Developer Capcom has continued to find success with the Resident Evil, Street Fighter, and Monster Hunter franchises in recent years. Yet that hasn’t stopped the creatives at the long-running company from continuing to develop new properties to test new gameplay ideas. Its latest example is the soon-to-be-released Pragmata.
Even developers familiar with third-person action games might turn their heads in surprise here. That’s because Pragmata blends exploration and shooter gameplay with real-time puzzle solving. As players run around and shoot enemies, they must also quickly solve Snake-style hacking puzzles to overpower enemies.
The system is justified by having players “control” two characters simultaneously—Hugh and Diana—essentially adding a supporting minigame layer on top of tense third-person combat.
Just ahead of the long-awaited launch of Pragmata this month (it was first announced in 2021 and faced multiple delays), Game Developer spoke with game director Cho Yonghee, and producers Naoto Oyama and Edvin Edsö about the making of Capcom’s next step into sci-fi action. The team was clear that they didn’t just want to make “just another shooter” and detailed how they found success by trusting players to grasp the game’s unique flow of action.
Pragmata‘s not just another third-person shooter
Set aboard a lunar base that’s been overrun by a rogue AI and deadly robots, astronaut and engineer Hugh Williams is the sole survivor of his crew after entering the hostile facility. But after encountering a mysterious android nicknamed Diana, who can hack and breach the base’s machines, the odd pair use their skills to take on the robots and learn why things went haywire.
Pragmata draws some clear inspiration from Resident Evil 4‘s tense third-person combat that has weight to it, but it also evokes the slick, arcade-style tone of Capcom’s lesser-known sci-fi action game PN.03. The main hook driving this particular sci-fi action-adventure is the combat-puzzle structure, which requires players to use the real-time, Snake-inspired hacking mini-game to break enemy defenses before unleashing their arsenal of shotguns, stasis guns, and beam-rifles for the finish.
There’s a careful and considered balance happening with Pragmata’s hack and shoot gameplay, which puts a keen focus on maintaining concentration. According to producer Edvin Edsö, the tactical hacking was the developer’s way of avoiding making another standard shooter and adding an element of strategy to combat engagements.
Image via Capcom
“The initial concept of Pragmata always had shooting, but we wanted something more to it, to add a strategic element on top of that,” said Edsö. “We also wanted to do a game that had advanced hacking for the gameplay, so we decided to do both at once to make combat feel [fresh]. The actual hacking and shooting gameplay for Pragmata has always been around from the very, very start, but over the course of development, we spent a lot of time working on the balance and feel of the gameplay to make it all work.”
Stacking two types of gameplay almost literally on top of each other during high-stakes combat can risk being overwhelming. This combat-puzzle approach makes the rules of engagement more about choosing carefully which targets to focus on, and then finding your moments to hack in and go on the offensive. It’s a flow that feels equal parts tactical and free-form, very much keeping players in the moment. The developers said they wanted to make players feel more comfortable juggling two gameplay styles to find that flow by keeping them on their toes.
“We put a lot of effort into making sure that you won’t feel like you’re repeating yourself,” said producer Naoto Oyama. “We really didn’t want players to feel like, ‘Oh, I’ve done this before, I want something else,’ and it was all about ensuring players felt confident about handling the pace of the action.”
“The hacking in particular evolves as you play, and you’re always on your toes to see what you can do with it as your options increase, and what happens from that is players build their own style of hacking to help with adapting to fights,” said Oyama, adding that even though players can choose which “side” of the combat system to focus on as the game progresses, they always need to keep the two sides in balance.
“So I think it’s very important for players to feel like they’re improving in the game, just as the characters themselves are building their bond,” he said.
According to the team, the aspect that brings the mash-up of genre action together is the relationship between Hugh and Diana. In game, their bond is presented as a far lighter and more cordial spin on the dynamic between Joel and Ellie in The Last of Us Part I. In addition to gaining insights and upgrades during missions, Hugh and Diana can deepen their bond in the player hub—the Shelter—which houses optional activities for both characters. One activity in particular focuses on gathering data to reproduce 3D-printed objects from Earth, which Diana will learn more about over the course of the game.
For Pragamata‘s game director, the narrative element ties into the experience of the core gameplay, which is about building a bond and familiarity between opposites.
“Hugh and Diana’s bond is a very important thing for Pragmata, as it’s not just about combat and exploration, but it’s also the focal point of our story as well,” said game director Cho Yonghee. “Diana’s curiosity about human culture opens up opportunities for players to talk with her, and these moments are all about showing the depth of this bond between Hugh and Diana, who are opposites from one another, which was very important for us to see evolve throughout the game.”
With Pragmata, the creative team is looking to find its spot within a competitive market by leaning into the developer’s rich history of action games with unorthodox twists. It’s an intriguing take for a genre that often puts players into fast and quick engagements.
For Capcom, Pragmata‘s more grounded and strategic spin on sci-fi adventure could very well show that there’s still room for experimentation.
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