Tag Archives: Jon Zuk

Singularity creative director Jon Zuk has admitted ambitions for more games to follow the fledgling FPS, but said Raven is “presumptuous” enough to assume the new IP will spawn sequel.

“Of course we’d love for there to be more Singularity games,” Zuk told VG247, “but right now we’re concentrating on making this first game as good as it can be.

“We haven’t set out with a plan for three, four, or five games because it all depends on this first one and it would be rather presumptuous of us to assume that we should be making a bunch of sequels. ”

Zuk did say, however, that there are plenty of seed-ideas in place for future plotlines.

“We have tons of ideas for future stories and if the game does well and people like it, then of course we will do more,” he said.

Singularity is a present-day FPS set on an ex-Soviet island ‘gone wrong’. Time manipulation’s the key to its puzzles. The game hits PC, 360 and PS3 later this year.

Raven’s Singularity is to be deliver the same experience across all formats, Raven’s told VG247, thanks to the developer’s cross-platform experience and the use of Unreal Engine 3 for the game.

“We are developing across the X360/PS3/PC simultaneously,” said the title’s creative director, Jon Zuk. “Each platform has challenges, but you’ll get the same experience whether it’s PC, 360 or PS3.

“There are no differences between the three, but you have to balance things to the specifications of each platform,” he added. “Fortunately, the Unreal 3 engine is very strong and already working on all of our platforms, so it’s not as big a challenge as it could be if we were creating a game engine from scratch.”

The shooter follows a nuclear accident on a Soviet island, and involves ageing objects with a Time Manipulation Device, or TMD.

Singularity is one of three new IPs launching from Activision this year, the other two being Radical’s Prototype and Bizarre’s new racer, Blur.

It’s out this autumn.

Bet you all thought Raven’s Singularity was just going to be “another” time-travelling shooter, didn’t you?

Not so. The nuclearafied Cold War FPS allows you to control the age of objects, not the flow of time.

We know because we asked. See:

VG247: The whole “time-control” mechanic is pretty well-worn now. How will Singularity freshen it up?

Jon Zuk, Singularity creative director: Using the Time Manipulation Device or TMD, the player can control the age of objects but not time itself. Many objects can be manipulated and these changes in age are permanent in most cases. When an object is changed in time, it can shift between the current day state and a state as it existed some 60 years in the past, when an accident occurred on the island. The TMD is an amazing piece of equipment, developed far, far ahead of its time. It uses E-99 as a power source, enabling you to effectively change the time-state of different objects, and beings, on Katorga-12. You can use the TMD on objects like ammo crates, gas-filled barrels and electrical equipment, for starters. Aging and renewing things like chains or even concrete supports can let loose heavy or explosive objects to fall on unsuspecting enemies. The TMD also has a Time Stasis feature that allows you to grab items and sustain them in time. A practical and rewarding use of the Time Stasis is grabbing enemy grenades and throwing them back at them – the stasis field nullifies the grenade’s timer so it won’t explode while you’re holding it.

Sound puzzlery.

Singularity is set on a Soviet island after a nuclear experiment goes wrong.

The game’s one of three new IPs Activision’s releasing this year, the other two being Radical’s Prototype and Bizarre racer Blur.

Watch for more from E3.