Survival-oriented games seem to be more popular each year. Video game enthusiasts have poured thousands of hours into Minecraft, Rust, The Forest, Subnautica, Valheim, and many more. Indie game developers have tackled the genre's popular mechanics from all angles, yet new titles continue cropping up and garnering the attention of millions. Another such project that hopes to stand out with its Early Access launch later this year is Frozen Flame.
Game Rant spoke to Dreamside Interactive founder Serge Korolev about Frozen Flame's development history, major events leading up to a planned Early Access release, and how the game's survival-RPG mechanics will differ from the pack. Interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Q: How did you get started working in games?
A: I've been making games for about 15 years, my goal was to make PC games and Dreamside Interactive united people to do that, with the hope we can do it well. I started doing separate adventures for games that were popular at the moment like Half-Life, Warcraft, anything that can be modded had out attention. We tried to make great games, and after years a lot of new genres were formed. I think modding is a great thing, even today it has a lot of potential.
Then I was one of the first Unity 3D developers, I used it from a modded version before it became popular, and I was part of teams that created mobile RPGs, browser-based online RPGs with 3D graphics. It was something new at that moment. Also, I was part of the team that published Lineage 2 locally. I switched to producing and created two companies making social and mobile games, then I could finally reach my goal of creating PC and console games. It took a long time to get enough experience, and I hope it was worth it.
Q: So was Dreamside created with Frozen Flame in mind or were there other ideas you were toying with?
A: For several years before that I tried to create indie games by myself, and decided I couldn't make projects with enough quality alone. So I decided to invite people into something more united and create something bigger.
Frozen Flame started from an idea like Rust, those kinds of survival games, but with more narrative, lore, and assembling mechanics - not just subject to environment or PvP limits that lead to five minutes of gameplay. There were a lot of iterations to reach that goal, the first one was a purple ice valley where you could die from anything around. Then we understood we had selected a graphic style that wasn't creating high expectations from players. So, we switch it to balance more of the gameplay between survival and RPGs.
It was hard to merge the genres, but that's a positive in some aspects. We just made a lot of iterations - actually it was in development for about three-and-a-half years total. The first year, like a lot of indie developers, we spent time getting money outsourcing to big corporations.
For now, our team has grown to about 30 people, a lot more even in just the last half-year. It was not easy to invite those people because it wasn't just from our local country, but international also. We invited a lot of expertise to try and level-up our quality, and there were people from places like Blizzard and other companies who offered feedback.
Q: When did you guys get started?
A: I believe it was 2017, with prototyping. We ran around, making major elements like the Ice Citadel - the final target of the game. Survival elements, graphics style. We were actually impressed by Darksiders' stylization and decided to move in that direction. Later we found out that Dauntless also went that way, so now people say our game is like Fortnite or Dauntless, which I do think is good since there aren't many RPGs in that style.
Q: Your team advertises recognitions or awards going back to 2018, how long as Frozen Flame's development been public?
A: I believe first came streams or videos about the game published after about one-and-a-half years of prototypes - so 2018. We started showcasing it at conferences and indie shows. At first, we got feedback that it was too hard, people would die from everything. We were happy to get that feedback. We also started to do closed playtests to grow our community. Our first target was to understand what people like or expect. Even now, we continue to use that feedback to move forward.
Q: Now you're getting ready to launch in Early Access, right?
A: I believe it will be this fall. I thought it'd be a good window to publish the game because there are a lot of sci-fi games coming, and not many survival games that aren't also sci-fi. We got that comment after the PC Gaming Show that people were "sad" it wasn't sci-fi. It was a good joke.
Q: So, what took you so long to get to this stage?
A: I think it's the quality. This won't be Early Access like saying "hey let's publish this and continue working on it." We want to deliver really good quality without even minor bugs, good optimization, and enough content for several hours - maybe 20 or 30 - minimum. It should also be a restricted amount of content, maybe in episodes like Raft did. I believe that's a good way.
