Ben-DutkaResident Evil 6 could be a global experience, if you so choose.
Capcom producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi has given us the lowdown on a feature they're calling "Crossover." It was fully explained during a recent Q&A at the PlayStation Blog , where we learn about how other players can join your adventure in real time and assist in the monster-slaying process.
"The concept of this feature is to have people joining you in real time and seamlessly, so whenever you happen to be at a point where you get to China as Leon, for example, somebody else in the world who’s playing roughly at the same time and they’re also about to get at that point or they’re already there as Jake, he or she will join you. So the idea is more to have a surprise about who’s going to play with you. If want to play with your friends, we recommend, first and foremost, playing with them within the storyline on the co-op, so you’ll be Jake and your friend is Sherry, or you’ll be Leon and your friend is Helena."
There is a setting for only playing with friends and when playing alone, you'll be asked if you want to let live players join your game. If you'd rather tackle everything alone, AI will simply control the other three characters. However, in regards to how your friends will actually enter the game, that will have a lot to do with how many of your PSN buddies are currently playing. As Hirabayashi described it:
"Yes, you have chapters and, if you pick a specific one and tell your friend to play at the same one, you can increase the chances of getting your friend in there. So let’s say both of you only have each other as their only PSN friend and the setting is to play with friends only, then it’s a 100% chance you’ll be playing with each other [laughs].
But let’s say we both are popular and have 100 PSN friends each, and we both choose to play with friends only; there’s still a chance we’re going to play together, but the idea of the design is meant to this kind of scenario. You can manufacture a situation to play with a specific person, but we don’t see it as the main idea behind the Crossover concept. If players want to play with friends, they can do it in Resident Evil 5-style: two friends playing a scenario in co-op."
Resident Evil 6 is slated to arrive in October and it'll be interesting to see how the long-time fans react to this cooperative feature. It's certainly a nice addition but we have to hope the AI is competent, right? We also wonder about varying connection speeds in different regions…sounds like a complicated setup.
Related Game(s): Resident Evil 6
