Games
We speak to Julian Gollop, the creator of XCOM, about his career in games and his latest venture.
Any PC gamer of a certain age will be able to tell you about XCOM, the hit series of strategy games from the mid-90s. The hours spent plotting a counter-attack against enemy alien invaders, developing new weapons technologies and trying to avoid going over budget – a nightmare scenario, even without the apocalypse going on at the same time. It’s ranked as one of the greatest PC game franchises of all time for a reason. But what you may not realise is how much its development was shaped by chance – we very nearly had another game altogether.
Budding game designers entering the industry today usually have a very firm idea of what they want to create and the kind of experiences they wish to share with players, but back in the early '80s things were significantly less certain; the medium of interactive entertainment was still finding its feet. As a result some of the people behind many early hits actually wanted to break into other markets – like Julian Gollop, the man behind classics such as XCOM, Laser Squad and Chaos: The Battle of the Wizards. "From the ages of 12 to 18 I was designing board games; home computers didn’t really exist then," he tells Red Bull.
However, when a close friend managed to get his hands on a BBC Model B microcomputer in 1983, Gollop immediately spotted an opening. "I realised the potential for implementing my board game ideas on home computers," he explains. "I worked with my friend to translate one of my pencil and paper games, called 'Time Lords', to a computer game. However, it wasn’t until I got my 48k ZX Spectrum computer in the summer of 1983 that I started programming my games as well, starting with Nebula and then Rebelstar Raiders. It was then that I decided that I was going to try and make a living from it."
Given the turn-based nature of board games, it should come as no real surprise to learn that Gollop's preferred genre of choice was turn-based strategy and the vast majority of the titles he has created since then have taken place in this realm. Back in the '80s, the rules of development were still being written and Gollop also had to battle against the limitations of the hardware he was working on. "The main constraint was the incredibly limited memory," he comments. "With the ZX Spectrum I had only 41kb for program and data – 7kb was taken up with the screen display. This tiny amount of memory is barely enough for a single desktop icon these days. Looking back it is amazing to think how primitive it all was, but there were still some great games made."
Indeed there were – Gollop's 8-bit output being particularly memorable. Games such as Chaos: The Battle of the Wizards, Rebelstar and Laser Squad are considered to be some of the finest titles of the period. As someone who has been instrumental in developing and maturing the turn-based strategy genre, he's perfectly placed to comment on its rise, fall and subsequent rebirth in recent years. "The strategy genre has gone through some dark days, especially turn-based games," he laments. "The heyday of the turn-based strategy game was between 1991 and 1994, with Civilization, XCOM, Master of Orion and Master of Magic. Then came the rise of the Real Time Strategy (RTS) game, which resulted in a tsunami of clones towards the end of the '90s. Turn-based games were practically killed off and the RTS glut destroyed that genre as well; it seemed like strategy games for the mainstream games audience were never going to happen again. I think that there has been a shift though since 2012 with the release of the recent XCOM reboot, which proved that high-budget, high-quality turn-based games can find a new audience. Also, strategy games have found a new home on the iPad, with a variety of games such as Hero Academy, Battle of the Bulge, Eclipse and a whole host of excellent board game implementations."
When Gollop talks about XCOM – arguably his most famous and enduring game – it's clear how passionate he remains about his work. Surprisingly, the iconic franchise was originally intended to take a slightly different form and only evolved into the game we know with the help of the man who made Thunderbirds. Yes, the Thunderbirds puppets. "XCOM began life as a demo called Laser Squad 2 – a sequel to my earlier 8-bit game," he reveals. "I took it to show Microprose and they liked it but they wanted a ‘bigger’ game – something to rival Civilization in scope and depth. They also suggested the theme of UFOs invading earth because some guys there were big fans of Gerry Anderson’s UFO TV series. So I came up with the design for XCOM."
Gollop would oversee the production of the 1997 sequel XCOM: Apocalypse (1995's Terror from the Deep used the same game engine but was developed by a different team) under the banner of Mythos Games, a studio he founded alongside his brother Nick in 1988. Other sequels from the same period – including XCOM: Interceptor and first-person shooter title XCOM: Enforcer – did not benefit from Gollop's input. However, his desire to return to the theme of the game brought about Dreamland Chronicles: Freedom Ridge, a re-imagining of the first XCOM outing. Sadly, events outside of Mythos' control meant that it would never see the light of day. "Our publisher, Virgin Interactive, was sold to Interplay and then to Titus Interactive," recalls Gollop. "Titus were not interested in our project, but we were locked into a four game deal according to our original contract. We had to liquidate the company."
