes in the environment.”
“We want The finale be a game about intuitiveness; wherever you think something should work, it probably will,” Tilleby said. Hence the extensive destruction that players can wreak all over the map. A standard match in The finale will consist of four teams of three players each. It’s “not a battle royale, it’s not a military sim,” Tilleby stressed.
Embark Studios, based in Stockholm, was co-founded in 2018 by Söderlund and Rob Runnesson, who is also Embark’s Chief Creative Officer. Originally would have been Embark’s first game ARC Raidersa free-to-play, third-person sci-fi shooter announced in December at The Game Awards 2021. In August, Embark announced ARC Raiders was postponed to 2023; but something codenamed “Project Discovery” – What’s The finale – “has progressed faster than we first imagined,” said Söderlund, putting development and launch schedule on track.
The finale“Completely destructible environments” means there’s plenty of chaos to go around,” Tilleby said. He called the maps “hyper-realistic virtual playgrounds,” which are “based on iconic real-world locations.” For example, a Monday shown was based at the Hotel Monaco in Monte-Carlo (although Embark didn’t provide any details on where else the game will go).
The environments will have varying weather and time of day to further differentiate each match. Players can destroy furniture and scenery, or entire buildings themselves, by blowing up a load-bearing wall and watching the rest of the structure collapse. “You can interact with physical objects, you can pick them up and throw them, set things on fire,” Tilleby said.
The main innovation behind all this destruction, Tilleby said, is that everything continues The finale‘ servers, as opposed to their customers’ hardware. This is what makes the collapse of an entire building possible, Tilleby said. “Server-side displacements and destruction is something we’ve been striving for for a long time,” he added. “In a multiplayer space, it opens up so many possibilities. It’s kind of a holy grail.”
Player avatars are of course endlessly customizable, both in appearance and performance. “You can be nimble, a little” [like a] ninja, take to the rooftops and take out enemies with a katana, or you can be a heavy tank, with a rocket launcher. It’s really up to you.” Yes, the game “will definitely have some form of battle pass,” Tilleby said. During Monday’s briefing, we saw players dressed in ballerina tutus and samurai armor, among many other outfits.
The finale will host a closed alpha beginning Thursday, September 29 and running until 3 a.m. EDT on Monday, October 3. Embark is currently taking registrations for the PC Alpha (via Steam), but says the player population will be limited and not everyone will be admitted. (When The finale fully launches, it will also come to PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X). Players can expect a game with bugs and balance issues, and they are asked not to stream their game (although sharing written impressions is fine). The alpha will drive in Europe and North America.
The finale doesn’t have a launch date or window yet; Embark plans large-scale alpha and beta testing after that next weekend.
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