In our case there will be several biomes playable to completion, and then you wait for the next update that we hope will come out frequently. There are two modes: first one is campaign mode where you can get with your friends (up to 10 people) and play it like Valheim. Also, there's survival mode for people who like PvP and survival with more hardcore gameplay settings. It's more for experienced players, new ones will probably just die in the first 10 minutes.
First we tried a united experience, but later we decided let's restrict it because it's impossible to make one game mode for everyone. It's better to focus on the flavors people like. So, I hope it won't be like a usual Early Access, more like a mini-release where we'll just add more content each month, since we have a lot of stuff in storage already like mounts, new biomes. We just need time for balancing, testing.
Q: You talked about Frozen Flame's story, built around a world of dragons. I was wondering how you came about the idea and how it might differ from obvious comparisons people will make, like to Skyrim.
A: The whole thing started from the idea that there's an Ice Citadel and something happens with the world, there are dying dragons around, and we need to save it. Some dragons were cursed and some were not. At that time we're just returning to the world, we're resurrected pilgrims, but we're not heroes. Just people who should help.
Dragons here aren't like in Skyrim, it's rarer. They're the final target of the game. You can see some flying around and meet Chronos, your friend and spirit of an ancient dragon who can show you the path. But you feel that impact of the dragons. They're a last goal and prize.
We saw Quin69 on Twitch who expected a dragon within the first two hours. He spared the time to open a portal and said, "Hey there's a dragon!" but didn't get it. So we hope to make it clear for players that dragons are there in the final location, you should beat it to save the world. The dragons aren't bad, but cursed, and that's the reason things are bad.
Q: Does the game focus heavily on story or is it more about survival? Where do you find the balance?
A: We focused mostly on exploration; not on RPG or even survival elements, but exploration. We wanted to make a world that's interesting to explore and has a lot of secrets or puzzle pieces. You should unite them to understand what happened and what to do to change things.
The balance we found is that survival elements shouldn't be like in hardcore survival games with lots of bars and hunger. Survival here is more about gathering resources, building a house, crafting some awesome armor, enchanting your weapons, and preparing for battle. Also, the environment is really empty. Nights are cold and people are angry at night, trying to break your house and yourself. You should also cook food to restore your health, there are status effects like curse or poison you should drink a potion to restore. RPG and story here are more like in Zelda. We have a narrative and are using it to make the world feel alive, creating interest in the NPCs. Also, we're creating a lot of details through notes or environmental elements, and we hope people love it.
For now, we see people making sounds for our NPCs because they just make a few noises for emotions. We don't have a voice-over, and that's because we want to see how people imagine it in their head. We already have a lot of voice-overs from streamers and each one is unique, it's interesting.
Here's what's important in the story. The world is trying to kill you, so you need to survive and move forward. But when you go somewhere you need to prepare for that. So you make a base where you can restore your resources, become more powerful, prepare for battle, so on.
RPG elements are more about creating unique experiences. You can build your class in a flexible system, get Flames that are similar to the souls in Dark Souls from enemies or resources like cutting trees. Then you will get Frozen Flames, which are like energy that got sealed, and you can use it on resources to become more powerful. It's flexible to where you can make subclasses, and each ability will open new ways to play. For example, you can get a bigger boost of weapon damage, the ability to make a really high jump, etc. We hope the system will let players do what you want.
We've gotten feedback from people saying I want to be a rogue or a mage. We will adjust and move in that direction, help players extend themselves within the game.
Q: You mention exploration being key, but I also understand there's an element of procedural generation. How do those work together?
A: In the first few years we tried to make a fully procedural world, and it was a problem. Procedural worlds don't allow you to get the full experience. So, we decided to go the middle route with pieces of the world that can be in different places, so each player's experience will still be different. Some people might find a thing late in the game where others don't, and some places might not spawn. Imagine it like a deck of cards that mixes differently on each session, creating partially procedural worlds.
For campaign mode people will not even find out it's different, but in survival mode on each server the situation will be different. Like we just made the floating islands, but they generate a bit differently on each server, which I think is a good way to give a different experience to players.