The XCOM series would remain in stasis until the reboot – handled by Firaxis – which arrived in 2012 and earned Gollop's personal seal of approval. "They made a superb, polished game – a worthy successor to the original," he says. He's less enthusiastic about the recent attempt by publisher 2K Games to apply a first-person shooter spin to the brand in the form of The Bureau: XCOM Declassified. "I haven't played The Bureau, but I am not particularly interested in doing so either, because it strays so far from the XCOM idea," Gollop says. He's not alone; 2K's title was a critical and commercial disappointment. Gollop feels that in this case, the XCOM name – and the expectation that goes with it – could have been detrimental. "It might be a good game in its own right, but perhaps the XCOM link doesn’t help it." Given the struggles faced by The Bureau, it's tempting to ask if Gollop is saddened by the lack of control he has over the series he created. "I don’t feel sad, no," he replies swiftly. "I don’t have any desire to return to the franchise either. I think it is in capable hands now."
Following the demise of Mythos, Codo Technologies rose from the ashes, again formed by Gollop and his brother Nick. One of the company's most notable releases was Rebelstar Tactical Command, a title for the Nintendo Game Boy Advance which featured turn-based action and an alien menace similar to that seen in XCOM. "I loved the GBA, but it was quite a challenge to work on," Gollop admits. "It had limited memory and graphics performance, so we had to be amazingly efficient with everything we did. We wanted to do a sequel on the Nintendo DS, but publisher Namco wanted it for the Sony PSP. " Like Mythos, Codo was wound up in 2010, and Gollop joined Ubisoft.
He now lives in Bulgaria with his wife – who is native to that country – and his two young children. "I fancied a change in scenery and it’s great living here," he says. "The game development scene here is small, but there is a strong presence from both Ubisoft and Crytek. I worked for Ubisoft here for nearly six years and helped the studio grow from 30 developers to over a hundred." Gollop's first major project with the publisher with Ghost Recon: Shadow Wars, a Nintendo 3DS launch title which applied his signature gameplay design to Tom Clancy's famous military brand.
"The Ubisoft Sofia studio had been working on casual games titles for the Nintendo DS," says Gollop when asked how the project game to be. "I wanted to do a decent turn-based strategy game again and I thought the DS would be a great platform, given the studio’s expertise and Nintendo’s popularising of the genre with Advance Wars. So I looked at all the Ubisoft franchises and picked one which would be appropriate, which was Ghost Recon. So the pitch I gave to the Ubisoft editorial board was ‘Ghost Recon meets XCOM for the Nintendo DS’ – and they bought it. During development we transitioned to the 3DS. It was a great project and I really loved working for a Nintendo handheld again in the genre I love."
Gollop's next assignment at Ubisoft was a welcome change of pace for the veteran developer, working on Assassin's Creed: Liberation on the PS Vita. "My initial focus was on the setting, the main character and the story," he says. "We couldn’t really mess too much with the basic Assassin’s Creed formula, but we came up with some small innovations, such as the persona system for the main character, Aveline, which allowed her to use three different roles in the game. I got to see quite a lot of what was developing in the whole world of Assassin’s Creed. It was during our work on Liberation that we were discussing how Abstergo would become a more prominent aspect of the whole story line, in the absence of Desmond,” a prediction that anyone who has completed Assassin’s Creed IV will tell you has indeed come to pass.
However, Gollop has always been keen to chart his own destiny and following paternity leave after the birth of his twins, he decided to part company with Ubisoft and return to his indie roots by founding a new studio, Snapshot Games. For his first venture, he is resurrecting one of his early and most beloved classics: Chaos. "It was my first assembly language program, the first game I wrote an AI for, and the game I have though most about remaking over last 10 years. The original Chaos was great, multiplayer fun – and no two battles were alike," he says. "So many unofficial remakes have been made that it got me wondering what was so enduring about that original formula. Even though the game design is 30 years old, it is still a relatively unique experience that no other game today delivers. This is why it is relevant. Plus I have a lot of ideas to expand on the basic system using procedural generation, a new single-player metagame and also bringing the presentation up to date. There is still unfinished business with Chaos."
Like so many independent developers, Gollop has turned to crowdfunding to create his new game. "It would have been a risky and unusual proposition for a publisher, so I needed to find another way," he explains. "Kickstarter is definitely the ideal platform for projects like this."
The campaign has proved to be a success, with the game exceeding its funding goal of $180,000 by more than $30,000. Gollop admits that getting Bioshock creator Ken Levine involved in his pitch video didn't do any harm. "Ken has been very supportive and I am really grateful for his help," he says. "He does have a very high profile and that certainly helped to get Chaos Reborn noticed."
Chaos Reborn is headed to Windows, Mac and Linux, but Gollop isn't saying no to other formats – in fact, he doesn't want to rule out any system which could potentially host the game. "I want people to be able to play Chaos Reborn on any platform they wish," he says. "I won’t exclude anything, unless it is really not commercially viable. I guess the only platforms we definitely won’t support are those which Unity doesn’t support, since this is our chosen game engine."
Chaos Reborn may see Gollop returning to his past, but it could provide him with the springboard he needs to start a new chapter in his long and illustrious career. "In five years I hope that I will have produced some more turn-based strategy games and that there will be a renaissance of this wonderful, neglected genre." It's a genre that he has committed three decades of his life to, and if we're lucky, he’ll have plenty of other strategy classics to offer to the gaming world.
