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Tactical sci-fi shooter Disintegration is inspired by Bungie’s real-time tactics series Myth, as revealed by creator Marcus Lehto (via WccfTech).
In Disintegration, Earth’s environmental stresses have mobilised humanity into a new form. Scientists introduced a revolutionary procedure in which the human brain was removed and surgically inserted into a robotic skeleton, termed Integration. The Integrated were intended to be a temporary solution to the environmental crises, but a branch of post-humanists believe Integration to be the next stage in human evolution. They hunt down the surviving humans and force them to become robots, or eliminate those who refuse. Only the Outlaws stand in their way, and hope for a future in which humanity bounces back and they become human again.
It’s being developed by V1 Interactive, a small studio founded by one of the co-creators of Halo, Marcus Lehto. When WccfTech asked him whether his background shaped Disintegration, he responded positively. ‘A big impact. I mean, there's no question. There's a driving influence. With Halo, I was there from the very first day of building Halo all the way to the last game that Bungie built, which was Halo Reach,’ Lehto explained. ‘And then onto Destiny as well. There are even some elements of the very first game that I worked on at Bungie, which was Myth: The Fallen Lords.’
Lehto continued to say that he began working on the world of Disintegration six years ago and then began building it four years ago. Like Myth, the first prototype was a real-time tactics video game but with robot units, unlike Myth. But he realised that the concept was saturated, and he chose to return to his roots. ‘So we took the first-person shooter aspect of the game by taking the camera into the sky, turning that into a vehicle, outfitting it with weapons, and allowing you to, from that shooter perspective, command those units on the ground in a way that's fluid, and consistent with first-person shooters,’ Lehto explained.
Regarding the story of Disintegration, its single-player missions are compact and linear. However, each are set in ‘wide-open territory’ that lets players approach the combat encounter ‘from any potential angle they want to.’ Once victorious, players will have the time to explore the environment to find ‘salvage’, a crafting material that will be ‘invested in their units to upgrade skill trees, for each one of the units and the gravcycle.’ Lehto emphasised that the robot crew is comprised of colourful characters and develop friendships with the player and each other.
V1 Interactive intended for Disintegration to be a single-player game only, but it then turned its attention to multiple multiplayer modes for the sci-fi shooter. Riffing off of the structure of League of Legends or DOTA, each crew has a theme that changes how they play. ‘Like, if you want to play the big heavy tank, that clears out ground units and nukes an entire area and can just be a giant bullet sponge in the sky, you can pick Warheads,’ he elaborated. ‘If you want to be a support role that hangs back and shoots things from afar with a marksman rifle, but heals units you, you can play Technoir. Those are two different examples of crews that play that kind of role that, if you with your team can build out your crew comp in a day that's effective and tactical together, well, you guys can wreck the other teams.’
Disintegration is coming to PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC in 2020.
