Cultivating the Past, Creating the Future

Stormland is both a synthesis hard-won VR game design lessons that came before it, and an expression of what the developers of the game themselves wanted to see in VR.

“You need to have a game design that simultaneously answers the question ‘why VR?’ but also goes beyond VR-specific elements to create a design that stands on its own and doesn’t feel like a gimmick,” Daly said.

“We are trying to push everything we know about VR into Stormland,” Moore added. “It’s a culmination of lessons from our years of experience as VR developers and players. Stormland wouldn’t exist if we hadn’t made Edge of Nowhere, Feral Rites, and The Unspoken, and without learning from the amazing content the VR community has been creating over the years. I see it as a rich evolution of many different experiments in VR.”

“The world of Stormland is vast and multi-layered, begging to be explored. We made this game as open and free as we could and we don’t hold your hand—each [region] of Stormland offers a unique biome for the player to explore. It’s full of beautiful and dangerous things to find, and you get to discover them however you choose,” Moore said. “Stormland isn’t meant to be consumed quickly—it’s a game that we want players to come back to for some time. Stormland is an experience you want to sink into over and over because it feels open and easy to explore […].”

– – — – –

In development for more than two years, Stormland launches on November 14th. Read our full review here.

More from this series:

Stormland – Insomniac Games

Asgard’s Wrath – Sanzaru Games

Blood & Truth – Sony’s London Studio

ASTRO BOT –  Sony’s JAPAN Studio

Lone Echo – Ready At Dawn

ARKTIKA.1 – 4A Games

Robo Recall – Epic Games

Bonus Art

A few more pieces worth seeing that we didn’t have room for:
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Newsletter graphic

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Ben Lang
Ben is the world's most senior professional analyst solely dedicated to the XR industry, having founded Road to VR in 2011—a year before the Oculus Kickstarter sparked a resurgence that led to the modern XR landscape. He has authored more than 3,000 articles chronicling the evolution of the XR industry over more than a decade. With that unique perspective, Ben has been consistently recognized as one of the most influential voices in XR, giving keynotes and joining panel and podcast discussions at key industry events. He is a self-described "journalist and analyst, not evangelist."
  • Observer1

    Very similar to what’s Valve is doing (from listening to their door interaction talk). I guess all the AAA VR games will have this kind of interaction system where different animations are played based on which object is being interacted with. Interestingly, this is a contrast to fully physic based interactions in a game like Boneworks. Make me wonders if most indie VR studios will have to do fully physic based interactions simply because they don’t have the resource to do all the interaction animations.

    • very interesting point. I wonder if anyone has released a pseudo-game-ready physics based interaction system for VR indie devs, since it seems like something that could be vital to the future of indie development.

  • The Bard

    Just a silly shooter, nothing new.

    • victor

      like we need another freaking shooter game

      • Andrew Jakobs

        Yes… There’s never enough freaking shooter games..

    • CURTROCK

      Just you crapping on EVERYTHING Oculus does, no matter what….nothing new.

      • The Bard

        Not true, at all. I support Oculus actions like Oculus Start, Oculus Quest. Rift S is a misunderstanding, low spec, too late thing.
        I just like productions like Apollo 11 HD, Batman VR, Vader Immoortal (although too static and too low spec). Be fair.

    • Hivemind9000

      Getting a little reductive there grumpy. It also has stealth mechanics, environmental navigation/climbing, flying etc. Nice graphics too.

  • Greyl

    I was hoping this game would have been like Metroid Prime, but it seems quite generic, instead.

    • Metroid: run around tiny corridors shooting ants

      Stormland: Fly through large vistas and stealthy annihilate robots.

      Not dissing Prime, I love that game, but as for VR, I’ll take the vistas. thanks.

      • Greyl

        Pretty sure you haven’t played a Metroid or Castlevania game in your life if that’s your description of Metroid. Either that or you lack the ability to discern the intricate differences between both game’s design loop beyond surface level action.

  • ahem…. SPACE?!?!? I didn’t ever hear about SPACE?!?!?!?

  • Wick

    I hope that the test level seen on page 2 will be accessible in some sort of extras tab in the final game. It’s really cool when you get to mess around with certain things in a safe environment, like how Defector’s test levels are more fun than the rest of the game.

  • Wildtz0r

    Far Cry VR o/

  • I love these series detailing what happens behind the curtains!

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