Q: Your advertising also talks about custom servers, letting players adjust the elements themselves.
A: Yeah, I started as a modder like I said, and I hope we will allow players to make their own servers with custom options and local games. We want to give as many options as possible to make things different. If the game is too easy for you, you can up the challenge. Or, for example, you can open a server with creative mode and just build with resources.
Later, when the game is in a good stage, we also hope to add modding in order to extend the content, or add new game modes. We'll see how it goes.
Q: Building off something else you discussed, how wide will the options be for class differentiation, and how will that dovetail with cosmetics?
A: We have player and body customization, but we are not going too far like an MMO. It's not a big thing in our game, we believe players should represent themselves via equipment. For example, in the first few hours of the beta we have creatures named Bubbles that are like slimes with jellyfish hats. You have a chance to get one and use it like a helmet that shines when it's dark. It's really fun.
There are also cursed creatures that use wooden masks, you can kill one of them and use it, or you can craft it into armor. You don't have an armor shop, so even for the starting armor you have to explore. People like it, it's a good feeling when you finally get a good set of armor. We want to expand that going forward; more armor types, more weapon types, more equipment. Plus there are enchantments.
We also want to extend that character customization, but maybe not at the start when you're making your basic character. Later you'll find out there's like hair ink or something that can give you a unique color or shine. I believe it will give more emotions, the target is for players to present themselves.
Q: How much freedom and customization is there in the building/survival? How does it compare to other big games like Fortnite or Valheim?
A: It was simple like in Rust or ARK, but then Valheim came out and I can't hide it, we were really impressed. Its alpha happened the first year of our development, so we decided to make a different game - we didn't want to just make a clone. But still, we have respect for players' experience and want to give them quality they expect with more features.
So, we decided to rework our building system, and for now I believe it's able to create more things than in Valheim. You can build more complicated structures, freely on almost any surface. For example, you can build a house in a tree or even a floating house with special magic elements. We don't have physics like Valheim does, like falling trees. We're making a game with more players online and PvP, so it's harder to optimize in those situations. But we decided to focus more on magic mechanics, like I said you can make floating platforms.
And we want to push it forward with more mechanics that could be realized with magic. Even for aspects of gameplay, when you're building a base you can cook food immediately like in Zelda. But you can also find special resources around that you can bring back to your base and grow it for use later in things like health potions.
I hope players will feel that it's interesting and different. We don't want to just clone it, we want to make fun, innovative gameplay. In that respect I think we're more like Terraria maybe, we want to be like that since it's a good version of RPG and survival-crafting with a deep system that allows you to find new blueprints. Sometimes you can go around, kill bosses, put their heads on the wall. It's awesome.
Q: Have you had any trouble balancing the building with destructive survival aspects?
A: Lots of it really. Game balance is always a pain, and we're frequently trying to optimize it. It's not easy, especially when you're trying to make a mix of genres because different people will come. Some of them are coming from World of Warcraft, some from Genshin Impact or Valheim. Even Dark Souls. They have different expectations about difficulty, balance, goals, everything. We're just trying to find a golden middle here and focus it around exploring, as I said.
There was a big problem with the building on PvP servers, so we decided we'd make private zones. Some folks told us their homes were fully destroyed by PvP players who took everything, meaning new players didn't have a chance. Right now we're actually thinking about restricted PvP and griefing so it can be more optional. Maybe you make some zones where PvP is allowed, could be a flag system.
For the building system, right now we want to allow players to build their world in both campaign and survival mode. Not only your own base, but bridges, taverns, or arenas. Maybe you could build your own shop. More social elements, more fun, and a feeling you can make a new part of the world.
Q: Is that maybe the end goal for Frozen Flame? Making a more social, kind of MMO-like experience where people can come together and create worlds?
