PotBS lead designer on pirate appeal and MMOs branching out

While some people are busy playing follow the leader, others are blazing their own trail. That’s what Flying Lab Software appears to be doing with Pirates of the Burning Sea, and it has something to do with branching out toward other genres – like pirates, for instance. Let PotBS lead designer Kevin Maginn tell you all about it after the jump.

There a certain mystique about the buccaneers of the Age of Exploration that’s hard to pin down. According to Pirates of the Burning Sea lead designer Kevin Maginn, the appeal of the pirate genre is one of the reasons why Flying Lab Software decided to carve out its own niche instead of playing follow-the-leader with World of Warcraft.

When quizzed as to why Flying Lab Software deviated from the tried and tested fantasy genre, Maginn responded by citing two reasons: one, the company believed that players were looking for a wider variety of game styles; two the pirate genre appeared to be a ideal but underserved genre.

Maginn explained the particular appeal of the pirate genre this way:

Partially, it’s the idealized romanticism of the pirate era. Pirates, it seems to the modern observer, lived in a time of adventure and freedom. The truth is, of course, much grittier (not to mention smellier), but that mythology of fortune and infamy persists. I consider pirates to be one of the great iconic pulp-adventure themes, right up there with Westerns and noir.

On the other hand, I think it’s also a cultural meme, endlessly elaborated upon by fans arguing the merits of pirates vs. ninjas, pirates vs. zombies, and pirates vs. robots. I’m not ashamed to ride the coattails of that zeitgeist.

Flying Lab Software isn’t the only company taking risks, however. Maginn said that more developers and publishers are branching out into their own respective genres. Even within the fantasy genre itself, people are coming up with new approaches, systems and ideas that are putting a new spin on an old story.

Those weren’t the only things that Maginn talked about, though. If you’d like more information on what he had to say regarding the PotBS subscription model, patches and new content, let the source link below take you back to the full interview.