ZAM speaks to Carbine's Lead Narrative Designer

Turning to the story of a specific race, the Cassians, I asked about the imperious, self-aggrandizing society of pompous bounders (I feel a deep affinity for them) and their view of the humans who now form a part of The Exiles. Chad explained the reason for the split and how the perception of the rebel offshoot was less than positive among “true” Cassians.

“They were once part of the empire, but as it grew in strength and prestige, they enacted a number of policies that, well let’s just call them unpopular among a certain section of society on Cassus. So a number of humans decided they’d had enough and chose to rebel and started a civil war. They were eventually driven off their home world by the empire.

There’s a strong underlying conflict between the Exiles and the Cassians, a philosophical conflict where the Cassians view these rebels as vermin who despise and rejected the destiny set forth by the Eldan; which is so central to their being they can’t possibly imagine what would inspire someone to reject that. There’s no love lost at all between The Exiles and the Cassians.”

Being an Englishman and having grown up studying the checkered history of my country’s own empire, I mentioned to Chad how easy it is to slip into that mentality and understand the concepts behind Cassian motivations (as disturbing as that might be).

 “Not to talk specifically about your history as an individual, but those are the reasons we made for taking those choices for stories and personalities is because we want them to resonate with certain demographics and players. A powerful empire, a storied history, a sense of honor and nobility, political machinations; all those things from a story perspective resonate with a lot of people.”

I also put to Chad that my American wife would attest to the fact that people just find English accents cool. While laughing (and not for the first time, Moore is a very personable and jovial interviewee) he agreed that giving the Cassians that voice added extra to their flavor:

“The comments on the boards have been really great, as soon as you give a villain a British accent they become twice as evil and twice as cool. I guess we made the right choice with that one.”

Feeling doubly evil and cool I inquired about The Dominion and its interaction with the Protostar Corporation. I asked if the Protostar would see The Dominion for its singularly important characteristic: wealth.

“One of the endearing qualities of Protostar is it doesn’t get involved in political discussions. For it, if you’ve got the money to buy its product it considers you a friend whether you’re a Dominion citizen or one of The Exiles.

You’ll get to interact with Protostar throughout the game and it has its own unique personality as you will have seen in the video and that personality gets reflected throughout the game."

I asked Chad if there were any rivals to Protostar’s economic dominance.

“It is one of the most successful intergalactic corporations in the history of the galaxy, in terms of scale and exposure; it certainly has no competitors who approach it.

Be on the lookout for more information about Protostar as we get closer to launch.”

Returning to the personality of the Cassians, I asked Chad how the arrival of the markedly more advanced Mechari challenged the inhabitants of Cassus’ perceptions of their place in the universe. Moore saw the Mechari’s message that the Cassians were chosen to help form a new empire as the key to the whole situation.

“Any fear that they had probably soon transformed into pride, “Yes, you’re right! We are worthy!” This, as we mentioned before, amplifies those personality qualities that you see in the game. For us that’s the reason why the Cassians are the way they are, for them having been chosen from all the races in the galaxy to do this thing, they believe it sets them apart.”

I asked about the hierarchical infrastructure of the Dominion and the Cassian’s place within it. Moore revealed some particularly fascinating details that expand the mythos of the race.

“There are parts of The Dominion that are reserved for what we would consider the nobility, we haven’t really talked about it but there’s a religion within The Dominion and those roles are mainly occupied by the Cassians. Each race has the things they care about and the Cassians have their pomp and circumstance and the other races attitude is “So be it."

We haven’t talked much about it but we have the Luminai who are the Human/Eldan hybrids, such as the first emperor of The Dominion [Dominus] and there’s a whole structure around the descendants of the first emperor and what role they play.”

Perhaps some Da Vinci Code-style skullduggery ahead for fans of The Dominion?

To end our interview (the first part of it anyway),  I asked Chad to comment on the Luminai as an example of the overall approach to story in WildStar, as it seems it hinted at layers of intrigue beneath the surface.

“It fits into our overall philosophy that for those people who just want to get in and play we’ll make it simple to understand, but for those who want to get a level deeper, you’ll get all the complexity of story, the lore of any well-realized science fiction universe. I think people are going to enjoy it.”

Keep your browser locked onto ZAM for the next parts of my interview with Chad Moore very soon and for plenty more WildStar coverage.

Scott "Jarimor" Hawkes, Editor in Chief