One of the best parts of Ghost of Yotei‘s recently added free multiplayer co-op mode, Legends, is the ability to play the coin-flicking Zeni Hajiki game against a friend. However, the devs at Sucker Punch needed to create a new set of rules for competitive PvP-focused coin-flicking. Thankfully, Yotei‘s collector’s edition included everything they needed for prototyping.
Sucker Punch senior staff designer and Legends lead Darren Bridges told Kotaku that while the studio had always planned to add the multiplayer co-op mode to the open-world PS5 exclusive RPG, fan response to the coin-flicking game helped convince the team it was worth including in the mode’s lobby, where players chill out between missions.
“PvP Zeni Hajiki was always an idea we were interested in,” Bridges told Kotaku. “But based on the fan response after the game launched, we knew it was a good investment. There was also strong advocacy within the studio – we did our PvP rule playtesting using real coins on a real table!”
When I asked why the team decided to prototype online Zeni Hajiki using real coins on a real table, Bridges explained that the team is always looking for the “absolute fastest way” to figure out if an idea works or not.
“Generally, this means creating simple, unpolished content to test it out in-game,” explained Bridges. “But Zeni Hajiki is one of the few examples where we could try out new rules without writing a single line of code!”
And funnily enough, they didn’t even need to make the coins or anything like that. Instead, Yotei‘s Collector’s Edition offered a fast and already available option.
“Ghost of Yotei’s Collector’s Edition includes a bag of coins that are made for playing the game, so it was probably the most efficient prototyping experience in the company’s history,” said Bridges.
No fighting in the lobby, okay?
All this talk of PVP elements in the lobby of Yotei’s online mode, where you can compete in bamboo chopping as well as play a few rounds of Zeni Hajiki, got me thinking about another PvP feature I wanted: The ability to fight my brother one-on-one in a duel. The two of us work great together, but we can also be very competitive, and we both wanted to fight each other after a few missions.
Sadly for my brother and me and our dreams of seeing who is the better online samurai warrior, Bridges told Kotaku that Ghost of Yotei’s combat system is built “specifically for PvE,” so co-op was the natural and only real option for Legends.
But maybe something like that will be added in a future, not-yet-announced sequel featuring an expanded lobby? The online mode of Yotei‘s predecessor Ghost of Tsushima, also titled Legends, didn’t include a lobby with side activities. The impulse to add the lobby in Yotei‘s version of the mode came from the studio’s experience watching players engage with Tsushima’s multiplayer. The studio learned that playing co-op games like this with friends always includes “downtime.” So the lobby was created to offer people more to do between missions beyond tweaking gear and loadouts.
Sony and Sucker Punch declined to talk about multiplayer modes being a part of future games from the studio.
Making an online game and a single-player RPG at the same time
When I asked Bridges if the plan was always to add a multiplayer mode to Yotei as Sucker Punch had with Tsushima, the developer confirmed that indeed it was.
“Yes, we started very early in the development of Ghost of Yotei,” said Bridges. “Ghost of Tsushima: Legends was our first real online co-op project as a studio, and the fan response was very positive, so we wanted to do it again! Ghost of Yotei brought new opportunities for Legends adaptation, including the new weapon systems and massive monstrous versions of the Yōtei Six.”
Balancing that seemed tricky to me, but Sucker Punch had a system that sounds simple and logical. According to Bridges, a smaller core team of devs worked on Legends early on while Yotei was in full development. As team members finished up their work on the main game, they’d shift over to Legends to help get it completed. And Bridges tells me that there was never a plan to charge money for this update.
“Just like with Ghost of Tsushima, we were happy to offer Legends as a free DLC for all Ghost of Yotei owners, with no microtransactions,” said Bridges.
A break from realism
Another bonus of this system was that as devs finished up work on Yotei and shifted to Legends and its mythologically inspired setting, they got to work on more fantastical locations, powers, and enemies.
“We all love the beauty in the grounded world of Yotei, but it’s creatively refreshing for the designers and artists to tackle the Legends locations and characters,” explained Bridges. “The fantastical setting provides a great foundation for building co-op-focused mechanics, and enemies that are worthy challenges for multiple players.”
For my last question, I asked Bridges about Sucker Punch’s history of updating and expanding on its games. We saw it with Infamous: Festival of Blood, Infamous 2′s user-created mission feature, the standalone spin-off Infamous: First Light, and now two different online co-op modes added to its recent samurai games. According to Bridges, every game is different, but Sucker Punch always tries to “find an approach” for developing and supporting a game that works with the studio.
“When we started building Ghost of Tsushima a decade ago,” said Bridges, “we knew we wanted to include cooperative content. Fighting side by side with your friends is a natural fit for the core fantasy of being a samurai. Developing Legends allowed us to expand our skillset as a studio, and to offer players a fantastical cooperative experience as a complement to Atsu’s journey in the single-player campaign.”