Exclusive Developer Interview with Grounded 2 Devs
The newly inducted Marcus Morgan and Chris Parker were eager to share details about Grounded 2, which is currently in early access. They discussed the secret sauce that enabled Obsidian to release Grounded 2, Avowed, and The Outer Worlds, all within the same year. Here’s a hint: Eidos Montreal helped.
Among the topics discussed were the lessons learned from the original Grounded and the new buggies and mount systems that allow traversal to previously inaccessible areas. Topics also included co-op/multiplayer, the shared world system, and the collaboration with Undead Labs, who helped due to their experience on State of Decay.
The devs also explained that Grounded 2 was built using Unreal Engine 5, which was much better at streaming assets. This should inherently decrease the lag in co-op and shared worlds, at least during testing. The original Grounded was built on Unreal Engine 4. It bears mentioning that the game is in early access, and the devs hope to learn to optimize it during this time.
We also learned that the size of the map is three times larger than the original Grounded. This time, it includes the whole backyard.
Among the more interesting topics discussed was that there are still no microtransactions in Grounded 2. There, however, was mention of a Founder’s Pack, which is free for participating in the early access and grants the player cosmetics.
You can find the full Iron Lords Podcast interview down below:
Context on the Original Grounded
The original Grounded is a survival action game where players are shrunk down to the size of an ant. Grounded was released into Game Pass and sold 2 million copies on Steam. It has an 83 on Metacritic. Players can choose to play in first or third person. Players can also choose to play in a multiplayer mode that allows up to four players to play together. It is filled with large insects and spiders, which have realistic behaviors.
Author Credit: Soiltek (Aka Mo)