A: It's still not a MMO, and we don't want to make one. MMOs are games that are designed to be unending, we want campaigns that might be completed. Also, a game without those kinds of quests that are like "kill 100 boars." There are going to be some quests in Frozen Flame, like cooking a fish. We want to set goals, but not select the goals for players. There might be a quest on your screen like "reach a portal," but how you reach and open it is your own mission.
Social elements will be here like at high-level gameplay, after players are tired of everything they might want and become friendly to new players or build something together. We saw one stream where people were trying to build a giant bridge to some unavailable location in-game, and it was awesome. They were happy, but they didn't get anything for it, so we decided to add something there. Almost everywhere there's something you can find around. For example, there's a floating place you can reach after only a few hours of gameplay. Players see that place and want to be there, it seems like it's a good gameplay experience. A lot of things in the starting zone are more for education and tutorial, but some people will spend hours, others might spend just an hour to get to the next location. Depends on your experience.
Q: Speaking of player experience, I was hoping to ask how the reception to your Steam Next Fest demo was.
A: It was a really nice experience, especially with a publisher we didn't have before. Now we have PR that helped us get to the PC Gaming announcement. All of that finally gave some attention to the game, and we got a lot of feedback. We'd done festivals the previous year and didn't get a lot out of that, so we're really happy with the results. The game was in the top-10 most popular, and we got some big streams. It wasn't paid or anything like that, we just got to sit on Twitch each day, each hour and watch things to get feedback, connect with some streamers. It was really nice.
The most impressive thing to us was Quin69, who gave us a lot of interesting feedback. He played a lot of demos and spent over two hours on our game, even though everything else got less than an hour. But he did expect that boss at the end and didn't get it, so we decided we should add a boss in the next version to make people happy. Also, there was a stream from CohhCarnage who played with his son. It was so cute.
A lot of people from the USA, from Germany, from France... We didn't know what all of them were saying, but they were happy playing for three-to-five hours. Several people had a lot of viewers on Twitch or YouTube, and by the end of Steam Next Fest we had several-hundred streams, which converted to big feedback. For now, we're working hard to fix and improve the game, make it better.
One big thing about the game was bad optimization, and we know why it was like that. Before the demo someone broke a lot, but it will be a lot better in the next version. Second was about combat, we got a lot of feedback and are reworking it. Players expected something else, and we understand what they expect now, so with our animators we're polishing things and trying to make it of better quality. Then there were smaller notes about exploration, graphics, narrative. I hope through Early Access it will be a lot better.
For the demo we only showed the starting zone, but we already have the second biome. We didn't allow players to fly in the demo, or have a main boss, but we've already created them and it's playable for a close group in our Discord. We still have a lot to show players. A new demo will drop before Early Access, which we'll announce later.
Q: Do you think implementing any of this feedback will push the window you're expecting for release?
A: You know, actually we're talking about that now. We have a basic plan, and we're adding feedback on top of that because we believe the game should be as comfortable and interesting as it can. For example, we didn't expect to add more survival aspects and make it harder, but got feedback like "things aren't really trying to kill me." We want to be forgiving here, but still players expect it because it's a survival-RPG.
We also reduced the damage from falling. One player jumped from really high and barely took any damage, they asked "why not?" Okay, so there will be more damage from a fall. Then adding more activities, more balance, more emotions. I think over 50 percent of our current milestone plans were changed based off feedback, and that's a good thing because I really hope we'll increase the game quality.
Q: Is there anything else you want to add?
A: Currently, I think after Early Access it might take nine months to a year before a final release. We want to make it stable as possible, balance it and everything. But still, I hope it will be enjoyable as well. We want to make a really good game that will be replayable. Surprisingly, we've got a lot of families who are playing the game. Couples, or friends just play it together. It's not an MMO, but it has a lot of similar emotions. We're also looking to invite more international expertise here, they're really helping us.
So let's see how it goes, hopefully it will be the next big thing in the genre. A lot of players have said "Valheim 2?" Players have expectations, I hope they'll get it. We'll deliver it differently, not cloning Valheim, but still.
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Frozen Flame is currently in development for PC, with a Steam Early Access launch expected in fall 2022.