GamersInfo.net: In a genre that already boasts games like Splinter Cell or Thief, how do you think Stolen will differentiate itself from the crowd?

Jaid Mindang: Stolen distinguishes itself by the absence of lethality in dealing with the enemies. You can destroy the drones, but you can't kill any guards, only incapacitate them or knock them out temporarily. A large portion of the player's abilities are geared around avoiding detection and actively evading capture, as such being able to permanently remove guards from the picture would unbalance the gameplay by removing the need for much of what Stolen is about. Anya can choke guards and render them unconscious, stun them with a taser, or punch them out, but they will eventually regain consciousness. Once spotted, if you allow the guards to radio for backup, the whole level will be put on alert by the guard booth and every guard will be automatically put on the lookout for you, using their torches. This means that hiding in the shadows will not be enough, and bearing in mind that they all carry firearms. Mind you, if you can take them out before they can get to their radio, then they can't raise the alarm until the recover. Being spotted by a guard doesn't automatically alert all the others - they don't operate as a collective consciousness. Guards will also persistently pursue you from room to room until they either catch or kill you, or lose the scent. They're not stuck rigidly to their patrol routes or to specific rooms. The gameplay in Stolen is skewed quite differently to other titles in the stealth/action genre, where you can quickly recover from a botched attempt at stealth by shooting the guard in the head.

GamersInfo.net: It can be seen that a lot of effort has gone into creating Anya Romanov. How important do you feel the main character is to a game of this nature?

Jaid Mindang: The importance of the character can't really be underplayed, especially in a 3rd person view game where you spend much of the experience looking at the character, as well as controlling their actions. Provided that you're aware of your target market, and the marketing effort concurs with that analysis, it shouldn't be too difficult to get it right, in theory. In practice, we spent many many months and untold reams of concept art in order to finally get to a character design we could all believe in. It's far more committee driven than people imagine.

GamersInfo.net: Point of view can be a very hot topic in this genre. What factors went into the decision to go with 3rd person point of view?

Jaid Mindang: For this genre, when the player characters positioning within shadows is a gameplay critical feature. we couldn't easily have imagined it any other way. How well concealed you are is a variable factor, whether or not you have a foot or a shoulder poking out from the shadows affects your visibility to enemy guards in Stolen. 1st person view would have made that aspect of the game very woolly indeed. if not impossible to resolve.

GamersInfo.net: There has been very little detail on the types of gadgets Anya will employ, besides the fact that she will have an array of high tech gadgets. Could you go into a little more detail on one specific item that is especially dear to you?

Jaid Mindang: The most original gadget is Anya's sonic visor view. It's like a passive sonar imaging system which works on doors and allows Anya to see through into adjacent rooms using only sound. Anything that makes a noise becomes visible by the sound waves emanating from it. Anything silent is invisible. It's not infallable, since guards can be totally motionless and silent, however, unless they're expecting trouble they usually make their presence known somehow. We were inspired by the scenes in the Daredevil movie where the viewer can "see" what DD is hearing.

GamersInfo.net: Lock picking has been attempted in many ways by a wealth of different games. What do you have in mind for lock picking in Stolen?

Jaid Mindang: It's a simple interface, as with all of the "gadget games" in Stolen. The premise for them all was that they occur in realtime, with the game world continuing to operate around you as you perform the "gadget games". The interface is provided by Anya's "ArmPad", rather than by peering directly into the lock, so although it's still a case of matching individual picks to barrel pins, it's slightly abstracted. Electronically locked doors can only be opened by hacking the local network or even causing a power outage by various means. The gadget games were intended to be quick to learn but hard to master. The main issue is the fact that they will all happen under some kind of duress. a time constraint imposed by a patrolling guard or a temporarily disabled security system. Only half the screen is used and the player has to keep peering over their shoulder in the other half, to make sure the guard hasn't come back early. These small windows of opportunity often make it a very nervous experience.

GamersInfo.net: One aspect of stealth games that folks often talk about is the ability to just blast your way through. What is your stance on this? Will it be possible to make it through Stolen guns a blazing' or will you be forced to play the covert role?

Jaid Mindang: Well this is precisely the reason we've taken the non-lethal approach with Stolen. Having invested so much time and effort in creating more than the normal number of stealth/evasion options in Stolen, we felt that to allow the player to just shoot their way through the game would be farcical. As it happens, because guards can only be knocked out, this means that even a successful confrontation with an enemy will mean that the guard in question will eventually come round in a minute or so and raise the alarm. So this solution reinforces the need to avoid confrontations without actually barring the player from playing in a confrontational way if they so choose. There will always be players who just want to shoot enemies for the sheer gratification of it, and we like playing those games too, but Stolen is an alternative to that type of play. There are already plenty of games in the genre that allow you to shoot your way through, as you've pointed out.

