Afterfall Interview

RPG Codex was able to corner Intoxicate Interactive’s Maciej Prósiński for a lengthy interview about their upcoming post-apocalyptic CRPG, Afterfall.

Mutations seem to have both good and bad effects on your character. Is there any way to get rid of them once you got one, maybe by a cure or by an operation?

It is difficult, but in some cases possible. The first degree mutations which you cannot hide with clothes or otherwise, you will be able to amputate. Such procedures, however, will not only be expensive, but also will virtually always bring harmful and irreversible consequences. For example, a growth on the cheek after being surgically removed will leave a nasty scar, which will cause negative modification of the responses from newly met characters.

How will mutations and implants influence the NPC’s reactions towards you?

Basically, implants in Afterfall are only am extrapolation of today’s trends and technology, a simple consequence of prosthetics and later cyber-prosthetics. Many of the implants are no more invasive than the ones currently used (limb prosthetics, false teeth, breast implants, pacemakers, artificial cornea or eye lens, or internal hearing aids), but nevertheless, among the population of the Afterfall world the users of such devices may encounter mistrust, or even aversion and aggression. People do not have their views written on their foreheads, and you never know in whom and when the dislike of augmented people will outweigh the hero’s good opinion. At the same time, the greater the degree of cyborgization, the less human the character appears to his interlocutors, even if they hold no grudge against cyborgs.

Mutations, in turn, especially not hidden or inconcealable, can make the character an outcast in many locations. They will force him to prove his worth to everyone, or to intimidate them to get his way. There are of course NPCs who are used to mutations and unbiased, as well as those who will remain intolerant whatever you do. The other side of the coin is mutant solidarity societies of mutants that subscribe to this principle will always give another mutant an advance of trust, and possibly food and shelter. Fortunately, you can hide most mutations and live normally.

To sum up, both mutations and implants can be the key to otherwise unattainable super-human abilities, but also the source of many greater and lesser problems. Their advantages are enormous and incomparable with anything else. the same as their drawbacks. Implants in some way destabilize the game. Mutations are like playing Russian roulette or walking on a swamp there is no balanced development here. Combining implants and mutations is even more hardcore.