MultiVersus’ open beta showed that Player First Games had the makings of a hit on their hands but a lack of content really killed the hype. With the game’s full release, director Tony Huynh still has big dreams for what it can achieve, though reliability for players is key.
Ahead of the game’s May 28 release, Huynh spoke with VGC during a preview event to discuss how MultiVersus had evolved after another year of heads-down development And, instead of simply focusing on the good, the PFG co-founder was very candid about the mistakes of the past and how his team learned from them for this re-launch.
“At the end of the day, we want to deliver the game that players deserve, and so we really looked at all of our learning and developed the product that you see before you now,” Huynh explained to VGC this week.
For Huynh and the team, reliably giving players a quality experience they can come back to and enjoy is the number one priority. They re-engineered several gameplay elements to improve how it feels to play and spent a lot of time enhancing MultiVersus’ netcode to ensure everyone had the best chance to experience the game at its best. This also included reworking characters and ensuring there was more for players to do with them—enter the Rift.
“That’s why we introduced our PVE mode, Rifts, so that players can get that experience. The interactions between the different characters, that’s what the magic of our game is in a lot of ways, so being able to deliver something for those players,” Huynh said. “And then allowing [Rifts] to be co-operative as well, but with our new netcode so that everyone just plays together seamlessly online, and experiences the game together, and also being able to deliver all these cool mini-games and really fun experiences, and all the events.”
But beyond the gameplay, Huynh also acknowledged a major failing of the MultiVersus beta was the content pipeline, which saw new updates slow to a halt in Season Two; only one new character was added and the player count dropped every week. Because PFG was a small team working with such massive expectations even in the beta, things fell apart, but now the studio feels ready to deliver on its promises.
Huynh noted giving players a “precise and great experience from a content delivery perspective” is something that was core to this revamped version of MultiVersus. That philosophy trickles down from a clearly communicated timeline of delivering new content post-launch to easier ways to unlock anything in the game thanks to Gleamium, the premium currency, now being earnable without paying.
“We’re now able to make this the type of content and the game, honestly, that the players deserve, and that was the biggest learning: ‘We need to do this in order to deliver the game that players deserve, so how do we deliver the original vision of what we had?’” Huynh said.
But with that plan, how do new characters fit in? Well, Huynh and the team aren’t with just adding anyone. Like with Jason, which has a special spot in the team’s heart, or the inclusion of a Banana Guard, the goal is “surprise and delight” with a diverse cast—and Huynh is still dreaming big about future additions beyond Agent Smith from The Matrix.
Many MultiVersus fans want to see the game go full Super Smash Bros. and bring in third-party characters to the roster. And, while PFG is aware of the interest, the licensing and legal work isn’t something they manage. But there is hope because “the dream” for this team is to make those crossovers happen.
“So again, there are difficulties here that I don’t think players would believe, but I will say that logistics and building an IP relationship is also one of those things,” Huynh said. “I’ve been on both sides of it, on the IP holder side of it and now with MultiVersus using the IP. And your IP and your characters are your babies, so we want to make sure that everybody’s comfortable with that, and with us taking that on. That requires a special kind of relationship and that takes time to build up, on top of the logistical side of things. So I will say, I’m going to work hard to make that happen. But at the end of the day, there’s no promises there. It is a difficult process. But yeah, know that I’m personally working hard on it to make that a reality.”
