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If you’ve been playing the Outriders demo ahead of the shooter’s launch you might have noticed its reliance on using cutscenes to transition between areas. According to its developer, People Can Fly, these are required for the game’s multiplayer to function seamlessly.
Eurogamer reached out to People Can Fly after noticing that the demo featured numerous instances of cutscenes for small transitions that would otherwise be an in-game animation. People Can Fly’s creative director Bartek Kmita explained that the decision was made to use cutscenes so that other players in your party have context for what transition is taking place.
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Now Playing: Outriders First 28 Minutes of PS5 Gameplay
“It started quite pragmatic, because we needed a system that would help us teleport the players and stream some other content to start to load the other arena,” Kmita explained. “A good example is opening the door. That was only because people in playtests said, ‘Oh, where am I? Why was I teleported?’ So, we needed to have these cutscenes. We couldn’t have done it so manually you can go through the doors, because we have a multiplayer game that opens different problems for us.”
Outriders doesn’t use dedicated servers to power its co-operative gameplay, so People Can Fly can’t rely on that architecture to support players transitioning and exploring different areas of the map at the same time. This means it requires these transitions to group everyone back up again, with Kmita explaining that it’s unlikely to change.
“I would like to have the door opening animation for two seconds, but still playing together with my friends, than just breaking apart through transmission,” Kmita continued. “So we chose this solution. We understand it’s not the best.”
The system is especially jarring when playing solo, which People Can Fly has advertised heavily as a viable option for Outriders. These transitions don’t disappear despite a lot of their purpose not being required, which makes the game feel old when compared to how many modern titles handle these asset loads.
Outriders launches on Xbox One, PS4, and PC on April 1.