GamersInfo.net: How open ended will the game-play be? Obviously, you will have your objectives in each mission, but will there be multiple paths to reaching those goals or will it be quite linear?

Jaid Mindang: In terms of map layout, there is a certain degree of necessary linearity, however, the balance of the game is such that a large portion of intrigue and challenge will be provided by the enemy A.I. As such, there are many different strategies you can use with these guys and testing their limitations will be a large part of the fun in itself. Especially since they can't be removed from play, you can keep going back to goad them some more, if you're that way inclined. If you've got the nerve, you can pickpocket a guard's wallet right out of his back pocket while he's walking his patrol route.

GamersInfo.net: What types of environments will Stolen feature? Can you walk us through one of your favorites?

Jaid Mindang: I'm probably in the minority here, but I still like the Museum level, which is the first. It's the truest to the original premise that inspired the game: a theif alone in a big marble museum, trying to steal a priceless artefact. That was what we were trying to make a game of years back. The plot carries the field of play to environments such as a partially rejeuvenated Prison complex.. half derelict and Victorian, half computer controlled and modern. There is also a high-tech electronics company corporate HQ, and mountain-top communications relay station.

GamersInfo.net: Could you expand on the story behind Stolen and where it will be headed in the game?

Jaid Mindang: In a nutshell, Anya and her business partner are hired for a Museum job. As the mission is underway, she becomes suspicious of the real intent behind the mission. There is a hotly contested Mayoral election campaign being fought by 2 candidates in the meantime, and she quickly becomes dragged unwittingly into the dirty tactics of one of those candidates. That's all I'm telling you.

GamersInfo.net: One concern for PC gamers on any game being developed for all major platforms is the concessions to simplicity that people often blame on this. How different will Stolen be on the PC as compared to the Xbox, Game Cube or Playstation?

Jaid Mindang: Unfortunately there will be little difference between them apart from the resolution and the fact that PC and Xbox version have bump mapping enabled. The differences are cosmetic. That said, it's not a no-brainer game in the first place.

GamersInfo.net: Your website boasts "deadly AI". Can you give us some examples of what that AI is capable of?

Jaid Mindang: Well the enemies will not be rigidly stuck to their patrol routes. They will respond to suspicious noises or partial sightings sometimes radioing these suspicions in to the guard booth, which puts all the enemies in the level on alert simultaneously. They have individual short term memorie, too.. so if you start messing with a guard's mind, creating several suspicious events in close succession, even if the guard hasn't actually seen you, he will become alarmed and assume that there is an intruder, reacting appropriately. You can just needle our guards indefinitely without getting some kind of unwanted attention in return. All guards carry both lethal firearms and flashlights. So not only can they shoot Anya on sight, at range, they can also see her in shadows if they have reason to suspect she is hiding in the dark. They can also team up with each other and will modify their search patterns in doing so to search a room quicker. If they have a positive sighting, they can also give chase and will run through doors from room to room, leaving their original patrol path far behind if necessary. As mentioned before, a successful confrontation with a guard may leave him unconscious for a while, but he will eventually recover and be hopping mad. One a call out is made, the guard booth can put all guards everywhere in a level on alert so that they will start searching all the dark corners with their flashlights and their guns drawn. That can make things very uncomfortable indeed for the player.

GamersInfo.net: Great music can really bring a game together. What type of music will we hear in Stolen?

Jaid Mindang: The music in-game serves a functional purpose beyond being aesthetically pleasing. The music and it's pace reflect the alert status of the level, meaning that if guards are alerted, the tempo increases and the player is reminded of a sense of urgency. In it's default state, it's actually qute minimal, since the player is required to listen out for various audio clues as to the whereabouts of hazards and security systems. CCTV cameras buzz faintly when they're moving, and guards may mutter to themselves or whistle when they're relaxing. You can't afford to miss these things.

GamersInfo.net: One thing I really enjoyed about Thief was the feeling that I was playing in a real world. What will Stolen do to create that ever-important suspension of disbelief?

Jaid Mindang: Stolen has quite a realistic style to it. That was as much a consequence of needing to stay in step with a fairly realistic lighting engine. But apart from that, we've shyed away from too many "game-ey" conventions in order to keep it that way. Up until quite recently, the jury was out on whether or not to keep the "emoticons" on the guards' heads that acted as a barometer to their states of mind, but it looked a but cartoony so we dropped it in the end. The biggest contribution to the suspension of disbelief will hopefully be the tension in the game. Stolen doesn't afford the player too many places where they can relax and let their guard down.