Sharky Extreme : You can win in SlaveMaster either by frag limit or Slave limit. How do these options change the way you'd play?

Randy Davis : Back when we were first focusing on SlaveMaster, we were worried that the idea was too crazy and would spook away people who are used to mutators, which usually provide a slight alteration to gameplay. Slave limit was the primary way to play, but we added frag limit as a sort of ‘SlaveMaster Lite’, for people that just wanted to play DeathMatch with a twist. As such, SlaveMaster with a frag limit is played pretty much like DeathMatch, except that there is more pain associated with dying, because you have to get free before you can start getting your frag count up again. The difference in play for me is that in DeathMatch, if I’m feeling good I’ll go around attacking people when I have 2 health, but in SlaveMaster I’ll make sure I have a better chance. Slave limit games are interesting because there are real tactics that go along with it. On our website I made a game guide to describe the method I use to try to win. This guide currently needs to be updated for the new beta, but it still works. The gist of it is that you need to be aggressive at the right times (when you have no slaves), and know how to earn favor without letting your master win (for instance by getting them ammo which is useless to them. When suggesting this I always envision the mad scientist with the incompetent assistant who always fetches his master the wrong items from the lab.

Sharky Extreme : What kind of feedback have you been getting from gamers who have played SlaveMaster? Has the overall response been positive?

Randy Davis : We’ve gotten a lot of e-mail from people telling us they enjoy the game, and many people who send in bug reports, which is always super helpful because there are many things we just don’t find (like bad interactions with other mutators, different HUD settings, etc.) One of the biggest feedback issues we’ve gotten is that people want to play online but can’t find any servers. We are continuously in the process of trying to get more server up time so people can do this. The response has been overwhelmingly positive, which we are very happy about. Some people are a little too into it, and their feedback frightens us. We probably won’t be revealing our home addresses anytime soon.

Sharky Extreme : You're also working on Team SlaveMaster, which sounds like a lot of fun! How would a team version of this mod work?

Randy Davis : For the team version, we must revisit a lot of the same problems we had before. Favor is no longer so cut and dry, because anything you do to help your master screws over your own team. We are thinking hard about what a slave’s role will be to make everything work together. One aspect we really want to bring to the game is the same thing that happened in gym class ­ when one player had gotten a lot of other people out, everybody on the benches would start calling for his blood. I look forward to being able to hunt down the player on the opposite team that owns a lot of my teammates.

A couple things we do know ­ all 4 teams will be supported, you will be able to use soul flares on the team that owns you so that your team can hunt them. Our first-pass play-testing has shown that games go fairly quick, since once one team starts to win, they can control the resources and finish it off. We think because of this we will make it easier for a slave to become free and help his own team.