“Believable and consistent up close”: What the dinosaurs of The Lost Wild share with Microsoft’s cancelled Everwild, according to the designer who worked on both
Game designer Gary Napper, former design director at Rare and best known for his work on Alien: Isolation, is reflecting on the design challenges of creating believable creature AI across multiple projects. Napper is currently working on The Lost Wild, an upcoming dinosaur survival game, and has discussed what it shares with Everwild, Rare’s cancelled nature fable that was shelved by Microsoft during a round of Xbox cuts last summer.
According to Napper, the dinosaurs in The Lost Wild and the creatures in Everwild share a design philosophy centered on creating creatures that are “believable and consistent up close.” Interestingly, Napper notes that designing the Xenomorph in Alien: Isolation (developed by Creative Assembly and published by Sega) was in some ways an “easier design challenge” than both Everwild and The Lost Wild.
The article suggests this difference stems from the distinct requirements of different game genres. Creating a singular, focused AI antagonist for a horror experience appears to present different design challenges than developing multiple convincing creature behaviors for survival or nature-focused games. Napper’s insights offer a rare behind-the-scenes look at how experienced designers approach the complex task of implementing believable non-player character behavior across different game types and design philosophies.