This week on the podcast, I sat down with co-founder of Mohawk Games Soren Johnson to discuss his time in the Game Industry and his latest project Offworld Trading Company.
We began with talking about Soren’s previous work on Civilization, at Stardock Games and more which led into a talk on how Soren’s design philosophy when it came to the strategy genre has changed from each of his previous studios and games. This led to a varied discussion on strategy game design including the balancing act of transparency vs. creating a pure simulation title like Crusader Kings 2. I also asked his thoughts on how the strategy genre has changed over the last decade since working on Civ 4.
Our final topic was focusing on Offworld Trading Company itself — The design of it, gameplay and I talked about some of the concerns I mentioned in my spotlight. I also asked Soren about his thoughts on Early Access as Offworld is his first experience with the new model.
One thing about the recording, Soren was doing the cast while being away from his computer and I picked up a lot of background noise that I wasn’t able to completely edit out.
- Here is my spotlight of Offworld Trading Company where I talked more about the game design and my thoughts of it
- For more from Soren and about Offworld, here is the store page for Offworld Trading Company and the Mohawk Games site
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